The Chai Social/ Project

Around 3 months back, a very close friend made me meet a young executive who wanted to open a theme tea cafe in a high street mall. He wanted me to introduce him to a few investors in my circle, which my friend knew that I could.

A few hours later, as we walked out of the United Coffee House' restaurant, the three of us shook hands and set upon an agenda to take the idea up as a project, albeit very differently. Me and my friend decided to mentor the project and possibly meet again to nurture the concept.

Today, as I wrote this, I am not amazed that I finally managed to bring this to life. An idea that was brewing in my mind for years has finally taken a form. While a few of my close friends knew about me thinking about it and most of them were amused and gave a hearty laugh when they realized that I was serious about pursuing this. After all it was not every day that they would meet a corporate executive, entrepreneur running a responsible consulting business and was now wanting to be a Sadak chaap chai wallah. 

Well only an entrepreneur will understand the feeling when one wants to sail a boat against the tide. It cannot be explained. In words or otherwise. I faced a few raised eyebrows from very close people, which only deterred me for a while but eventually it was destined to be a go.

To start with, our idea was no rocket science and did not solve any puzzle. It was simply rewriting the principles of chai drinking outside our homes. Almost everyone consumed tea and coffee outside homes - In offices, cafes, road side tapirs. In fact you look around in any small or big city, town, village in India, you are almost certain to spot a chaiwallah or a cafe in various forms and factors quietly doing business in some nook or corner. A rough estimates puts 10 trillion cups of chai consumer annually in India and it is safe to assume one third of this is outside our homes, and each person pays anything from Rs. 5 to 500 for a cup of tea depending upon the place, blend and affordability. It is perhaps the oldest business set up from the medieval times. The tea served with machines in offices were one of the reasons people often missed office work and ventured outside compromising precious office work time. A good cup is what everyone deserves! 

If We set aside prestigious large format cafes and other tea/coffee outlets which serve tea for Rs. 40 onwards and concentrate on the mass market product with a offering of anywhere between Ra. 5 to 10. The situation is quite different. 

So what was there to rewrite, you will ask. Well, everything I would say. 

We prospected various chai tapris at various places and time zones. At times gazing at them from a distance or very often appearing as real customers. We realized they were using either normal tap water which they were fetching from unauthorized water connections, public toilets, neighboring shops, fetching from a pipe connected to some neighboring residences or slums. This was shocking as the most critical component was sure to be infested or the least be unhygienic or not potable. The milk used was often adulterated with some powder to increase viscosity and then mixed with water to increase volume. So a typical one liter of milk became 1.5 liters which no customer will figure out. Thirdly, the sugar used was high sulphur content and a few tests we did gave shocking results. Being a industrial chemistry student I was familiar with the testing methodologies.  Lastly, the tea blend used was a bigger surprise. We found that quite a few were using tea dust instead of tea leaves powder we use at home. For those who don't know, tea dust is the residual mixture of impurities that is left behind when tea powder is made which is what you get in branded tea bags for your home. And this tea dust was put to reuse 5-6 times juicing it to extent of near poisoning the tea offering. And lastly, the teas was served in plastic disposable cups made from non food grade plastic material. I don't have to mention to make you understand what it means when hot beverage reacts with the cheap plastic material. Hell!

fSo as you see, there was a lot to rewrite about the business.

The Chai Social project is a business born out of the desire to sanitize the street tea vending business. It an honest offering at an honest price. We use mineral water, branded tea, sulphur-less sugar and branded tea powder and still managed to bring the price offering at Rs. 15. Just two months in operation, we have served over 12000 tea and coffee cups from a single outlet.  It goes to show that an honest product has a market and that a gap existed. We just need to make the people understand when people questioned our price point. And it worked.

Additionally, being a group of marketers we couldn't resist packaging the whole chai offering. A good brand name generating recall, engaging brand presence, a fancy noticeable fully equipped cycle cafe cart, an effective social media presence and a good trained tea server with a pleasant smile? A wholesome experience. The limited period trials have been encouraging us to leap ahead and we know that we are on right path. 

Chai Social is a small business with a larger vision, we intend to do over 100 locations to start with and then do few hundreds more Doing business at this scale needs people, resources and processes. We might succeed in overcoming the roadblocks or we might crash for any reason. But the flame which we have lighted, will certainly enlighten you to demand for a good cup of chai with hygienic ingredients. And be willing to pay a right price for it. 

As the business stands today, we have just completed 5 weeks of operations and sold over 8000 units and generate operational profitability from just one location.

As you see, this business has already shattered the stereotypes, has the potential to drive inclusive growth, generate employability through sustainability operations and potentially become  a long term revenue driver for everyone.

Ameen!