After travelling for years and collecting souvenirs from different parts of the world, Vivek Prabhakar and Shubhra Chadda realised that India has very little to offer its visitors in terms of souvenirs that represents the vibrant country in its true colours. That’s when the husband and wife duo decided to launch Chumbak in 2010 and give a slice of India to its visitors by adding a bit of quirkiness and humour to the Indian souvenir market.
“We were a little bored of the usual marble Taj Mahal replicas and handicrafts that were becoming the only option and we thought travellers deserved options that were hip and still represented India,” says Vivek. After understanding the growth and potential of the market, their passion drove them to sell their own apartment for R40 lakh to use it as a seed investment to launch their first ever product line which was Fridge magnets. It also inspired them to name their brand Chumbak, which means magnet in Hindi.
They follow a hybrid business model where they handle both online and offline presence. Initially majority of their marketing and advertisement was through Facebook, and then they gradually started retailing in multi-brand outlets like Crosswords, Sapna Book House and other small boutiques. “Eventually people started coming back and saying that they want to see all of Chumbak under one roof, that’s when in 2012 we decided to open our own store. So, we opened our first kiosk in Forum mall in Bengaluru,” adds Vivek.
Though it was a six months experiment, within three weeks they realised that they need to grow more in terms of their offline presence as their loyal customers started loving their stores. After they received their first round of funding of $ 2 million from venture capital firm Seedfund, they started expanding more and today they have around 30-32 kiosks across the country.
The idea of venturing into the vast category of home and décor came along in mid 2014 when they got their second round of funding from Matrix Partners. “Followed by which there was a six-seven months exercise where we went into redefining Chumbak’s design language itself, because from the old India themed designs which was more character driven, we went into what we call now India inspired which showcases different colours and design sensibility of India,” says Vivek.
Their average purchase value has gone nearly two times higher with the introduction of new categories. Also they realised that they need a larger store to showcase all these products. Hence, last year in September they launched their flagship store in Indira Nagar and with that, overnight they added close to 600-700 new products.
Currently there are five large format stores and around 32 kiosks across Indian malls, including eight of them inside PVR cinemas. “We have partnered with PVR to set our kiosks inside their theatres, there are about 8-10 of them in Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru combined,” says Vivek. They are in the process of expanding internationally and have tied up with Virgin Megastore to retail their select range of products.
Their online website has always contributed 25% to their business but in the last few months they have started working on improving their websites to communicate with the customers better. Vivek says, “Our online presence along with our participation on Marketplaces is going to be the focus for the next year. The challenges of a strong online and offline presence are different in terms of understanding demand and providing for all channels. We are committed to building an equally strong Chumbak web store that is high on experience and quality besides our presence on Flipkart and Amazon which includes a brand store on Amazon,” he adds.