Hit badly by the pandemic, corporate gifting company OffiNeeds.com with over 1,000 customers including Infosys, Tafe, Flipkart, Tally, Lenovo, Siemens and Lowe’s, pivoted to offering work from home (WFH) products and solutions in mid-May.

The 15-year old, Bengaluru-based company launched TheHomeOffice.in for corporates and independent consumers in mid-May to make WFH more efficient and comfortable. The company offers Wi-Fi improvement products, curated work-friendly ergonomically-designed furniture, electronics and stationery, along with free shipping and installation of products pan India.

The first few orders started trickling in from May 22. By the end of May, the company was delivering orders worth ₹25,000 per day, which swelled to ₹3 lakh worth of orders/day by end-June, and ₹10 lakh/day by end-July. In the last 45 days alone, 4,000 orders were delivered and the company raked in a total of ₹2.5 crore in revenue, a top executive told BusinessLine .

“2020 was supposed to be a bumper growth year for us with significant traction for corporate gifting. Both our revenue models were witnessing traction — creating e-commerce brand stores for our corporate customers on their websites and running it for them, which we started in 2018; and our franchisee business of experience centres spanning 500-700 sq ft in corporate hubs across Bengaluru and Chennai, which we started in 2019 for corporate buyers to touch and feel our products. Unfortunately, our corporate gifting business came to a grinding halt soon after the national lockdown was announced in March, as events and conferences were cancelled. We were faced with two options — either shut shop and wait for recovery to happen or start selling Covid-19-related masks, sanitisers and PPE gear,” recalls Srikanth Acharya, founder and CEO, TheHomeOffice.in, the e-commerce arm of TouchStone Enterprises Pvt Ltd.

Over-abundance of supply

Since every organisation had started selling Covid-10-related gear to generate revenues, there was an over-abundance of supply in the market vs demand. That’s when realisation dawned on Acharya and his team that all corporates had started WFH and that WFH is here to stay. WiFi routers/adapters/UPS, range extenders, noise cancellation headphones/mikes, printers, webcams, bluetooth speakers, LED ringlights, study lamps, tables, chairs with lumbar/neck support and wheels/no-wheels, laptop tables, white boards, markers, pens, post-it pads, notebooks, water bottles, flasks, mugs, masks and sanitisers are available on TheHomeOffice.in.

“While WFH is a safer option, it presents many issues because 99 per cent of homes are not designed for a Work From Home scenario. Corporate professionals find it very difficult to work from home especially since they are used to luxurious corporate spaces that provide the best of everything, including lighting, furniture, internet connectivity, F&B and recreational facilities. Now, they find themselves stressed out amidst multiple distractions, uncomfortable seating and the dreaded failure of the home Wi-Fi network,” said Acharya. The company exited FY20 with ₹18 crore revenue and has been growing at 25-30 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y) for the last three years.

In July, orders for corporate gifting started making a comeback and the company delivered 30 orders worth ₹50 lakh. With the corporate gifting business on one hand and the WFH solutions business on the other, TouchStone Enterprises Pvt Ltd expects to grow its revenue by 39 per cent and exit FY21 at ₹25 crore.

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