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News · PROJECT UPDATE

Warangal weavers launch a producer-owned brand on three e-commerce platforms

SEARCH Skill Development Team · 8 June 2023 · 4 min read

Warangal’s handloom tradition has been hollowing out for two decades. Power-loom competition and middleman capture of margin meant the next generation rarely took up the loom. A skill-and-credit programme across 280 weaver households has, three years on, produced something the cohort itself owns: a producer brand carrying the value chain back to the village.

Project update · SEARCH Skill Development Team

SEARCH partnered with the Telangana Handloom Weavers’ Cooperative on a programme combining design training (with NIFT Hyderabad), working-capital credit (through SHG federations), and direct-to-consumer e-commerce linkages. Each weaver who completed the design module received working-capital credit through the local SHG federation.

What the cohort has done

  • 280 weaver households across two mandals in Warangal
  • Average household income up 38% across the cohort
  • Twelve households report at least one migrant adult child returning home
  • Producer-owned brand now selling on three e-commerce platforms
“My loom was going to my brother-in-law’s scrapyard. The design module saved it — and now my daughter is learning to weave on it.”— V Anasuya, Weaver — Bhupalpally mandal, Warangal

Two adjacent mandals have started the same programme template, with their own cohort taking on the design module this season. The brand has trained the new cohort’s peer mentors as part of the rollout.

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