B.A. Kodandarama Setty has been a visionary, and, ever since he started managing Vivek & Co. he was determined to develop the business capitalizing on growing opportunities in durables trade. Economic liberalisation and growing consumerism brought several international brands into the Indian Market, and, seizing the opportunity he decided to move into a faster pace of growth. This necessitated corporatisation of the operations, and he registered Vivek Limited as a public limited company in 1994 and, with his two brothers, moved into a corporate office leaving the three showrooms to be managed by experienced loyal employees.

Viveks Group is credited with several pioneering initiatives. The most significant of these was the New Year Sale, a brainchild of Kodandaraman. Moved by the overwhelming patronage and loyalty of customers in Chennai, he decided that Viveks should do something unique for its customers. Sri B.A. Kodandarama Setty has been an icon in the Indian retail sector and has been playing a stellar role in activating the organized sector retailers into forming a Retailers’ Association to be able to take up common issues with the Government of India in a single voice. Sri B.A. Kodandarama Setty has built Viveks into a formidable brand which is now known across the country although operating only in the southern region. There can be no better tribute to the success achieved by Kodandaraman and his team than what McKinsey, the leading global consultancy firm, had to say in their report on Indian Retail, done for CII, in which they called Viveks as “a brand more trusted than the brands it sells”.