Bharat Entrepreneurs

” When I thought of starting a company, I felt India needed 100 people like Narayana Murthy and Ambani. If 100 such people support 2 lakh people each, imagine how many Indians get supported. Entrepreneurship is needed to uplift the poor. It is not easy to be an entrepreneur, especially a first generation entrepreneur. There will be lots of challenges in the beginning but you should learn to look for the light at the end of the tunnel. Never give up even if there are hurdles. There are many who give up within a week. You need determination and a tough mind to cross the initial hurdles.” E.Sarathbabu

E. SarathBabu is not the typical IIM Ahmedabad student you read about in the newspapers. He did not take the easy path to earn mega bucks in spite of being offered plum jobs from top companies. Instead he chose, like a true entrepreneur, to carve out his own path to success. So he started FOODKING.

His mother worked as an ayah in an Anganvadi to educate him and his siblings. Later he went on to complete his higher education in the prestigious BITS Pilani and IIM Ahmedabad.

In the beginning, he took a loan of Rs 20 lakh and started Foodking in August 2006. Initially the losses were poised at Rs 2000 a day. The cafeteria’s he set up initially did not work according to plan and he soon came to the conviction that only by selling in large volumes that any profit could be made.

In 2006 IIM A alumni meet, he hoped to bag a contract but could not.

In march 2007 he got an offer to start a unit at BITS, Pilani. This contract proved profitable. Spurred with this initial profit and with the money that he borrowed from his IIM A friends, he wanted to move ahead. He got BITS Goa contract which was to be his biggest break. He had to cater to over 1300 students and the sales peaked at 65,000 Rs per day.

Then he got an opportunity to serve at SRM deemed college which boasts of over 17,000 students!

Right now he has a turn around of Rs 3.5 crore per annum. By next year he hope to increase it to Rs 20 crores.

At present he has BITS hyderabad in his hands and it all set to be operational by July 2008. So the future does look rosy to this Foodking.

http://www.rediff.com/money/2006/aug/31spec.htm

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Dheeraj Gupta, an MBA in Finance from Symbiosis, Pune once went to meet his friend in London who owned a franchisee of Burger King (2nd largest hamburger fast food chain after McDonald’s). This triggered the idea of an Indianized version of burger. His first venture was Manali Foods, selling Indian sweets abroad. Unfortunately, it ran out of money shortly after its launch due to low margins and short shelf life of the product. After going through various criticism and pain he started Chaat Factory near Malad Station, Mumbai in 2001. With the support of his wife, also an MBA and 4 other employee, he started selling Vada Pao. Mumbai’s most selling snack caught people’s attention with cheap, health and hygienic version of street food. Chaat factory started showing positive results on day one. He then renamed it to Jumbo King. What started from one outlet has now entered into franchise model and boasts of 40 outlets in Mumbai, Surat, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Pune. Its target customers are mainly railways comuters.

Mantra
Rs. 6 vadao pao! Along with some innovative menu which Mumbaikar’s found tempting. How about “diet” vada pao? It also has supportive products (lassi, soft drinks etc.) to add to its sales and revenue.

Growth
Jumbo King holds 20% of market in Mumbai itself. With 40,000 customers every day, Dheeraj Gupta (Managing Director, Jumbo King Foods Pvt. Ltd.) says that the company earns about Rs 18 Crore as against Rs 6 Lakhs in the first year of its operations.

Future
If projections are to be believed then by 2008-2009 it will have an annual turnover of Rs 60 Crore. A highly ecstatic Dheeraj Gupta believes that there is a possibility of 5000 outlets in 8-9 Years. Moving beyond India, he expects this business to generate billion dollars with a capacity of 12-15,000 outlets all over the world.

Innovation. Hunger. Branding -> Dheeraj McDonald

What else can I say… i’m lovin’ it

Reference

• nenonline: Top start-ups of the week
• TiE Entrepreneurial Summit 2006

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