Sattviko, a packaged food startup, is looking forward to foray into three international markets – Dubai, US and UK.
Prasoon Gupta, Co-founder of Sattviko said, “We are starting our Dubai operations this month and next month, we will be entering the US market. Currently, we are focusing on three regions internationally – Middle East, the US and the UK.”
“Primarily, we chose these regions because of a few reasons. These are the cosmopolitan cities with international audience and comprises of influential Indian diaspora. We think that Indians will be the early adopters and then the products will go to the other mainstream consumers in these markets,” he further stated.
At present, the traditional snacks – albeit with a modern twist – brand is retailing through 2,000 stores in six major cities – Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune and will be launched in Kolkata very soon.
“We believe in an approach where we can focus deeper into territories. Our product is targeted towards the new-age, modern consumer and so we do not want to go to a Tier III or deeper than that. Our presence in next one year will be primarily restricted to urban cities. We will expand to the top 20 cities of India – in terms of population, growth and affluency – and then probably after spending upto 2-3 years in this kind of geography and demography, understanding what the consumer demands are, we may want to go deeper,” he said.
Tracing the Brand’s History
Sattviko, which has 30 plus SKUs across eight different types of products, started its journey in 2014 with the idea that there are lots of flavours and traditions in India that the country has not been able to market well to new-age consumers or to global audiences.
“We created this company so that people from across the globe know that there is an Indian brand which has modernised all Indian snacks,” asserted Gupta.
Sattviko started as a chain of restaurants, but in a gradual journey, moved from the restaurant business to the packaged food business where it is doing a business of almost Rs 40 crore a year in terms of annualised revenue.
The brand is available at large format retail stores including Reliance, Le Marche, Foodhall, D-Mart, Big Bazaar, More and Metro. Apart from that, it also sells to airlines like Spice Jet, Lufthansa and its products can be found in hotels like Taj, Novotel, Pride Plaza. The brand also runs a lot of smaller independent counters in Delhi/ NCR and Mumbai.
Product Innovation
“Our product has been appreciated by consumers. We are now trying to innovate on the product side while building distribution around it,” Gupta said.
We have just launched Minute Namkeen, the world’s first two-in-one namkeen. It is a combination of Indian superfoods, roasted and mixed. It can be eaten as is or add hot water to it and convert it into a meal. It brings convenience and health benefits, which traditionally Indian food is all about, apart from taste,” he added.
The startup is also working on ayurvedic fortification of some products which means that products launched in the next six months will come with added ayurvedic and herbal benefits.
“Apart from this, we are also entering some larger categories including biscuits in the next 6-8 months,” revealed Gupta.
Fund Raising
Recently, Sattviko raised funding from multiple investors, including Helion Venture founder Ashish Gupta, former EY India Head Sunil Chandiramani and others.
The brand had raised its pre-series A funding in September last year from a clutch of investors led by Raman Roy (Nasscom).
In a statement, the startup said that it used the amount to grow six times in FY2017-18, and it aims to further grow by Rs 50 crore in FY2018-19 by making use of the fresh capital.
Sattviko, which registered Rs 70 lakh revenue in the first year, now aims to touch Rs 45 crore mark in the coming years.
