Giftabled - A Case Study

DISABILITY IN INDIA
Disability is defined as any physical or mental condition that limits a person’s movements,
activities or senses. The impairment can be cognitive, developmental, intellectual, mental
physical, sensory or a combination of these.
As per Census 2011, out of a population 121 Cr population, about 2.68 Cr people in our
country have some form of disability, which is 2.21% of the total population. Even though
disabled people constitute a significant percentage of the population, their needs for fulfilling
life and meaningful employment remain unmet. In spite of the implementation of the `Rights
of Persons with Disabilities' Act (2016), which reserves 4% of all categories of jobs in the
government sector for disabled persons, 74% of persons with physical disabilities and 94% of
persons with mental retardation sin the country still remain unemployed.
Refer to the exhibit 1 to see the distribution of disabled population of the country as per Census
2011.
Exhibit 1:

GIFTABLED – Working towards inclusion

Founded by Prarthana and Prateek Kaul in 2013, Giftabled is a Social Enterprise, which strives
to create an ecosystem of like-minded individuals to collectively build an inclusive society. The
aim of the enterprise is to empower People with Disability (PwDs) across several aspects of
their life and support them in living a life of dignity. In addition, the organization also provides
variety of services to equip the disabled individuals with the right skills and to sensitize and
educate organizations across the country to hire and meaningfully engage with PwDs.

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HOLISTIC SERVICES

The enterprise provides the following services to the organizations to achieve its Goal:
1. Workshops and Training
The objective of our workshops is to alter mindsets, address fears and confusion, break
stereotypes and bust myths around issues related to People with Disability.
Some of their popular workshops are:
• Disability Sensitisation Workshops for Leaders
• Disability Sensitisation Workshops for the masses
• Meaningful Employee Engagements

Giftabled offers an array of training programmes for Employees with no disability and
Employees with Disability.
• Customised Training for Team Managers/Leads
• Online Trainings
• Trainings for Employees with Disability

2. Accessibility Solutions
The organization provides the following accessibility solutions and also perfomrs audits
to ensure inclusive infrastructure and web designs:
• Web Accessibility Services
• Accessible environment
• Accessible documents

3. Learning and Development

Giftabled believes that the dismal employment rates of Person with Disability in most
organizations are generally NOT due to the absence of intent BUT, the internal incapability to
do so. To facilitate the process, Giftabled proposes an Inclusion Framework that can be
worked upon to include for persons with disability in one’s workforce. The inclusion frame
work can be accessed form this link.

The professional interventions provided by Giftabled are available in exhibit 2

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Exhibit 2

CORPRATE GIFTING
In addition to the above discussed services, Giftabled also provides a platform for the PwDs
to earn their living by means of their corporate gifiting program detailed below -
The Current Business Model
Giftabled has connections with more than 50 non-profit organisations across the country.
This network provides benefits to more than 500 individual beneficiaries. The enterprise
identifies beneficiaries or communities which can be trained and benefit with their help. The
beneficiaries which are chosen are given skill training in tailoring and other skills. Once
trained they can sell their products either through Giftabled or in their own local markets and
earn income. The enterprise sometimes helps in providing financial help to some of the
beneficiaries so that they can get their business going for a few months and establish a
stable cash flow system. These beneficiaries are often also provided with raw materials as
well. Once the products are ready they are either sold in the local markets or through
Giftabled on their web portal. The main customers who buy these products are corporate
establishments, while sale through the portal to the general public is very low in comparison.
The beneficiaries are not kept on fixed payroll and are paid with respect to the order
generated mainly due to uncertainty in demand and high overhead costs
Products
There is a huge variety when it comes to products that are made. The products consist
mainly of decors that can be used in offices and at home. These are eco friendly products in
most cases and compared to other products in the market are of superior quality. Inventory
is kept at a minimum so as to keep costs down while products with new designs are
launched on a quarterly basis on the basis of demand.
Corporates place orders during certain occasions for gifting purposes. The occasions can be
festivals, leadership gifts, event facilitation etc. These may include bulk orders from existing
products, while some corporates like Toyota and Cisco get to have custom made products

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due to their long relationship with the enterprise. On an average a typical corporate partner
gives around 3-4 orders annually.
Moving ahead and Future challenges
Currently Giftabled does not have a dedicated business development team and relies mainly
on word of mouth and personal networks to find more business. They have been awarded as
the best upcoming social enterprise on a few occasions and that has also helped them in
gaining some traction and credibility. They also participate in summits and other events to
gain more visibility. They are a 10-member team working round the clock and the livelihoods
of many families are dependent on them. Moving ahead they must keep in mind that their
growth is sustainable and scalable. While getting more demand seems to be the bigger
challenge on one hand on the other hand competing with imported gifting items in the market
from the Chinese and other assembly line products is another major challenge.
Reaching more beneficiaries is also a mammoth task due to the sheer size of our country.
With most of the rural areas being far from cities, reaching out to different communities
which can be helped takes a huge effort and a lot of time. Apart from reach, logistics
becomes another issue with costs jumping up with increasing distance.
In terms of the skill training that they provide, corporates have so far been sponsoring them
for a few stints. These sponsorships come out in the form of CSR from the corporates. A lot
of CSR activities are done by the corporates but are generally done in those areas which
already have support from the government. Getting a corporate to fund its CSR in a different
needful cause is the major challenge to get more skill training activities funded. To keep the
business going and the beneficiaries earning profitability is the only important metric here.
There has been steady growth over the past few years for Giftabled, but real deal lies in
growing faster.

Questions to be answered:
1. In the current business model, Giftabled has been able to benefit the communities in
urban areas. It would now like to expand it’s operations to reach more communities in
the rural areas. What challenges do you foresee in rural expansion. How would you
address them?

2. How can Giftabled compete with imported products to sell more of there products to
the public? How can they use marketing as a tool? Which marketing channels would
be most effective?

3. Corporate buying is the major source of revenue for Giftabled. How can Giftabled
increase corporate demand to generate more revenue? Can you suggest alternate
business models to generate revenue for the disabled, given the current capabilities
of this organization?