The Story Of Chumbak

-Pratiti Nath

We all like to travel and collect souvenirs and mementos from places we have visited. Now, think of a foreign traveler, travelling to India and looking for objects to remember the place. Well, here the market is flooded with conventional showpieces and mementos of monuments like Taj Mahal, Howrah bridge, India gate or Qutub Minar. At best clothing like saris and pashmina shawls.

A couple from Bangalore got bored of all this. Vivek Prabhakar and Subhra Chadda thought of channelizing their frustration to come up with a business enterprise. Thus, in 2010, started the journey of Chumbak, the popular lifestyle brand. The name by itself attracts like a magnet, and indeed true to its property. As illustrated by the co-founder Vivek Prabhakar, the name means “kissing stones”. As they wanted to monopolize the Indian refrigerator magnets market. Their tagline “home is where the love is” delivers the ultimate attraction punch for a lifestyle 

The Journey so far

Chumbak with just 45lakhs arranged by the couple by selling their house. It started as a 30 member souvenir store and ended up being a 150 member lifestyle store. The duo coupled their knowledge with pragmatism. It started as an online store that continued to flood the e-commerce market. 2012 brought the opportunity of seed funding via Matrix partners. Then , in 2013 they opened their first flagship store in Bangalore. 

Visiting their store or browsing through their products will make you gasp in disbelief. It has a quirky, colourful and vibrant range products. They have a magnificent range which spoils you for choice. It has  a wide range of lifestyle products – from key chains to mementos to dresses to footwear to apparel to jewelries to bags, wallets, watches, phones- all under one roof. 38 categories with more than 500 products. Thus, here is a brand which perfectly understands your needs. Price, design, style, range, colours EVERYTHING!!!

Like all start-ups they wanted to be different but in a different way. The company philosophy is to do it in a fun and lively way. This is visible in their public interaction and eccentric vibrant range of products. They team up the curiosity of a child, the innovation of youth and the experience of a knowledgeable person. 

Another potent problem for a start-up is real estate. Subhra and Vivek were pragmatic in this matter. They started with small kiosk of 150-200 square feet and then made it to 2500 sq ft. They have 20 such kiosks with more than 60 outlets in 5 major Indian cities. Of them Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore gathers the maximum revenue (60%). 15% of sales are made through online. They are first of its kind store. They are quick to adapt with changing market dynamics and fashion trends. This lead to an unprecedented growth rate of 300%  in 5years. 

Future Venture

In the coming years they are targeting a 400 crore annual revenue. It is vying to spread its wings all over India. Their future target is to open more such kiosks in other cities. Chumbak planning to boost is online sales percentage to meet the target. 

Overall, with their unique set of ideas and executions they are a force to reckon with it. A viable start-up story for every entrepreneur dreaming to make it big.