As part of our relentless pursuit to identify and share with our community some of the unique and compelling startup stories from the ecosystem, this week we spoke to Team Designer Events Inc to understand more about their journey, their vision and the way forward. Kaveri Vij and Akshay Chopra are the co-founders of Designer Events Inc. It is one of the well recognised Boutique Luxury Wedding Planning & Designing company. Let’s read their unique story!
Excerpts from our exclusive interview with Kaveri and Akshay:
Talk us through your background and your journey as an entrepreneur so far, please. How did the idea to start something like this come from?
Me and Akshay have studied together at DPS R.K Puram and then went on to do hospitality together. I was a science student and Akshay was a commerce student. Akshay wanted to study design but ended up at a hospitality school. After giving precisely 15 engineering exams, I wanted to become a chef after reading an article about Sanjeev Kapoor. So we both found our way to a hospitality school.
We worked in London for a year as a part of our course. Right out of college, Akshay & I took divergent paths in life. After wanting to do an MBA, got selected to work with Pullman Hotels, ACCOR as an events coordinator. Akshay on the other hand got selected at Trident, Oberoi Gurgaon in the Kitchen department. He’s always been very fond of baking, and this was his golden moment in time.”
Being in the hospitality industry didn’t give us much time for ourselves. An industry that calls for being on your toes round the clock became our entire life. I always wanted to be a wedding planner and Akshay had always wanted something of his own. On getting my first promotion and being extremely disappointed with my raise, I decided to quit and pursue my MBA dream and Akshay meanwhile shifted to handle marketing for a spa chain.
Just while we were going through these shifts in our life, we got invited to our best friend’s sister’s wedding in Chandigarh. One of the most chaotic weddings me and Akshay have ever attended! On our drive back to Delhi, me and Akshay started discussing how we could have done this differently. We both felt Aunty & Uncle, our best friend and her elder sister did not enjoy one bit of the wedding, as they were only bogged down with endless wedding work. Uncle also fell a little ill at a function.”
We both realised there was a gap in the market, and we felt we could fill this gap by being an extension to the family.
Our prime thought was to take the stress away from the families and be there for them to handle all the work. Oh! Sorry missed mentioning, Akshay was still working unlike me who was only preparing for MBA. When we got back to Delhi, we both got back to our life and got busy yet again. It was Holi after a week, and we were invited to a Goli lunch. Me and Akshay decided to ditch the lunch and go on a drive to discuss our business plan. And the next day, yet again we were back to being busy.
After seven days, Akshay called to tell me he’s quitting his job. And I couldn’t be more excited. I had got admission in two colleges – but it was time to make choices. Akshay had made his and I made mine too. Just like this, we took the risk at 24 years with a mere investment of INR 25,000 to get our website in place and some fancy business cards, we were ready to take on this world. We started out from our cute home office planning the most memorable days for our guests, and started what we call Designer Events Inc. – 7 years, 110 happily ever afters, unconditional love and a treasure of priceless memories.”
What attracts you towards entrepreneurship instead of a corporate career?
Well, to be honest, entrepreneurship happened to me and Akshay, like it was our meant to be.
It found its way to us silently. And now that we know this world, we wouldn’t trade it for anything. Working 18 hours a day in hotels was definitely not the life we wanted for ourselves. But irrespective, we would never complain because that was our strong foundation and we are so grateful for it for teaching us all that we know.”
On starting DEI, we realised being an entrepreneur was not all fun, but a very big responsibility. A responsibility towards yourself, your people, this society and to the people you provide your services too. But at the same time, being a master of your own time and a dictator of your own decisions is definitely the most powerful feeling. Building an empire brick by brick takes a lot of grit, hard work and commitment. We found our way through failures, little successes, trading our nights for days, and burning our midnight oil to get to a place. A place which is never defined.
It is a place which you feel you will arrive once you have accomplished x,y or z, but the irony being – you will have more wishes and more wants for your own work. And this is how the life of an entrepreneur is – A rollercoaster. You work – 365 days and 24 hours almost.”
However, the most satisfying part is making a difference in the lives of people, providing employment, providing livelihood and of course for us planning the most memorable days for our guests. We work to make dreams come true, and trust us when we say this it comes with the non-negotiable clause of never making a mistake.
The risk of failing is something that is a constant run, but with time we have learnt our way around failures and made friends with it too. There is no true success without falling and trying to innovate 50 different ways of doing something so uniquely that the world will remember. We don’t know if this justifies the role of an entrepreneur – but this is truly our home, our life and our hustle to become better with every passing day. Entrepreneurship is a journey and not a destination, make sure each of your days is full of purpose.
Our audience would also love to know what kind of problem you are solving with the help of your startup?
As a boutique luxury Wedding Planning and Decor design company, with a vision to live for the moments we can’t put into words, we want to empower to celebrate the most special day of someone’s life hassle-free. In a world of big fat Indian weddings, we still focus on the smaller numbers to personalise every detail of the wedding.
We do not plan weddings for more than 400 people. Our vision is to plan boutique luxury, intimate, unique and understated weddings that truly reflect the family’s personality and style. We work to create a bespoke authentic experience and the happiest celebrations. With our love for life, passion for weddings, creative stride, boundless energy, devotion to work and commitment to their couples, we design celebrations full of style and character.
Every wedding is a story to tell and we work tirelessly to plan it just the way you have dreamt of it. Inspired by our couples, our wedding planning style is infused with personal touches, a lot of detailing and a big no to over the top shenanigans.
We weave in our couple’s personality to create something that feels just like love. As Luxury Wedding Planners & Designers we weave in there own character and personality to create an atmosphere that feels just like home. It is not only the couple and their families, but each and every guest at the wedding who needs to feel special and take back a heart full of memories.
We work tirelessly to plan a day which will be remembered for generations to come. Together we’re a force & like something we always believe in – “If you do something with Love and heart, it is bound to resonate with everyone!” because we understand that “The Secret Ingredient is always Love.” A big no to the word “NO” keeps us going endlessly and making the impossible possible.
During this COVID-19 crisis, what are the measures you have undertaken to continue your business without disruption?
According to Spillan & Hough, crisis management is “the function that works to minimize the impact of a crisis and helps an organisation gain control of the situation. It also operates to take advantage of any benefits that a crisis may present” They further go on to establish that in certain times, the crisis dictates the recovery process rather than an organisation adapting to strategies to solve the crisis, just like Corona did for the wedding industry.
Post the lockdown, when the Indian government allowed 50 people at a social gathering, Indian weddings saw a three-sixty degree paradigm shift. From an average guest list of 500 in our country, the real challenge was to fit the guest list to an intimate number of 50. A lot of wedding experts dictated the trends post covid, but in our opinion, these trends were a forced consequence of Corona, a few commandments which came by as a result of the rules enforced due to a corona hit country.
The industry saw a varied response among the people willing to get married amongst this pandemic – a certain section decided to postpone their wedding, some people opted to go ahead with the rituals with the most important people by their side and some couples have found it as an escape route to run away from the big fat Indian wedding their parents have wanted and opted for the intimate weddings in the given scenario. Weddings are a festival in India, and curtailing their level was a new challenge in itself.”
The following are the measures we took to cope with the situation :
a) Intimate weddings: To ensure the lesser number of people gathering at one place and ensuring social distancing, the first obvious trend that found its way was Intimate weddings. It wasn’t a predicted trend but something that found its existence as a result of the regulation announced by the government to allow a 50 person wedding.
Intimate is a word which can be influenced by the local meaning of any country, we would like to call them Micro Weddings or Pop up Weddings, with a selected handful of people alongside the couple. This wasn’t difficult for us, as we have always had a boutique wedding planning style.
b) The uncertainty reflected in the shorter timelines for wedding planning. We entertained anyone who needed to plan a wedding in these difficult times by offering our services as consultants virtually, and not being physically present.
c) We saw a drastic decrease in the wedding budgets. A sudden slow in the economy combined with the mindset of organizing a wedding for a lesser number of people, reflected in the reduced average spend on weddings by 65%.
“When people have to cut back on expenses, eating out and entertainment outside the home are the first things to go.” (Hsu and Powers,2002). It was difficult to explain to guests about the minimum charges for us, but we did not take up any project where the amounts for our services weren’t accepted. We did not resort to the desperation of getting business and were fully confident the industry will bounce back.
d) A lot of new things became a part of our life – masks, gloves, PPE Kits, gloves etc. A new set of rules were imposed to ensure safety guidelines by each and every one.
e) Considering the uncertainty, The author saw the bargaining power of the end-user increase considerably as compared to pre-corona times. We battled this by sticking to our ground and explaining to the guests about our fixed costs and expenditures.
f) Wedding meetings found their way to a virtual world. A way no one could have imagined. With the evident need to meet and discuss the wedding query, pre-corona times were replaced with zoom meetings. This showed us a new way of perhaps saving time and also incorporating this style in our daily ways of working.
g) We also saw a very unusual and unacceptable trend of Indian society moving away from the very essence of auspicious days, and the more important factor being the availability of the right resources to get married in the safest way possible. A country who wouldn’t indulge into any wedding rituals without a “Muhurat”. This also gave us the opportunity to work with more dates in hand and allowed flexibility to choose the projects to space them out.
h) We started to suggest immunity-boosting foods in a number of weddings in the buffet spread, just like a Jain food section.
i) Concepts like E-Shagan (Contactless money gifting) and wedding registries which have always been a very foreign concept in India, had a booming market post corona. As per HriDei, a wedding registry firm in India, they showed an increase in sales from May to September by 25% as compared to last year.
j) There was a drastic increase in online shopping post corona. We capitalized on this opportunity to identify the products anyone could buy online for a wedding and had it conveniently delivered to one’s doorstep.
k) India is a DFM country – Do it for Me, but there has been a sudden wave of DIY – Do it yourself as people have decided to tie the knot and the restraint on budget also made them self-sufficient. We promoted a lot of DIY ideas through our social media pages to constantly help people – not to compromise on their big day.
l) These times saw a drastic increase in the rental of things – from clothes to jewellery because of the direct pressure on people’s earnings. Our wedding rental business saw a boom too.
Apart from the above-listed ways, a lot of couples thought marrying amongst the Pandemic was definitely creating history. There was an increase in the rush of people wanting to get married post the lockdown. A defined shift from a mass to a micro approach found its way to the Big fat Indian Wedding World. To build relationships and authentic connections over an online world, was the new normal of the wedding industry.
The wedding planning checklist had some interesting new additions: Thermal screening, hand sanitisers, gloves and cuddle curtains. The UK Based – Anthony Cauvin invented the concept of cuddle curtains to hug his quarantined grandmother. How can weddings be complete without hugs. He invented a hugging station – where a shield is made between two people, so it’s a shield guided hug.
Above all, the pandemic guided the weddings to be a hybrid mix of the best of both worlds. The ceremony took place in real-time and the relatives who weren’t able to attend the wedding in person were present virtually to bless the couple. Till now, if someone wasn’t able to come, we would only regret not coming, but very rarely have an online setup for them to view it.
Considering this, Now the planning points are – time of the day, the information that needs to be mentioned on the invite – instituting a dress code for everyone attending the event virtually, any specific background for pictures, any specific drink to cheer for the newlyweds etc. Two lawyers got hitched in March in Bangalore, and 400 people attended their wedding virtually. Rather than a relative being the star of creating stress, this hat would now move on to technical glitches., if any.
How do you manage yourself and keep on going despite the challenges? What drives you?
Our undying love for our work, our timed deadlines and just us together as a team keeps us going.
Every journey has its ups and downs, but what keeps us together is our commitment towards our work and towards each other. The choice of never giving up keeps us alive through our most difficult challenges too. Having the right business partner beside you to live your dream, can be the real deal-breaker.”
After all these years, we have found our way of understanding each other, accepting our strengths and respecting each other. Even on our toughest days of getting annoyed with each other, we wake up the next day to show up at work without any grudges. By comprehending each other’s unsaid words, we have truly built a strong foundation of our friendship and our dreams. So what keeps us going is each other.
If we can put it together, Our failures have made us stronger together. We fill in the gaps for each other wherever needed, his weakness is my strength and my weakness is his strength. The world around us fits so perfectly well that we have crafted a beautiful world of memories by relying on each other and working together.
What are the three most important lessons you have learned building your startup?
(i) The first most important lesson from our journey is – doing the right thing at the right time. Timing is very essential. If Akshay hadn’t quit his job then, or I wouldn’t have chosen to forget my MBA – we wouldn’t have been where we are. Your choices make your destiny and choose the path of your life.
(ii) We have learnt how compassion can make a big difference to your way of working. Understanding the needs of others can always put you in a better place to deliver. Always think from others point of view. As an entrepreneur, committed to making a difference in the lives of others, being compassionate definitely takes you a long way.
(iii) A lesson – Me and Akshay abide by is “People might forget what you said, who you are, but they will never forget how you made them feel.” – This is our living mantra. We live to make people feel special. And if you are able to do this in your own little or big way, happiness is added to your days.
In your opinion, what is more necessary: An idea or a good team for a successful startup?
In our opinion, both need to be a perfect balance to be successful. An ideation brought to life with the right kind of team is magic of a very different kind. You can’t have a team who does not resonate with your ideas and believes in your values as a company.
Choosing the right people is a very important step to determine the success of a company. For us – whether it’s an idea or people or just anything in life, we feel anything which has our full heart in it will surely be a super hit. “Connection” is what we thrive on, if we can’t feel connected with anything, Me and Akshay wouldn’t go for it.
Given the rapid pace at which the world is changing, what are the leadership traits that are necessary for success?
Being a leader is not an easy job. You have to be the best at what you do and also know everything this world around you expects you to know. Leadership is a quality you design for your own self. You can’t pick up a style laid down by a textbook and follow it. You need to carve your own style and follow it to suit your ways.
Being leaders to our team, me and Akshay always choose kindness in our style. We have always believed in the power of believing in others. We feel, believing in someone can get them to deliver much more than their potential. We are very empathetic as bosses and always have an open-door policy at work to discuss any issues at hand our team has. We have a strong culture promoting growth and learning.
We feel, the right direction is very important for every individual’s personal growth in terms of work, performance, leadership and being an integral part of the team. We always include our team members in the decision-making process to have a variety of opinions and also instil responsibility in them.
You need to always lead by example, which is something me and Akshay truly believe in. And a dictator type leadership style is something we both detest, and feel it confines the individual to them achieving only their daily tasks and not going beyond their descriptive job descriptions.
You are always positive and motivated, what keeps you going?
Our love for our work, the amazing people we get to work with and being the witness to so many love stories first-hand keeps us going. Me and Akshay truly believe in working with good people, people who respect us and value us for the US. This keeps our heart full of love and our motivation always high to deliver the best.
We always believe in going beyond the ordinary and hustling to create an experience never seen before. Working with new ideas and designs every single day of our life keeps us so excited about work.
No two days are the same at DEI but are filled with loads of work as we have so much to achieve and only one life to be. The families we interact with give us unconditional love so that we never have a dull day in our life.
We would love to know your advice for all those starting out as an aspiring entrepreneur?
This is what Me and Akshay would tell you:
1) Never fear making a beginning. It is always about the first step and everything else follows.
2) Never fear taking risks or trying something new, after all, if a bird never tried, it would never fly to know the entire sky is her home.
3) Never fear failure, that is where the true learning lies. Your failures show you a side of you, which you wouldn’t see in a normal situation. They will be mirrors to make you realise – you are capable of handling much more than you imagine.
4) Every day is a new day, take it as it comes. Never let your past mistakes take over a new day. Always start afresh.
5) Entrepreneurship is a journey, making the most of each day. Every day becomes a part of your story to be told to this world.
6) Nothing comes easy, if you want something you need to work for it and work for it with a grateful heart. There is no substitute for hard work and commitment.
7) Never stress about situations which aren’t in your control. No one gets anything by stressing, so rather deal with this world with a calm mind.
8) Always be your biggest cheerleader.
9) Be so crazy and so dedicated to achieving your dreams, that when anyone looks at you, they can read this in your eyes. Otherwise, don’t do it.
10) There is nothing like work-life balance as an entrepreneur, you got to struggle, make your mark and strive for your success. There is absolutely no shortcut. You got to hustle and make it count for your own self.
11) You have choices and chances. You need to always choose to take a chance, and never give up.
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