Jyoti Ramnath, Founder, CraftMyGift.

The Young Entrepreneur has taken her talent and skill for finding and personalizing gifts and come up with a wonderful idea. She explains her concept saying “CraftMyGift specializes in creating valuable and meaningful gifts where there is a deep touch of personalization and emotions. Our creative team constantly comes up with new concepts to suit a particular gifting need. We are not just a gift store but a team of gift experts suggesting which gift suits which occasion. All the gift ideas we come up with are presented to a customer as gift suggestion when they approach us with their requirement. Once a gift is selected by the customer, we start the processing.”

“The idea of CraftMyGift came from one my passions of adding a touch of personalization to each gift that I used to gift my friends. I did some market research and realized that a lot of people don’t find the right place to get such gifts and end up creating such personal gifts on their own. That’s how I thought of starting CraftMyGift.”

“While naming the company I wanted to ensure it conveys the message that we can create a gift from scratch for people and has a personal touch to it. After listing almost 10 names we zeroed in on CraftMyGift. Yes the company is registered and our logo is also trademarked.”

Unlike your traditional gift makers they have a selective focus on each of their customers. No mass produced trinket can match their creative force for inducing happiness. She says “We are not just selling gift items but a lot of feelings, memories and emotions. The gifts we create have such a deep connection between the person gifting and the person receiving it that is it difficult to match it with readymade gifts or photo gifts.”

“CraftMyGift is one company which has the right combination of creativity, professionalism and understanding of human emotions which is highly required to create gifts. Each of our customers has walked out with a happy smile on their face and great satisfaction. This can be seen from the feedbacks that we regularly receive from our customers.”

“For each of the gifts, we work very closely with the customer to create something which is perfect for them and expresses all that they want to say through the gift. We take inputs from the customers also in case they have any specific need.”

“Currently we have served around 50 customers and each one of them has been extremely happy with their purchase.”

“Our USP is in our unique gifting ideas, personalized service, gift advisory service and the detailed personalization done in products.

There are a lot of players in the market in the space of custom Mugs, T-shirts, Key-chains and photo books. We differentiate ourselves from these companies by:

• Deep understanding of which gift suits which occasion & relationship and providing the service of gift advice to our customers.
• Creating gift products which are personalized for customers in a unique manner adding lot of meaning & value to it and not just a photo print.
• Being able to suggest a completely new gift idea to suit their specific requirement so that no one walks out without making a purchase.
• Being a company which is providing a personalized gifting service starting from advising on what is the perfect for an occasion to creating the product for a customer.”

Her idea is also one that will be growing not by making the process more mechanized or by introducing material value but concentrating on the thought that goes into the gift. She says “We plan to focus more on close relationships of people where there is an immense need to express a lot of meaning and value to loved ones through gifts. We plan to add more gifts for themes like Anniversary, for Kids in the age group of 5 – 10, birthday return gifts, gifts for mother, father as well as the ever popular romantic gifts.”

“We also plan to bring a lot of life and meaning in work place gifting by creating some unique and refreshing gifts for the corporate sector.”

With her entrepreneurial visions already in the market she revealed why she chose to make her idea into a business venture. She says “I don’t have anything against a 9-5 job. If a person thinks he/she can grow in that setup, they should definitely do it. For me the challenge of building something on your own seemed more exciting than a 9-5 job. The satisfaction that I get in building CraftMyGift from scratch and making it successful is much more.”

The journey toward realizing her dream was fraught with perils. She faced them head on and emerged victorious. She reminisced on the tests she has endured saying “Some of the challenges faced in my journey have been:

• Finding the right resource or talent especially in design field.
• Understanding where to invest & where not to invest

I have not completely overcome the above challenges but it is a constant learning. I try talking to as many experienced entrepreneurs as I can and take their advice in solving challenging problems.”

“There has been innumerable number of mistakes that I have made being a first generation entrepreneur working on my first business. Some of them are:

• Giving work in the hands of wrong people
• Spending too much money on unnecessary things. For e.g I spent too much on building a basic website, I bought some of the items which I never sold, I spent on office space when I didn’t really need to have one.
•  Spending time on things which are unwanted and ignoring the activities which need the most attention.

But each of these mistakes has brought in lot of learning.”

Jyoti believes that the money she has invested has been worth it. She adds “The growth of the company in its first year was quite slow as it was a huge learning period for me. But this year has been quite good. We added 2 part time employees & 1 full time employee.”

Her idea has won the Best Business Plan award at IIM-B while it was still on paper. CraftMyGift has also been featured in multiple news media’s from time to time. 

Jyoti has been best by thoughts of retreating to the safe environs of a 9 to 5, she says “I’ll be dishonest if I say that thought does not cross the mind especially when things are not going well. But then your company is your baby and if you know there is a need for the service you are providing, you really question yourself that why can’t you put your 200% to it and take it out of the mess. This thought gets you so involved with the company that taking up a regular job feels like a failure.”

“It is the deep passion to make the company a global success and constantly listening to people who have been there done that. I regularly listen to Stanford lectures which are feely downloadable from their website. In these lectures they call an entrepreneur every week to share their experience. Listening to them just charges you up and also provides loads of learning. There is always something new to learn.”

Jyoti had a few words for future entrepreneurs looking to make their ideas come alive. She says to them “I would say you are taking a difficult but exciting, unpredictable but worthwhile route. If you are really passionate about what you are doing and do see a market for your offering, go for it with all your energy. Read a lot, speak to a lot of mentors, ask a lot of questions and practically try everything. Do good analysis but don’t get caught in analysis paralysis. Start offering the service or product soon to get a feel of real customer. Irrespective of whether you succeed or fail, it is going to be a journey you’ll cherish.”

Yourstory believes that Jyoti has found her calling in life and while wishing her success also recommends CraftMyGift.com for all your special gifting needs.