P. V. Rajan & Company

P. V. Rajan & Co was a South-India based company which manufactured tobacco snuff.

Originally started in Old Town in Chennai (formerly known as Madras), India, by Mr. Narayana Iyer and Mr. Naidu. During the evacuation of the city during World War II, the entire establishment was moved from Chennai to the southern railway town of Arakkonam. After the war, the company was handed down from its original founders to their sons. Mr. K.N.Viswanathan Iyer and Mr. K.N.Parasuraman Iyer (sons of Mr.Narayana Iyer) each had 25% share while Mr.Devaraja Naidu (son of Mr.Naidu) held 50% share of the company. Mr.K.N.Viswanathan Iyer was a brilliant strategist who turned around the company immediately after the war and substantially increased the market share of the company, thereby boosting sales and distribution network for nationwide coverage. He was very well regarded in the business circles of early south India and forged relationships with other business families in the south.

Much of the development of Arakkonam (besides it being one of the early railway junctions of the British) came about due to P.V.Rajan & Company. The snuff was manufactured in Aathoor, a small town 15 miles from Arakkonam. The company's snuff distribution network was one of the largest in South India and it employed hundreds of locals for packaging, branding, marketing and distribution of snuff throughout India. The snuff even made its way into the markets of Singapore, Malaysia and Burma owing to its popularity and superior quality.

Towards the seventies and eighties, the decline in the popularity of snuff (and other legislations against tobacco) led to the slowdown of revenue for the company, which later caused the shutdown of the company in the late nineties nearly 75 years after its inception.