When Bangalore-based Hector Beverages decided to launch ethnic Indian drinks brand Paper Boat with Aamras and Aam Panna, it found its main ingredient, raw mango, a tough nut to break.
“It was almost impossible to process a hard fruit like raw mango. If we ripen and then pulp it, it loses its green colour,“ recalls Neeraj Kakkar, co-founder and CEO at Hector Beverages. The solution was an age old home remedy: boil before pulping.
Another big challenge was to procure the crop at the correct time to get the right green hue, which called for building strong relations with growers across the country and paying the “a little more“. “Our vendors constructed green sheds, like nurseries, to ripen mangoes naturally,“ Kakkar said.
Hector is among a handful of new age companies offering eclectic products -ranging from packaged traditional drinks and food to fashion and jewellery inspired by tradition -for which inputs and ingredients come from farthest places and different cultures. And these companies have built innovative models at the back-end to retain authenticity while appealing to contemporary sensibilities of modern day consumers.
Take the case of Caravan Evolved Craft, a Bangalore-based retailer of fashion and lifestyle products that sources various components for their merchandise from local artisan clusters, self-help groups (SHGs) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) specialized in various skill-sets from across the country.
At present, Caravan sources products from 560 artisans and it has an inventory of 2,000 SKUs across five categories including jewellery and gifts, assembled at its factory benchmarked to global standards. Caravan had raised .12 crore from Unites Seed Fund and others besides a debt of 14 crore from NSDC.
Similarly, Delight Foods, an e-commerce portal for local Indian food brands backed by Mape Advisory and Fireside Ventures, designed a model to pull off a logistically heavy business.
It has set up packing and collection centres in each of the 13 cities where it currently operates. Food items ordered by customers through the platform from various vendors in a particular city are collected in the centre.
These are then packed and shipped to respective cities from where orders have come. At each destination’s packing and collection centre, the items are disaggregated, repacked into consumer packs and shipped to consumers.
This entire process takes 2-4 business days.
Source: The Economic Times