Case-Study-DTPS

The Bohri Kitchen (TBK)

Nafisa Kapadia’s son Munaf was done watching his mother monopolize the TV at
home, and in a bid to put her extraordinary culinary talent to good use he decided
to have a few friends over for lunch. Only these ‘friends’ were paid guests and the
‘lunch’ was a 7-course Bohri meal around a thaal which was to become the first
ever TBK home dining experience. Thus, the Bohri Kitchen was founded by former
Google executive Munaf Kapadia and his mother Nafisa Kapadia in 2014.

What started as a small project slowly turned into a mini revolution where
Nafisa aunty’s smoked mutton kheema samosas and 2 day marinated raan suddenly
became a hot topic amongst foodies across Bombay. Few mentions in newspapers,
blogs, radio and TV channels later, TBK became Bombay-famous..
12 months later, they garnered the necessary courage to take up the gigantic task
of making Nafisa aunty’s food available to people across Bombay in the comfort
of their own homes by opening their first ever delivery outpost in Worli.

Since then their founders have found themselves on the cover of Forbes
magazine and a reality TV show, and numerous TV shows and news channels. The
Bohro Kitchen is now a 2-time winner of the Times Food Award, a recipient of
the Midday Rising Star Award (Midday The Guide, Restaurant Awards) and
they’ve expanded to 4 delivery outlets -Worli, Bandra, Juhu and Lokhandwala and
a quick service restaurant at Flea Bazaar Café at Kamala Mills. They continue
hosting their home-dining experience every weekend at Colaba.

The TBK Founders

Nafisa Kapadia is the co-founder and backbone of The Bohri Kitchen. Her
entrepreneurial attitude, openness to host strangers every weekend in her living
room, her warm personality is the reason why The Bohri Kitchen has scaled the
heights of success this quickly. Munaf Kapadia- the self-designated Chief Eating
Officer, marketing genius and co -founder of The Bohri Kitchen--Munaf Kapadia
quit a lucrative job at Google to ‘take Bohri food to non -Bohris’ which is the
vision The Bohri Kitchen even today. . A former Googler, Munaf Kapadia is the recipient
of the title of Forbes ‘30 Under 30’ for creating The Bohri Kitchen (TBK).

Services
Home Dining Experience at Colaba
What started in 2014 as fun experiment to keep Mom-Chef busy has now turned into one of
the most sought after dining experiences in Bombay! For four years running, they have
successfully fed over 4000+ guests at their home in Colaba. The menu changes every weekend
but the experience of sitting around a thaal and gorging yourself on 7 brilliant courses of home-
cooked Bohri delicacies stays the same. Home-dining experiences start at INR 1500 per person.
Catering by The Bohri Kitchen
What do Farah Khan, Hrithik Roshan and Rani Mukherjee have in common? They’ve all had
The Bohri Kitchen cater their birthday parties! The Bohri Kitchen is a great way to celebrate
food and special occasions! They can put out a beautiful Bohri spread at a venue of your choice
from intimate house parties to grand banquets. If you have an occasion in mind, they have a
menu for you.

The catering services allow you to curate a menu from a large variety of Bohri fare that
will be served to your guests in a buffet spread. Such events are executed with full service from
their end and delicious Bohri food inspired from Mom-Chef’s recipes. TBK has catered to
1000+ people wedding receptions, parties, and corporate events (Corporate clients served so
far are: Grey Advertising, Yash Raj Films, Google, Axis Bank, Godrej, YouTube etc)

Home delivery/Take-away and The Travelling Thaal

TBK offers select menus for takeaways/home delivery in limited areas in Mumbai. A minimum
order of Rs 5000 with a pre-notice of 48 hours is necessary for availing this service.
The Travelling Thaal conjures up images of a large saucer-like object making its way to
different homes in the country carrying a regal looking raan in red masala, platters piled high
with sumptuous kebabs and dishes full with the dum-est biryanis in town. The Travelling Thaal
allows you to recreate the home-dining experience in Colaba at a venue of your choice. They
will curate a 7 course (or more!) menu with you and show up at your place with a large steel
platter in tow (aka the thaal) and a team that will execute and host the experience for you
seamlessly. The travelling thaal starts at INR 800 a person.

Funding
In 2017, Mumbai-based specialised cuisine startup The Bohri Kitchen has raised an
undisclosed amount of funding from Venture Catalysts, an integrated incubation platform. The
three-year-old startup raised funds from Anuj Puri (Venture Catalysts, Qatar), Abhishek
Agarwal (managing partner, Rockstud Capital), Nikunj Pachisia and Anirudh Damani (Artha
India Ventures) and Vishal Brahmbhatt.

The Bohri Kitchen (TBK) also saw participation from food and beverages doyenne
Riyaaz Amlani as well as high-net-worth individuals such as Romil Ratra and Chef Rahul
Akerkar, among others, venture Catalysts said in a statement. The funds will be used to upgrade
infrastructure which will involve moving into a bigger central kitchen and hiring skilled
workers for standardising recipes, said Munaf Kapadia, founder and CEO of The Bohri Kitchen
The Bohri Kitchen is known for combining specialised cuisines with a unique dining
experience. The brand claims to be the first to take delectable dishes unique to the Dawoodi
Bohra community and make them available to gastronomes and food connoisseurs. “Securing
funds from leading names in the startup and food and beverage ecosystems such as Venture
Catalysts, Riyaaz Amlani, Rahul Akerkar and Romil Ratra is a major shot in the arm for us,”
said Munaf Kapadia.
“TBK’s dedication towards ensuring authenticity in both experience and taste of the
Bohri culinary offerings is the main reason why I have chosen to invest capital in this disruptive
F&B brand,” said Riyaaz Amlani. “The brand has grown from strength to strength, setting up
a delivery kitchen and expanding into the restaurant vertical as well. TBK will continue to set
new benchmarks in the experiential dining space,” said Anuj Puri.

Impending Challenges
While TBK’s USP has been exquisite taste and experiential dining, the food industry in India
is wrought with intense competition not just from the traditional players but also from the new
players experimenting with platform business models. Future Group has recently announced
its venture into the delivery of cooked foods from its kitchens as part of consolidation of food
business, according to its Chief Executive Officer Kishore Biyani.

The group is looking to leverage its digital wallet FuturePay to deliver affordable
meals at the doorsteps of consumers under the cloud kitchen concept. "Now, we are talking
about cloud kitchen and ready-to-eat food at customers' home at Rs 40. That is another project
on which we are working upon," said Biyani on the sidelines of an event here. He further said:
"You would see a lot of action on that project. This would be fresh food and supplied from the
kitchens, which we are creating in every cities."

In a cloud kitchen concept, operators prepare, package and deliver food without
providing any dine-in facility to end-consumers. Biyani said Future Group would "very soon"
start its cloud kitchens but declined to reveal further details such as the number and network
reach. "We are creating rice-based meals," he said, adding "you can get two samosas at Rs 10
because we are managing end-to-end operations". He said the group plans to use services of
FuturePay app under its digital project Tathasthu for getting food delivered at the doorsteps of
consumers. Bullish on the venture, he said: "We have huge ambitions...Whichever way food
would be consumed in India, we would be there."

The group will leverage on its enterprise strength to overcome low margin hurdle in
the food delivery business chain by handling end-to-end operations, he said. "We will manage
the entire value chain. We have our own rice and floor mills. We have our factories and own
supply chain companies, we have own brands. If anyone can give margins, we can get," Biyani
said. When asked whether Future Group's cloud kitchen would compete with food delivery
platforms such as Swiggy and Zomato, Biyani replied in negative.
Future Group, which currently gets around 50 per cent of its sales from its food
business, is also expanding its network through its chains of Aadhaar, Easyday and Future
stores and aims to cross around 60 per cent in the next five years.
"Till now, we were focused on fashion business," he said, adding that "food business in the
long run would touch 55 to 60 per cent of total sales". As part of the strategy, the group will
have Aadhaar stores for the towns below 50,000 population and Easyday in the cities with
50,000 and above population and Big Bazaar stores in the towns with population of above two
lakh,Biyani.said. The company is creating an all India Food Grid, where it is creating 38 big
warehouses across the country. It now has five operational warehouses with the opening of a
new one here and expects rest to be completed in the next two to three years.
TBK in the Post-Pandemic World

Until the end of 2019, Munaf had standardised the food, created a proper supply chain to
different corners in Mumbai, and planned to expand to Pune.

But, a lot has changed for TBK in the last few months. They made nearly Rs 35 lakh in
August and September last year, but the cost of maintaining the five outlets was high.
Although he was confident that they would receive Pre-Series A funding, no one signed the
check.

“I realised that investors were not looking to put their money on a business that produced
niche food and were seeking out businesses that were delivering multiple cuisines from the
same kitchen. But, with COVID-19, the decision was taken away from my hands,” he says.

Khajoor dry fruit chutney which is available for retail

Like most businesses, TBK, too, had to scale down to survive. Three of the five outlets have
been shut down, and they had to let go of over 50 per cent of their staff. Despite this setback,
Munaf feels that this is a new phase and an opportunity for him to use the wealth of knowledge
he’s gathered over the years.

Now, they plan on relaunching TBK around August-September. Scaling down their operations
also gives them time to focus and do things well, emphasises Munaf. He also hopes to expand
on the retail aspect where they bottle and sell more of their condiments like the khajoor
chutney and pickles.

“The idea is to create something that cannot be replicated. I want to make Bohri food more
relevant to everyone. I see us being unconventional and standing out. I want The Bohri Kitchen
to be something that survives a lifetime and has the sense of community at its heart,” he says.

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The Problem Context
Given the impending challenges from the new competitors
and the ongoing pandemic crisis, TBK is contemplating to
sustain its business by expanding its retail aspects and
focussing on the niche dining experience which makes TBK
stand out from the conventional players in the field. So, the
problem statement is:

In what ways TBK can sustain its business to

withstand the rising competition amidst the
ongoing pandemic crisis?

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