Sridhar Balakrishnan decodes What It Takes to Modernise a Legacy Brand Without Breaking It
Background – education and career
Sridhar's career is a study in scale across very different industries. He spent 17 years at Marico, rising to Chief Operating Officer for clusters across South Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, where he handled international P&L along with sales, business finance, and supply chain for the India business. He then moved to Star India as President and Head of Distribution, before serving as MD and CEO at ACC Limited and Chief Sales and Marketing Officer for Ambuja and ACC within the Adani Group. He holds an MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur and a B.Tech in Electronics from IIT (BHU) Varanasi.
3 key takeaways from the episode
Legacy brands need patience, not panic. Sridhar makes the case that rushing a 50-year-old distribution business into a digital-first model usually breaks what was working.
Running two brands with different DNA requires different playbooks. Duroflex and Sleepyhead serve different customers and cannot be managed with one strategy.
Modern retail transformation is an internal problem first. Systems, incentives, and organisational structure have to change before the customer sees anything different.
