 And once again, welcome to E4M Pride of India brand series, a unique effort to celebrate the success stories of leading homegrown brands in the country. In today's episode, we are glad to have with us Mr. Dheeraj Gupta, the founder of Jumbo King, a 20-year-old QRSR brand known for its lip smacking what-a-powers in burgers, but with a twist. The brand further expanded in 2018, introduced a variety of vegetarian burgers, positioning itself as India's one of favorite go-to-snacking brands. Today, Dheeraj will be talking all about the brand, its journey, and the role of marketing in its success. Welcome, Dheeraj. Thank you, Mansi. It's a pleasure to be here. It's our pleasure to have you here, Dheeraj. But let's just start the discussion. Can you tell us all about the inception story of the brand Jumbo King? What inspired you to start the brand and what was the initial thought when you began the process of creating this brand? I think when we started way back in 2001, the idea was very simple. We wanted to create an Indian QRSR brand. So I come from a family of food entrepreneurs and we are the third generation in the food business and having pursue amount of management and then an MP and finance. The thought was to always use the modern technology and the modern systems which were available. Of course, in 2001, they were modern today. They look outdated. However, use what the next-age stuff and build a brand. And when we looked around in Mumbai city, Barapa was one of the largest selling products, single largest snack, which was unbranded. And we said, why not go about launching this product as a brand? Our inspiration, I've said before, was McDonald's who picked up the burgers, which in America at that time were equivalent to the Vodapars. And a very simple street side food which they put systems around and were able to scale up beautifully. So that's how Jumbuking started. Great. As you said that when you had started the Jumbuking and just Vodapa was your prime and only offering. It was mostly an unbranded space there. I think there weren't any brands established selling Vodapars in a restaurant-like space. Also, you said that your inspiration has been McDonald's and it was also the time when these international QSR brands were trying to find a footing in Indian market. So what was the market situation overall like? What was it analysis when you started the brand? And where did you try to position yourself like a direct competition of McDonald's or something different? I think for the first now, Jumbuking, of course, we have repositioned ourselves, we call ourselves the Indian burger. I will discuss with you why we made that switch. So we are a 20-year-old brand of which the first 15 years we lived the life of Vodapars and then we moved to Indian burger. So I think when we started 2001, Mumbai is a large city. We have close to 75 railway stations in Mumbai city and each station pretty much has a famous brand of it. So you can technically say that there were 75, famous, local, but I'm upset as in Mumbai city. What Jumbuking did was to create a brand which started scaling up. So not only at one station, we moved into every station and that is, I think very clearly worldwide what has happened and what happened in India is that all commodities will eventually become brands. And I think that for India is a very large market, huge scope. There is so many things which are yet to be branded. And the basic meaning of what a brand stands for is, it's people's trust. So different brands make different promises to their end consumers and those consumers buy into that promise. So when we were talking about a brand, we were talking about the hygienic for our power. And I think it was that brand promise which the Mumbai girls really bought it too. And that is how we were able to make a name for ourselves with very, very, very ministerial marketing budgets. And so I think the market is very large. At that time, we said Mumbai city used to consume about 20 lakh units of what our power take. And we said that even if 10% of the people would care about hygiene and 90% don't. So let us target those 10% people, give them the hygienic they need. And with that premise, we positioned ourselves as the more hygienic option. What was the initial pricing point for your products when you started? We had started at five rupees. Like super super. You said that you spent miniscule marketing budgets. What was the marketing and the brand positioning strategy in the first phase when you were just establishing the brand setting up in Bombay? Yeah, so we are not all right at the beginning. At that time, the P and the VC environment was not very, very active. You had to build out brands with your own resources. So we had allocated a 4% of our total sales into marketing. And of course, the sales were small. So the 4% was much smaller. So we did what best we could. I think we, so we used PR very, very effectively and we used to go out and talk to the media about what we are doing. And we got, we were very fortunate to have got good media support. My wife Rita, she was heading about the move that was at that time. And now she runs an entire company of her own. So however, it was, I think people, the media liked what they were seeing and they're sharing about it with people through their newspapers, radio channels. And I think that is how slowly we got traction. Was there a lot of... Was Masi was largely what I'm talking about. Sorry, I couldn't get the last point. I think initial, I think the initial five years was largely what I'm talking about. But did you invest in a lot of, out of form activities as well, maybe pamphlets or maybe, you know, holdings? Was there, was that a part of the plan? No, so we wanted to, we did not want to build as you know now we are seeing a lot of businesses where they do large fund raises and there's cash burn and people understand. Go with the assumption that they're going to do cash one for five years, 10 years and build out brands. So that was not how we were thinking. And even today we don't think of businesses that way. I think the effort was to really understand the positioning part. What is it that the customer wants? What is very clearly differentiating us from the other what about guys? What is differentiating us from the McDonald's and the Burger King's of the world? And then finding that niche and, you know, focusing on that niche very, very sharply. I think that is the biggest, so you know, I often say that at the end of the day people choose brands and when people are creating brands. So you have to choose categories. It's like when people are a what about brand. So that was the what about category which we had selected. And in all categories, you always have the number one, number two, number three player. These are the three players who make money. And then there's a long pay off a lot of also hands. So we had in what about the position ourselves as the most expensive hygiene, you know, those kind of attributes. And that is what we kept on communicating at all times. And somewhere in 2016, we realized that, you know, the category that you incorporate in, you know, sometimes tends to have limitations. So what about as a category had a limitation of pricing power. People used to feel that what about is cheap food and they did not want to pay a team for it. And they did not want to pay a team for that. And so then we had this realization came to us then at one of our stores, you know, we were buying from the best in class batteries for the patty for the sources for the press, you know, lots of systems and processes and place. And right next to one of our stores, there was a local burger night, you know, who probably was not following the hygiene standards. It was a local and individual offering. And we believed a lot in market research. So we asked, went and spoke to our customer why they were choosing us. And they said that because you're not bad. And we also asked the people who were buying from, you know, the next door guy, they said that we are buying burgers. And our product at 20 bucks, they were saying, this is expensive. While the burger paying 60 rupees for it, they felt it was very good value for money. So that's when we realized that all the automation and the systems you want to put in place, putting all of those costs onto the product. And then, you know, selling a product for 20 rupees was becoming very challenging with the kind of inflation that, you know, we are seeing. So we said that, you know, why not we just kind of move our positioning to the end in burger? So, you know, I say that in two categories. So we said that what about we went as the most expensive, what about as positioning? In burgers, we said that let us go with the positioning of the most value for money. Yes. Right. So let that be the more expensive and the premium. Then we take up the positioning of being the most value for money. And I think it has been a huge, a big realization, very different, very good results for us over the last five years, where we are able to, you know, give people the experience that they want, the taste along with the quality hygiene, you know, service and all of those, you know, parameters where we are very important and which are aspiration for today's youngsters without having to compromise on margins. So how many SKUs you have currently under the burger of your position? Yeah, yeah. So we start, we've been a, you know, strong believer of having a very, you know, good promotion and everyday promotion. So you look at, you know, Walmart, they used to have this curbside sale on every Saturday that they would take one of two items and set it really at very discounted prices for which they became a talk of town and people would come to them and then they would sell other stuff also. Then you have, you know, McDonald's doing the Happy Meal. Yes. Then, you know, different, different brands, they have their own way of expressing. So we came up with this thing of that let us have a jumbo king of the day, we call it the jiki of the day. And that is how, because there are seven days of the week, we ended up having seven types of burgers. And the original, the Indian burger we call it, the Mumbai burger, which is the new avatar of the Vada Maw. So we have basically eight types of burgers and all are vegetarian. Okay. Why have you stuck to the vegetarian positioning of the brand? Why? Because non-vegetarian is becoming a big marketer in there. Yeah. I think being vegetarian was more a choice where, you know, we felt that, you know, as in, you know, it was a personal choice that we did not, you know, kind of kill animals, cruelty against animals, you know, all of those kind of things. So, you know, I have done two courses of Vipassana, you know, so there was a lot of inputs around. So I said that, you know, we can create a very large business. We see this as a, as a billion dollar opportunity around vegetarianism. So that, you know, people go out and do it without having to get, because I think the bigger trend, which is there in the West, and which will eventually come to it, yes, a lot of people are becoming vegan. Yes. I think that a lot of people are vegan. More people are becoming vegan than they become non-vegetarians. Yes. So you may say that probably 10 years down the line, this would have been the smartest thing to do to stick to vegetarians. Yes. Makes sense, completely makes sense. And what's your positioning in market like now? You have explained that you had a shift in perception and you introduced burgers as well. So which are the key competitors of yours right now in the market? And what's the USP? What's the standout point for your brand? Okay, excellent question, Seema. So what, so, you know, we keep looking around how the large brands, brands which are built to last, you know, how they get created. So I'll give you an example of say something category like pizzas. So you have, you know, Pizza Hut and Domino's, which are the two dominant brands in that category. Both selling pizzas, Pizza Hut gives that restaurant experience. They have a fine time, kind of experience. Families go over there with their kids to celebrate birthday party, et cetera, right? While Domino's selling the same pizza, you know, similar, they have slight variations, but essentially the product is the same. Price point is the same, but they super specialize and focus on delivery, right? So in pizza, same product, two very different brands giving very different experiences. So we said that in the burger category, there will be the McDonald's and the Burger King. They are giving the fine time experience, right? Jumbocking, we want to give the on-the-go experience. We want to put up these two and put up these stores, where when the person is in a rush in a hurry and wants to quickly, he has the paucity of time, you know? But he's looking for a, you know, a decently priced hygienic, tasty food that he can eat before he rushes off for his next lecture, or for his next meeting, or before he's boarding the metro train to go to his home. So that is where he said that we will be the, we will become the go-to option for people who are on the go and, you know, who are wanting to buy burgers. So burgers as a category, McDonald's and Burger King is somewhere where you will go to the store to eat. Jumbocking to the store, which will come to you because it will be there at every look and form. And what's your marketing positioning like right now? Which sort of mediums are you using? How much are you spending currently on marketing? And how has it helped your brand to grow? So I think when building the restaurant, the QSR business, right? So there are two things which are very important to keep in mind where the tool of economies of scale applies. So one is in the purchase on the supply chain side, right? Because we have only these eight types of burgers, right? Even when we introduce a new burger, we remove one of the eight, which is not working, right? So our menu will always remain eight. However, there will be some variation which we keep from. So this is done because we want to keep our supply chain very clean and we will enjoy economies of scale. The same tool applies for marketing also. So for us in Mumbai, like we are close to 100 stores in Mumbai alone, right? And we see, we feel that Mumbai is a market of close to 300 stores for us. So we feel that how many brands are there or rather most of the brands would have to go national to be able to put up 300 stores. So we have this unique advantage that within one city we can put up 300 stores. So we are going ahead and doing this. And that's how, so we also keep it in our marketing efficiency. Like our ad budget for this year for Mumbai City alone is about three crores. So we've come a long way in that sense from having the entire ad budget used to be 10,000 rupees and we used to pay that, we have something to pay with. Now, it is a very different ballgame bet. I think of course the past two years of COVID we did not do any advertising at all. And but this year, as you know, I think one city, three crores, we will probably be one of the largest vendors in our category. Yeah. So it's a lot of hyper-local advertising. And are you using digital in a medium? We use digital also. Digital is a reality and we've used smartly. It can give great results. So we do a lot of the ATL stuff, like we do train advertising this in audio and trains because that's where our customers are. Yes. Then for our, so very clearly, then we are looking at you on the post when people are on the go, what kind of stuff are they doing? They're checking out the M indicator app or what kind of stuff. So digitally how we can target them then through the ATL, traditional medium, what can be done? And also not drown people with advertisement. So we have a marketing calendar in place. So we do about four activities as we are in one of water with a clear sort of reinforcing our positioning of the bubble on the go. And how many cities are you present at currently? So now we are in Mumbai, some amount of presence in Pune. We have just launched about six months ago and Delhi has such a done very, very well for us. So we will be at 10 stores in Delhi by June and we have three stores in Lucknow. So presently we have only three or four cities here. Thank you so much for launching in Delhi because I was in Bombay for a year before the lockdown and really used to enjoy Jumbuken. And when I came back to Delhi, couldn't found the product. So that was something that I was missing. So thank you for launching in Delhi. I'm going to be regular customer again for you. So we are at Kashmir Iqit metro station. So next time you're there. Definitely going to Brabhubhai. And are you also, because in Bombay you were present on Spiggy and Zomato. What's the situation in other cities like right now? So, Spiggy Zomato, I think we are very fortunate that the digital development growth which has happened is like, you know, if we were an apparel brand, we did not have a Spiggy Zomato delivery for us. We are very fortunate that we are in the food business and Spiggy Zomato of the world have got created in the food space. So I think the entire delivery part which we used to miss out is now happening. So I think we treat them more as friends than hosts. And so we, in fact, now with the advent of cloud kitchens, you're seeing a lot of the cloud kitchen thing which has come up. So see, these are all, sometimes people get a lot of hype around it. I feel that Domino's was the first cloud kitchen which got created 50 years ago. The policy strategy they used was we will not put up from stores in the front. We put up stores on the backside and make our number famous and people will call the number and get their pizza. Today, it's an app, right? People are saying it's the app and get the food and they're putting up stores which are on the backside of the high price. Right, so it is not new, but it's a flavor of the season. You get a lot of funding if you say you're putting up a cloud kitchen. So about three months ago, you know, we decided that let us have the best for both the points. We have our offline stores which are two on this one, three on this one, three stores and we said that let us make 20% of them into cloud kitchen which means basically they will now operate 24 hours, right? And I think it has worked extremely well for us. Business at those stores, at some of them has doubled because of this and getting confidence from that. So we said that let us not, we should not fight out the new technology. We should figure out how we can use it to benefit instead of getting worried that, oh my God, cloud kitchens are gonna replace all restaurants and you know, we are all gonna be in trouble. So they are the enemy, let's fight them. I think that is probably the wrong way to look at it. Instead, wow, this is great. It's gonna help us. Let us figure out how we can collaborate with them. Right, that is the way to look at it. And so I think, you know, and in fact, now we have a separate team and a separate marketing strategy for how to increase business on the cloud kitchen part of what we do and the offline part of business. Because the two mindsets are very different. The online guy is a very different mindset. The customer has very different reasons why they buy. So I think we are very, I think more keen on understanding how people choose. It's like if Seema is traveling in Mumbai, if she's choosing jumbo king, why? So she's looking for a quick snack and she's looking for hygiene, she's looking for taste, she doesn't want to fall ill. So we have to kind of fulfill that reason and also understand that she's not gonna consume the product every single day. There will always be options which one is gonna buy, but even in once a week, she chooses to buy jumbo king then the job is done. So similarly, understanding the mindset of the online customer, when does he buy? Why does he choose jumbo king? Right? So I think a lot of people, they look at what competition is doing, look at what others are doing. We keep telling our team, because let us understand why are our customers choosing us? Because he's made the choice. How can we say, why did you choose jumbo king? Exactly. So we did this really interesting exercise. There's a jumbo king store at Andheri metro station and right next to us, about one feet away, is a jumbo king store. So we went and we spoke to a thousand customers, people who are buying at jumbo king. We asked, is there a jumbo king right next to us? How come you chose jumbo king? And we were kind of understanding why they buy jumbo king. And then we did a similar exercise with the jumbo king customers. There's this jumbo king here, how come you, why did you choose to buy jumbo king? So such beautiful insights came out of how people are actually choosing. Yes. So I think research-based marketing is extremely powerful. With this time taking, it requires a lot of application of mind. And I think as, you know, for your audience, if there are entrepreneurs who are going to be, you know, watching this video, we, you know, probably get very busy with the execution side, putting up stores, managing the staff, doing the supply chain and production. And marketing is something which is fiendish because you have closed up the marketing manager, but you know, let them do it. However, I feel as so I, so we have a very strong marketing team, but I say that my full-time job is only two things. One is marketing, the other is new product. All the other functions have been, you know, we have got great professionals in the team. Yes. And I think we'll do a great job of handling that. Completely agree to the last part that you said that people are spending a lot of time on execution, but there's a lot in the background that happens that needs to be taken care of. Especially in today's time, when the consumer is a whole big, it's the time when people are trying out fewer things. You know, there's a lot of change in lifestyle that's happening and it's the right time to get to the nerve of the consumer to hold them to the future. I think consumers are always evolving. Otherwise, I was saying consumers are always evolving. Otherwise, in 2001, we should not have got a start, right? Exactly. We were new. We were setting the apple cart at that time. Yes. But and people tried and the brand got created. Yes, and today you are a big success story as well. If I ask you, what's the future looking like for you? What are your plans in terms of expansion, in terms of marketing and what are you trying to achieve within the next six months? Six months, I don't know. But five years, so when we complete, 10 years of being a burger brand, right? We hope to be at about 650 stores, that is what our target is. And largely in Mumbai and Delhi. You know, I just have very small. So India is such a large country. And I think that the bookings we can keep on. What excites us is that the United States of America with the 33 crore population has gone about 18,000 subways stores. 30,000 or 26,000, I'm mixing up the number. But, you know, a lot of subways stores and we said that in India. With, you know, 150 crore people, right? So we can put up a lot of the bookings stores. And yes, someone may argue that, but there are a lot of people, but not necessarily they don't have that spending power. I say that even if 20% of them have the spending power, we are still 30 crore people. That's equivalent to USA co-population. So it's a huge market. Yeah, there's a lot of corporate. Once you realize that. And then you just, you know, focus on strategy execution. Great. All the best for that. Hope to see more stores coming in at many more cities. And as I said, I'm going to be a regular customer. Thank you so much for your time here. It was a pleasure having you with us here today. Thank you. Thank you. Bye, take care.