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Idli, dosa, uttapam. Chettinad curry. Sambar. Sunday curry. Pasta sauce Arrabbiata. Gujarati dal wada. Amchoori aloo paratha. Lachchha paratha. Dal makhani. Dal dhabewali. Chana masala…
Sounds like the menu of a restaurant? No. These are ready-to-cook dishes prepared without any preservatives by Fingerlix, that are now available in parts of Mumbai for direct delivery. The orders can be made online, on the company's app or at the neighbourhood retail store. The shelf-life of these preparations is about five days.
“By the end of 2016 we will be expanding our reach from about 25 retail stores to 120 in Mumbai alone,” Shrikrishna Bharambe, Co-Founder and CEO of Fingerlix, the ready-to-cook food solutions provider, told BusinessLine .
In 2017, the firm is targeting expansion to Pune, Delhi and Bengaluru, followed by other top cities. The three-month-old start-up provides fresh, almost-ready, hygienic food solutions inlcuding batters, mixes, curries, dals, parathas, and fully-ready accompaniments such as salads to go with them.
Bharambe, an IIM-Bangalore alumnus and a former Johnson & Johnson hand, founded the start-up in May 2016 with Shripad Nadkarni, ex-Marketing Head of Coca Cola India, and two others. “We get about 600 orders a day, mostly from retail stores.”
Made without any preservatives, the start-up’s kitchen at Chandiwali (Mumbai) turns out about a dozen almost-ready such delicacies everyday and delivers the same at the customer’s doorstep in a radius of 4-5 km, or at retail stores at an affordable price tag ranging from Rs 65 to Rs 150 for dishes that can be quickly prepared at home for four to five persons.
“Ready-to-eat products available in FMCG stores are not part of the everyday meals we have at home. Moreover, these outlets are not designed to handle perishable products and mostly market preserved or frozen food.”
“We would soon be adding more dishes to our portfolio,” Bharambe said.
In the recent past, start-ups that have ventured into the food segment as food-tech or restaurant aggregators have failed to deliver as they have focused more on technology or logistics than on the core proposition of food itself. It was important that the quality of products offered was maintained while ensuring better back-end services.
It is here that start-ups like Fingerlix have entered with the aim of assisting home-makers in the process of preparing food.
However, no start-up seems to be currently offering that missing link: the cook!
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