Charcoal Biryani plans to spread flavour across India

At a time when several biryani-based QSR (quick service restaturants) chains have failed to go national, Mumbai-based Charcoal Biryani is nursing ambitions of becoming a pan India player. The year-old home delivery QSR incubated by Lion Ventures and HNIs has already raised $0.5 million and is now ready to raise funds as part of Series A as it plans to expand its operations beyond the city of Mumbai.

Krishnakant Thakur, Co-Founder, Charcoal Biryani, said, “We already have 16 centres in Mumbai today but the plan is to have 500 centres in the next three years with a pan India presence for which we would need VC funds. Biryani is a huge category upwards of ₹2,000 crore and the reason most players have exited or are struggling is due to quality and consistency of the product.”

Currently Charcoal Biryani has a home delivery model with outlets measuring 200 sq ft but as it expands to Tier 2 and 3 cities, there would be bigger dine in formats. With annual revenue of about ₹7 crore, Charcoal Biryani is being cautious while scaling up and ideally would like to break even in Mumbai before venturing into more cities.

“We want to be the domino’s of Biryani since there is no national player. But we have to break even in one geography before scaling up to the next city. While we definitely want to become a national player, we have to be cautious while raising big money for Series A for which we will be in the market in the next 6-9 months,” he added.

Meanwhile Biryani-based start ups such as Ammi’s Biryani and Biryani 360 have either shut shop or have pivoted to other cuisines.

In the case of Ammi’s Biryani, despite the backing of SAIF Partners and having lower capex, it could not become a national player.

“Scaling up and justifying profits is difficult in the QSR segment and most of us are struggling,” admits Navaj Sharief, CMD & Founder, Ammi’s Biryani.

Having started operations in Chennai and Bengaluru, it had turned profitable for a while but its entry into the Mumbai market did not bode well for the QSR chain and it had to shelve its plans to go national.

Others such as Biryani 360 with its app-based delivery format also pivoted to selling yogurt and rebranded itself as yogurt 360.

Besides, raising money has not been easy for domestic QSR chains compared to their international counterparts. “When it comes to raising funds, international QSRs find it much easy than domestic chains. This is due to the fact they are already established QSR brands who have learnt from their mistakes in other markets and have more robust systems in place. Today there are barely any domestic QSRs who are successful in this country with the exception of possibly a few like Haldirams,” observes Siddharth Bafna, Partner & Head of Corporate Finance & transaction services, Lodha & Co.

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