Ayurveda at the Click of Your Smartphone: The Success Story of India Shoppe

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by India Shoppe.

Digitization and E-Commerce have transformed the traditional way of business. Online shoppers Online shopping sales across India amounted to around $67 billion in 2021. Online shoppers are increasing year by year. There were 189 million online shoppers in 2021 which is expected to reach 220 million in 2025. The shopping behavior of customers has played a crucial role in the development of ECommerce retail. India Shoppe is one such E-Commerce retail platform that provides all the products for household needs. Staying bootstrapped, India Shoppe's revenue growth has reached INR 1300 Crores.

Read to know about India Shoppe, its founders, products and brands under it, its business model, and the story of its growth.

India Shoppe - Company Highlights

India Shoppe - About
India Shoppe - Founders and Team
India Shoppe - The Idea and Startup Story
India Shoppe - Vision
India Shoppe - Products
India Shoppe - Business Model and Revenue Model
India Shoppe - Challenges Faced
India Shoppe - Revenue Growth
India Shoppe - Tools Used in the Company
India Shoppe - Achievements & Recognitions
India Shoppe - Future Plans

India Shoppe - About

India Shoppe is an Omni-channel retailing company, started in Aug’13 to provide Wellness & Nutrition, Personal Health-care, Skin-care, Oral-care, Hair-care and Home-care after identifying & understanding their customers. They design & produce the products for which enough demand is created through various social media & other channels of Marketing. Recently, they have added fresh Agro-care solutions to their bouquet of products.

India Shoppe - Founders and Team

Rajesh Chandan is the founder of India Shoppe. Mitesh Bhandari and Viresh Mehta are the Co-Founders of India Shoppe.

Mr Rajesh Chandan is an alumnus of Harvard Business School and a first-generation entrepreneur from Chennai and a technology enthusiast, with over two decades of hardcore exposure in various business verticals. He upgraded himself to the latest trends in business & technology, by attending various programs at ISB (Hyderabad) & IIM, (Ahmedabad). Rajesh Chandan actively conducts leadership workshops for Start-Ups, mentoring them to upscale their business. He held the position of VICE CHAIRMAN at JITO INTERNATIONAL W ING and continues as an active member of the JAIN INTERNATIONAL TRADE ORGANISATION with more than 15000+ influential (Jains as) members. Rajesh is an avid social worker associated with various organizations & rehabilitation centres. His family has donated a day-care hospital in Ayanavaram (Chennai) which is run by RYA Cosmo Foundation.

Mitesh Bhandari is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of India Shoppe.

Mitesh Bhandari is a young & dynamic commerce graduate from LOYOLA (Chennai) & MBA from NMIMS (Mumbai). He is a certified Chartered Financial Analyst with a decade of experience in several lines of business & off- late prominently in the Fin. Tech landscape. Mitesh Bhandari is an active investor on many alternative investment platforms, including Venture-Debt. He has more than 2 decades of experience in the business of Ferrous & Non-ferrous metals. Mitesh Bhandari also has a well-curated portfolio of leasing, and real estate assets.

He serves as the Charter President of RCC Magnum, an organization of 100+ youth members & has been an active member of Round-Table (India), a philanthropic organization.

Viresh Mehta is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of India Shoppe.

Viresh Mehta is an enthusiastic leader who heads Business-Development. He is a marketing & sales specialist who focuses on the smooth functioning of an organizational supply chain and related value addition processes for the company. He has an outstanding experience of 17 years in merchandising & sourcing various consumer goods. He developed various distribution channels across India, for different FMCG Products, ensuring business growth. His strong decision-making abilities have played a critical role in handling and strategic planning of the product launches of several esteemed brands like Coorg Filter Coffee in Tamil Nadu, Detergents like Shudh, Rakshak and Samundar crystal salt from the house of industrial-giant, Tata. Understanding and engaging in public relations is a primary reason for his success. Crisis and Disaster Management at various business houses is his forte.

Once Viresh Mehta organized a Dandiya Mela or a traditional folk-dance festival with over ten thousand participants from all ages & ethnicities, for raising student scholarships for the underprivileged.

India Shoppe - The Idea and Startup Story

Rajesh Chandan always wanted to start a brand, which would be more than just a business-house or a commercial- entity. He wanted it to be a part of people’s lives. That ‘want’ remained a distant dream until 2013, when he identified a dearth in a specific segment of the market & eventually, the spark grew into a flame.

After a series of brainstorming with his peers in business, about how the global giants were becoming market leaders, online & native brands were ruling on-ground with their branches & franchises, the market in Omni-channel retailing remained unexplored. Soon, the idea started taking shape.

India Shoppe was designed to be a lifestyle brand with a sincere focus on Tier II, and Tier III cities & towns targeting the “middle” & “upper-middle” income groups or the ‘active’ segment of society that is always aspiring for a better lifestyle.

Rajesh went to the original ‘Shark-Tank’ to bounce his idea: My friends! Not for lack of options but this wasn’t just about, Validation of his idea but also the Sustenance of a promise!

India Shoppe - Vision

India Shoppe has a vision to:

• Be a large customer value creator in the market, focusing on customer service, understanding the customers, their way-of-life & identifying their requirements to improve their lifestyle.
• Customize & develop products after market research & ensure they’re organic, healthy & easy to use.
• Invest in new product lines & implement the latest technology to ensure they are delivered on time.

India Shoppe - Products

India Shoppe offers various daily-use products for individuals and the entire family. They are committed to building effective brand identity by aligning the consumers’ perception and expectations with the development of their products, with the highest standards in quality.

India Shoppe has developed its private labels, under the brand names of:

• “AAHAR” Food & Gourmet
• "ELEMENTS WELLNESS" Health-Care
• “NEUSTAR” Personal-Care
• "ON & ON" Wellness & Nutritional-Care
• “Mi HOME CARE” Adding a sparkle to your world
• “INDIAGRO” Reflecting their commitment to farmers, they have scientifically researched and developed, plant & soil-care products that: help in maximizing the yield (for farmers) & are packed with nutrition (for consumers) while ensuring the quality of soil is retained.

Their products do not contain (any) chemicals that are harmful to the body and are made of natural ingredients. They use raw materials which conform to API and in-house standards.

Their proprietary health & wellness products are made of various nutritional ingredients & herbs, after extensive study and research. India Shoppe has experts who remain in close proximity with scientific researchers & market analysts to stay updated on developing new products or enhancing existing ones. Beginning from the sourcing of ingredients to the final Eco-conscious packaging, they ensure that their products are of premium quality.

India Shoppe takes Conscious-Care for:

• The People: Propose and promote a healthy lifestyle for consumers, with their products.
• The Products: Prohibit the use of any ingredients which aren’t organic in their processes.
• The Planet: From Products to Packaging, it is all vegetarian and eco-friendly.
• The Past: Promoting Ayurvedic products which are preventive & also hail from this holy land.

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India Shoppe - Business Model and Revenue Model

India Shoppe creates a demand for its products, through active social-media campaigns and its chain of small-format retail stores & websites. Additionally, to reach a wider market, we’ve designed Pick-up Centers (P.U.C’s), in several remote locations that are mapped to their nearest store. Such P.U.C.s only purchase merchandise from the stores, they’re mapped to. It can also be explained as – H.O.: Parent, Store: Child, Store: Parent, PUC: Child.

• Their stores maintain an online account of the respective PUCs mapped to them, based on the volumes of transactions or redemption of Pre-orders.
• To ensure easy flow of the stocks, they are replenished from multiple warehouses, online & offline.
• Their M.O.P is mostly through pre-orders having several types and denominations (Non-Transferable).
• Customers carrying such Pre-orders get the merchandise at a discounted price while other customers purchase at M.R.P.
• Customers can redeem/ purchase with dual-validation (Code & OTP) at the Store, PUC and Web-portal.
• Their product range is further classified under different sub-categories.

Strengths:

• They have well-established network of 16 Warehouses, 51 Stores & 649 P.U.C’s, spread across the country,
• They have tested & proven systems and ready-to-go processes for generating assured Sales growth.
• They undertake periodic market research with corresponding Product-innovations.
• They collaborate with scientific developers, manufacturers, designers, marketers & suppliers to ensure they come up with rich Ayurvedic products.
• They build on brand re-call & consumer loyalty through Digital Marketing posts and campaigns by regularly posting engaging content on various social media platforms.
• Their customers have been their biggest strength, as their testimonials are the hallmark of certification.

India Shoppe - Challenges Faced

Being an enterprise with most products based on Ayurveda, subscribing to their solutions would mean a shift into a better/healthier lifestyle. But this is the very reason most people today, resist choosing Ayurvedic medicine, which is more of preventive care, in contrast to the instant relief of western-medicine (Allopathy).

However, the Covid Pandemic has rightfully pointed out that, instead of choosing the (so-called) ready remedies and instant reliefs, it is advisable to have a healthy lifestyle. And, going Ayurvedic, not only aids to eliminate the chances of infection but also has them equipped to battle other infections/ microbes, known & unknown.

India Shoppe - Revenue Growth

India Shoppe operates PAN-India. Starting in 2013-’14 from less than INR 100 CRS. to almost INR 1300 CRS. in 2021-’22. With a CAGR of 22%, their growth has continued during the Covid pandemic, even. So far, they are a bootstrapped company, running & managing with their capital & operating revenues.

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India Shoppe - Tools Used in the Company

Their team of developers, designers, researchers, product managers and engineers of various disciplines, work together in building a user-friendly design & well-tested interface with every aspect of the organization.

• They have been using state-of-the-art ERP software for Finance and custom E-commerce.
• The capacity of supply chain and logistics operations can be scaled anytime with their automated stock replenishment during peak periods (festivals/ holidays) for consistency in their deliveries.
• With their in-house cloud-based mechanism and automation, Traffic is gracefully throttled if & when it goes beyond the given conditions.
• Having high-performance integrations, connecting to third-party applications like the State GST portal, Supply chain Vendors and up to Last-mile deliveries.

India Shoppe - Achievements & Recognitions

India Shoppe has achieved recognition from the Government of India and others.

• In the personal-care category, “Elements Wellness” was prestigiously awarded: BEST HEALTHCARE Brand by The Economic Times in 2019-‘20 & 2022-’23!
• 7 & 14 State Governments in the country, have recognized India Shoppe as a prompt Tax-payer for 2020-2021 & 2021-2022 respectively.
• At the peak of the Covid pandemic, when the health ministry of India advised everyone to take a spoon of Chavanprash (an Ayurvedic goo-ey preparation loaded with anti-oxidants & immunity boosters) a day, it hiked the consumption of their equivalent, On & On “Kavach Prash”.

India Shoppe - Future Plans

As a growing large-scale Value-Creator, they are eyeing expansion in the scale of operations, setting up more Distribution centres for easy reach & faster delivery, planning more stores & investing in new product lines & technology.

After finding a firm footing in the local market, India Shoppe team have been exploring the possibility of expansion, especially in our neighbouring countries.

FAQs

When was India Shoppe founded?

India Shoppe was founded in 2013 in Chennai.

Who is the founder of India Shoppe?

Rajesh Chandan is the founder of India Shoppe. Mitesh Bhandari and Viresh Mehta are the Co-Founders of India Shoppe.

What are the products of India Shoppe?

India Shoppe products list includes various daily household products:

• Food Products
• Health-Care Products
• Personal-Care Products
• Agro Care Products
• Home Care Products