At BrilliantRead Media, we always strive to bring some of the meaningful and powerful stories from around the world to empower and motivate our growing community. This week, we invited Serial Entrepreneur and Business Leader Abhishek S Chauhan to know more about his inspiring journey and the way forward. He is a Mentor, Leader, Speaker, Marketer and Founder of Iessentialss. Let’s learn more about his impressive journey so far and his advice for our growing community!
Excerpts from our exclusive interview with him:
Talk us through your background and your journey as an entrepreneur, please;
I’m postgraduate from La Trobe University, Australia with my roots back in Kanpur where I was born and brought up. During my stay in Australia, I also earned a graduate diploma in social work due to my desire to serve humanity and to understand social structure thoroughly.
I voluntarily contributed 1000s of hours of work in Old Age Care centres and in counselling youth and immigrants from war struck countries.
During my college days in Australia, I have been one of the most active participants in student activities.
After finishing my studies, I started working for one of the biggest FMCG in Australia, Woolworths. During those 38 months, I got the opportunity to see retail from deep within which was a great learning experience and realised the importance of customer satisfaction.
After the untimely demise of my dad in Aug 2010, I planned to come back and be with my family which consists of my mother and younger brother. Soon after I tied the knot with an aspiring doctor pursuing the final year of her MD degree from King George Medical University in Lucknow. With the completion of her course, we decided to move to Noida to start our Professional journeys and in my case, it was a restart.
We both, me and my younger brother, decided to resume our father’s construction business through a newly formed company YKS Infratech Pvt Ltd. The company accomplished numerous road safety projects successfully in Noida thus ensuring the road safety of the city. Our main focus was to make roads safe through proper signages and road safety equipment.
I also helped state government in setting up hospitals and schools through our specialized procurement services.
In Nov’18, I started a restaurant ADDA126 CAFE & KITCHEN at Sector 126, Noida which is basically Noida’s IT Park sector which also consists of two big and few small universities/colleges.
ADDA126 became an instant hit in the first few months through our meticulously curated recipes and hospitality. Around the start of 2020 when I was planning to expand the restaurant by opening 7 more quick service and delivery outlets, COVID struck the whole world and we were no exception. All plans about ADDA126 had to be held. Now ADDA126 is in talks with outlet buddy team for expansion plan in collaboration.”
Lockdown had started and there was fear everywhere and no one had the right answer about anything.
During this time my wife who is very dedicated to her profession motivated me to start something which can help by providing most of the COVID Essentials under one roof and I started www.covidsessentials.com, this was my first experience in E-commerce though I was familiar with a retail of different format through my Australian experience.”
The site started giving encouraging results slowly but steadily. With this project, I tried to provide essentials at a much reasonable price with free shipping nationwide.
www.covidsessentials.com started in May’20 and by end of July’20 already did business worth 25 lacs without spending more than 20k in online advertisements which is, in general, the backbone of e-commerce.
While I was still exploring e-commerce, I realised the need to bring unorganised small & micro MSME curators and manufacturers together under a single platform where they will be able to sell their products under the categories of personal care, health care, hygiene, wellness, home care, child care, eco-sustainable & organic. This is the basic idea with which www.iessentialss.com is being developed. The site is under development and will take a bit of time to be online. The motive of “iessentialss” is not only becoming one of the best marketplace of its type but also empower all its vendors through various skills development plans and programs.
I am also concentrating on bringing vendors from satellite parts of the nation who are doing great in their own skills and a national e-commerce platform can provide them with a right set of audience for their product.
So far life has been very active and I have been thoroughly enjoying every single second of it.
COVID came as a blessing in Disguise and gave me a chance to connect with something, I was always in love with … Shopping but now I am at another end.
There is a saying when life throws lemons at you, catch them and make lemonade by mixing a bit of sugar so I did that.
Why you choose entrepreneurship over a corporate career?
While it’s true that you do have to be disciplined and organized to be an entrepreneur, it offers in return freedom, more free time to think of more ventures, and a path towards creating one’s own ultimate reality. Being an entrepreneur means that you don’t have to risk someone else putting you in a box. You are free to seek out opportunities that interest you the most, or flex skills you’ve worked deliberately to develop. If you don’t know how to do something, you are free to pursue the skills training you need to know how to do it, whether you take night classes or utilize an online or digital platform for skill development.
Entrepreneurship allows you the opportunity to shape your own destiny and to direct yourself towards different paths and fields of expertise – an empowering thought and even more empowering practice. Now since my desire to work for unorganised small and micro curators and manufacturers is motivating me to make an impact on Current Business scenario, I believe Entrepreneurship was my destiny and I am very proud of it.”
Please share with us some of the challenges you faced in your journey;
From the day I came to India till today, there has been various type of challenges. Working from Woolworths to working in the Construction industry and managing all day to day activities from Managing the office, Accounts, Procurement and various construction site all in the same time.
Some of the Govt policies also posed a challenge at various levels.
Now, COVID19, the biggest challenge of the century, But I firmly believe that determination, perseverance and persistent motivation can make you reach any goal in life. Trust yourself and just keep trying until you achieve it.
During this COVID-19 crisis, what are the measures you have undertaken to continue your business without disruption?
Shifted all operations from office to home and started covidsessentials.com during pandemic which is also the pilot for iessentialss.com. It was just not developed at home but also operated from home without any supporting staff.
The idea of iessentialss emerged after the encouraging results of the pilot, virtual meetings and con-calls helped in continuing the planning of the new project without any disruption or delay.
What is your Business Mantra: Money or Emotions?
Discipline and Ethics do come first for me. A lot of people get into the business line in order to make money where emotions turn meaningless. But if you do what your heart wants money follows and people anyways say there is no room for emotions in business.
How do you handle the pressure and manage stress?
When you are in love with what you doing. stress and pressure are not anywhere near.
At times some bitter experience on the path may give pain but at the same time, it’s another learning.
In general, I’m very excited about my goals and if something like stress or nervousness come on the way, then it’s just part of the journey.
Btw I love watching YouTube and that’s full of good stuff if you look for.
Given the rapid pace at which the world is changing, what are the leadership traits that are necessary for success?
Adoption of technology and being aware of the changing trends is must for leadership to keep in pace with the changing world.
Please share with our audience – what has worked well for you so far?
My Determination and Persistence has worked well for me.
I’m a very punctual and focused person in life and it also helped me greatly
What are the business mantras you have embraced as you sought to establish your success story?
Honesty, the right set of people, constant learning and adoption of technology are the mantras.
In your opinion what are the keys to success?
Key to success in one word would be focus.
If you are focused and determined, nothing can stop you from achieving your goals in life.
We would love to know your advice for all those starting out as an aspiring entrepreneur?
Becoming successful in business is more about your mentality, psychology and determination. The only true way to learn is by doing and you can’t afford to sit around waiting for funding, hoping someone else will come along to help you execute on your idea or complain that you don’t have the time. Making excuses won’t help you start a business and it sure as hell won’t help you create the lifestyle you want for yourself. Do everything in your power to avoid spending money when you start a business. Build a lean solution that provides value to your customers and only spend money on the absolute essentials at the moment you need them. Focus on setting & achieving small incremental goals rather than trying to start a business and instantly build your vision of what the company should be in the years to come. At last, Never stop building meaningful relationships with customers and other people in your industry.
BrilliantRead is committed to bringing stories from the startup ecosystem, stories that reshape our perspective, add value to our community and be a constant source of motivation not just for our community but also for the whole ecosystem of entrepreneurs and aspiring individuals.
Note: If you have a similar story to share with our audience and would like to be featured on our online magazine, then please write to us at [email protected], we will review your story and extend an invitation to feature if it is worth publishing.
