SASHA - Sarba Santhi Ayog, Kolkatta, India

About Us

More than a shop

Sasha is a not-for-profit marketing outlet for more than a hundred groups of craftspeople and producers from all over India.

At Sasha, producer groups are actively involved in the total marketing process - from the pricing of the product to the nature of the Sasha shop, and thus the role that Sasha will play in their lives. By establishing alternative trade practices and emphasizing group participation, Sasha encourages small producer groups to take the first step towards independence - the exploration of market possibilities within their own environment.

Initially, Sasha only exported craft to other nonprofit organizations, but eventually this complete dependence on overseas markets increased the producer group's vulnerability and reliance on Sasha. To address this problem Sasha opened a domestic retail outlet in Calcutta in October 1981.

Sasha is a network of over 150 producer groups involving about 7000 artisans and marginal producers – 80% of them women. It deals with a wide cross-section of handcrafted products, gourmet spices & teas and body care products.

In its journey of 25 years now, it has organized and promoted the informal sector of artisans in the global market place. The Sasha network is a live example of collective capabilities where survival efforts of scattered groups and communities have transformed into an alternative business model.

Fair Trade has played the catalytic role: Fair trade principles, practices and buyer networks opened the doors of perception, change, and market opportunities. Artisans & producers are more confident and have started moving from isolation to dependence to ‘interdependence’.

Sasha is strategically focusing on national market development that will promote ‘Fair Trade’ products and practices and aims to move up from the ‘niche’ market to a sizeable market share of functional and aesthetic craft products.

To match up the changing market dynamics and increased competition from other “Southern” countries, Sasha actively engages in enterprise development initiatives with producers for business development, scaling up, inputs on know-how, product development, skill and facility upgradation etc. that will lead to a better and more regular income.

Some of Sasha's values and targets are:

• Emphasize development rather than profits.
• Revive handicrafts and support artisans.
• Help producer groups to become economically viable.
• Assist groups through their formative stages by helping them set up systems and procedures.
• Develop inherent skills and diversify the product range through research, design and technical development workshops.
• Forge links with groups that produce similar products so that they may work together.