The pivoting tale of ICS24x7; From professional corporate services to Cakehunt

iCare Services, known as ICS24BY7, is a firm based out of Ahmedabad that handles bill payments, banking, grocery and vegetable purchase and other menial chores for clients. Launched in October 2012, ICS24BY7 aims to help save on late payment charges, penal interest on credit card etc. for people busy with other things to do.

The Trio

ICS24BY7 is a joint venture between colleagues turned friends turned partners Ashish Parik, Pavan Balani and Jatin Shah. An engineering graduate, Ashish was with the banking industry for six years and ICICI bank was his last outing. Ashish learned the ways of life very early in life as he dealt with his father’s death at a young age and his mother’s cancer later. Pavan is a commerce graduate and had worked with Ashish & Jatin at ICICI Bank. At ICS24BY7, Pavan manages the operations while Jatin looks after operation and distribution part of business.

Filling the gap

“We saw people waste a huge sum on late payment charges, penal interest on credit card besides the delay in other mundane jobs etc and that made us think of ICS24BY7. We have decided to help people save money and time by outsourcing bill payments, banking, grocery purchase, vegetable purchase, medicine purchase, etc to us,” says Ashish. The trio started with few thousands rupees from their pocket, but soon ran out of it. Another round of funding from kin, helped them stay afloat and also turn around ICS24BY7.

They offered bill payments and banking services to individuals and societies. “We have installed post box type box in society. All the members of the society can drop their billing and banking related cheques in this box. The box is cleared on every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We don’t observe any holiday. There is no limit for cheque deposits and members can drop unlimited payments though this box,” claims Pavan. They charge a princely sum of Rs. 10 per flat per month for the service rendered! Jatin claims they have become a preeminent part of their customer’s lives.

Ashish soon realized that he needs to start a horde of services to stay afloat as the margin in the bill payment service was not huge. Fortuitously, the firm started getting inquiries from individuals for cake delivery. Ashish could convince Monginis about their services and subsequently they started delivering cake from February 2013. In the course of making these deliveries, they identified a need gap they need to fix if they want to make a headway. An online foray in partnership with few offline stores would get them the necessary traction and numbers. “All the bakers can showcase their products on CakeHunt, which in turn will be promoted, sold and delivered by the website,” he says. Ashish claims they sell all products at a very competitive price than others sell for. CakeHunt also lists information about bakery products, places these products come from, and can also help get them delivered to any place they like, says Jatin.

Both ventures are bootstrapped and rely on print media and word of mouth for marketing. Recently when ICS24BY7 crossed turnover of Rs 7 lakhs lac per month, the trio’s felicity knew no bounds: “Being down at heel has never forced us to retreat and it is our passion within that pushes us to continue,” says Pavan. They are currently a team of 6 people and ICS24x7 hopes to make it big in the service industry. Entering other Tier 2 cities and metros is also on cards for the startup.

Website: www.cakehunt.com and http://ics24by7.com/