Three former collegemates-turned entrepreneurs have taken the fad for healthy food to the next level by opening a restaurant in the city that serves only organic food.
“Ours is a unique, first-of-its-kind concept,” says Sristi Organic Foods CXO and one of the promoters Mahendra Bharadwaj about Jivati restaurant, in the commercially-vibrant Jubilee Hills, that was inaugurated on Thursday.
The 114-seater fine dining restaurant, he says, uses 100 per cent certified organic ingredients. Apart from procuring from vendors who have been certified for their processes, the restaurant is also certified by Vedic Organic, an agency mandated by the APEDA (Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority).
Apart from serving buffet and thali, the plan is to also market organic food items, both sourced from vendors and other branded players in the market. The company has invested ₹2.5 crore on the restaurant. By mid-April, a restaurant serving organic non-vegetarian food will be opened in the same building.
Expansion
There are plans to open 15 more restaurants in the next one year and in the process expand to Bengaluru, Chennai and Mumbai.
Estimating the investment required for the expansion to be ₹40 crore, Mr. Bharadwaj says it will be met through funding by the promoters besides HNI (High Networth Individuals) based out of the US and Australia.
Catering to the corporate clients and dishing out organic sweets, packed in earthen pots, followed by namkeens are also on the cards. On the revenues, he says, at full-fledged operations, from the 15 restaurants and retail packaged organic food and product sales, Sristi Organic Foods expects to clock ₹180 crore.
Describing marketing and logistics as the twin challenges of organic food business, which still is in a nascent stage, Mr. Bharadwaj says the proposed expansion will lead to bulk purchase and thus benefit from the economies of scale.
The cost of organically grown products, which are about 20-30 % higher, are expected to come down with more acreages coming under cultivation. In 3-5 years, the cost of organic and non-organic food items will be almost at the same level, he said. The restaurant was inaugurated by Raghunatha Rao, Director, Homibaba Cancer Research Hospital on Thursday.
