TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - A senior partner at the Smartplus Accelerator business consultant, Baskorohadi Sukatmo, advised Indonesian entrepreneurs to avoid an inferiority syndrome or inferiority complex in doing businesses.
Baskorohadi is the marketing figure behind the success of tea-based beverage Tekita in the 90s and the milk brand Anlene that continues to be popular up to this day.
“Don’t have that syndrome, especially when competing against foreigners. As an Indonesian, it is us Indonesians that should know the details of our domestic market,” said Baskorohadi in Tempo’s Friday vibes business talk show entitled 'Defeating business giants like David VS Goliath,' held at Tempo office building in Palmerah yesterday, August 25.
An inferiority complex is the lack of self-esteem, a doubt and uncertainty about oneself, and feelings of not measuring up to standards. This itself, he said, does not only apply to Indonesians in facing expatriates but also Indonesian companies in facing foreign companies.
Baskorohadi retold his story in 1995 where he established a business network in the beverage industry with a tea beverage under Tekita, which was initially based in Surabaya. That was the time when Teh Botol Sosro with its 220ml packaging dominated the Indonesian tea beverage market.
At the time, he was the Pepsi-Cola Indo Beverages Product Manager, which owned Tekita. One of his strategies was to introduce a product similar to Teh Botol Sosro but in a larger 300ml package that was marketed mainly for high school students. It only took a year for Tekita to rank second in the segment with a 15 percent market share.
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