Prosperous Cities

On-street Value


By Harish Bijoor

How rich and prosperous is a city? Is there a quick measure and metric for this one?
Is a city defined to be prosperous basis the number of cars its citizens buy? Or by the ownership pattern of homes? Or by the investment profiles represented by the stash in their banks as cash or in their lockers as paper securities and gold on hand?
Having spent a fair bit of time with macro-economic data that talks of prosperity indices that are complex and aggregated to a country, I have been in the quest for a measure that is true-blue micro, true-blue representative and true-blue comparable across cities and economies, never mind the color of their politics.

Being as rustic as I am, I have always wanted to get at it simply rather than look at complex numbers that boggle more than answer right. One measure that serves me right and serves me well, particularly after using it across cities in India (21 to date), and across cities from some 17 countries (Eastern Bloc cities included), the On-street value method is a great way to go.

What does this method do? It very simply looks at the on-street value of the citizens of a city and does a quick valuation of the various commodity items and brands carried on the persona of an individual on the street.









Take for instance Bengaluru. Hit the street and pick a whole cross-section of people off the street for an assessment. Pick from bottom to top. Pick up an auto rickshaw driver, a bus conductor, a newspaper hawker, the driver of a BPO van, the cook at a local dhabha, the pan-wallah at the street corner, the BPO employee in a hurry either to or from office, the Tech-worker from an end-to-end services enterprise, the bank clerk, the tinker, the tailor, the teacher and more.

Having picked sets of people who truly represent a city, run a clear and clean audit on what he or she is wearing, carrying and with. Let me look at two possibilities we have explored.

Look at the tailor and the techie for a start. The tailor has on him a shirt, which is stitched by him. Check the cost of garment and put a notional stitching cost to that. Add to it the price of vest and every other under-garment he is wearing. In most cases, the under-garments are aggressively branded items and the over-garment is not. Put a price tag to everything.

Look at the watch he is wearing and the purse she is carrying. The mobile phone, the blue-tooth device, and more. The contents of the purse, every one of them, lipstick, mascara, comb and every one of the 26 other items that adorn a woman’s handbag. The cost of the slippers, the belt, every earring, every accessory and right upto the point of assessing the value of the brand of perfume sprinkled onto her. Add the gold and silver ornaments on the persona as well. The cost of the 'Janivaara' (sacred thread) as well. God is in the details of this assessment.

Having done this basic exercise across every one of them, do it across every city. Do it across countries and you have a benchmark that tells a rich story. A story that is both gory and dark as well as bright and prosperous.






Is Chennai more prosperous than Bangalore? And is Delhi equally as prosperous as is Istanbul? The answers are blowing in the winds of such a study.
Some quick data points then for Bangalore.

The average on-street value of a techie on the street of Bangalore is INR 87,500 when on the way to work. At a weekend his value dips to 31,450, as he is without his trusted laptop on shoulder.

The average on-street value of an auto rickshaw driver in Bangalore is INR 12,100. And this is nearly three times more than the on-street value of a black and yellow taxi-driver in Mumbai.

The average on-street value of a BPO employee in Bangalore is INR 13,700, not too far from the on-street value of the auto rickshaw driver he employed to ferry him around.

The data goes on and on in the impact-throw of prosperity and flaunt value of the man and woman on the street.

A great way to check, compare, collate and literally run on a quarter to quarter basis as well to see a change in trend, if any. A rustic route to market. A rustic route to understanding cities and consumers who live and thrive in them as well.

We have just emerged from a study of some 7970 such on-street people from all walks of life. A study that looks at 38 cities across 18 countries. A study that is rich and compelling and a study that can get richer by the day.

Reading a city off its streets is a rich and satisfying way to go.
The author is a brand-strategy specialist & CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.
Email: ceo@harishbijoorconsults.com