He had a friend at the EPB who kept on feeding him about the fair information. First he went to the Melbourne textile fair with some bed sheet and textile products. But he knew his products have no hope there. The Chinese and Indian textile items are much cheaper and better in quality and designs.

But Gautam is a learner, he took one lesson there -- instead of going for machine made textile products, he should try textile handicrafts.

Next he went to Frankfurt in 2001, this time with some textile handicrafts such as table clothes, napkins and cushion covers along with earthen potteries. But again he made a wrong choice, this fair was not for exactly this type of things.

"There I met a woman who advised me to participate in another fair -- Heimtextil Fair -- in Frankfurt," says Gautam. "I went there and had a look around. There I found a stall set up by Norad -- the Norweigian donor agency -- titled 'Jute from Bangladesh'."

In fact, Norad had been working with jute products for quite some time in Bangladesh and supporting a few small enterprises to develop designs and market.

Gautam was impressed and came back infused with the new idea.

"I planned that next year I must also go with jute products," Gautam narrates his story. "I had a friend who worked on the Norad project. Together we started designing."

He got together a team of 16 including designers. Now he needed a special kind of jute fabric for his products and got them from two jute mills -- Sonali Aansh and Pubali Jute Mills. Again thanks to Norad because through its technical assistance that these two plants developed the special kind of fabric, which is much finer than normal jute hessian and comes in different colours.

Gautam shows the fabric in his factory on Ram Krishna Mission Road in the capital. It is difficult to recognise them as jute fabrics, they don't have loose fiber of normal hessian or the knots and signs of bad knitting.

Gautam and his team got down to work and for the next six months, they just designed, procured fabrics and leather -- because their designs had leather elements -- and rejected the items to try them again.

"Finally by February we had everything ready," said Gautam. "I raked up funds to rent a stall at Heimtextil for 8,000 euros. It was a big burden for me because I had already spent so much in the previous fairs. But still I was persistent."

As the fair kicked off, Gautam had an immediate hit. Heimtextil is the largest home textile fair in Europe and buyers from the whole continent flock there to scalp new products. All big names gather to plan their product portfolio. And some of them such as John Lewis of UK, El Corte Inglaze of Spain and Ide Mobler of Denmark found Gautam's products interesting. All these three asked Gautam to send samples for order.

On return, an elated Gautam sent the samples immediately. But then nothing happened and every morning Gautam's day started with expectation only to end with despair. But as every wait has an end, one day he received a letter from John Lewis. The UK department store had ordered cushion cover of five designs for $10,000.

"For a few seconds I could not think of anything else," Gautam continues. "I could not believe my eyes I have finally bagged an order. I was in the seventh heaven. I forgot the pain of all my trouble in going to the fairs. But then I came down to earth and started thinking of the order."

Gautam and his team, Sristy Hometex Limited, had a long task in hand. Till now they only purchased small quantities of jute fabrics. This time they have to order big, and they need to procure good quality leather, and above everything, they need to recruit more people to produce on time. Gautam did some head hunting and got a few experts from other handicraft firms. He got a good marketing man from one of the country's top ceramic firms. The work started in full swing and then it stopped. To his horror, Gautam found that the leather he had used is not of the proper quality and thickness. It cannot be properly sewed. So, he frantically searched for the correct type of leather and got it done all over again. Finally, the shipment was sent on schedule.

"It was a nervous time for me," says Gautam. "Who knows if the quality control would accept the products or not. For three months, there was no news. And then finally I received contract form from John Lewis, they want to place a repeat order."

Gautam and his Sristy had no look back since then. One by one he got orders from the Danish top shop Ide Mobler, Spanish El Corte and others. His last year's export was $0.5 million, which he aims to push to $1 million this year. He has modestly expanded his Sristy to a 52-staff outfit.

"I have my failures too," says Gautam. "I tried and failed in France, Norway, Canada and the US. But I don't mind because I have my own success story to tell."