This Surajkund-based startup is UrbanClap, Amazon, Flipkart in one app
Home Jiny is an on-demand ecommerce aggregator for frequently-used household products as well as services needed by housing societies and micro-clusters.
When Kuldeep Pandit (45), Navita Srinet (47), Arvind Raina (44), and Sanjeev Kumar Bidhuri (42) realised how painful it is to juggle multiple vendors, shops, service providers, and apps for daily needs, they decided to solve this pain point and launched a startup.
The co-founders started working on the idea in October 2018 and incorporated in March 2019.
“It took us almost six months to build the technology platform, which includes two front-end (android and iOS apps), vendor app, delivery app and finally, a fully-integrated ERP,” says Kuldeep, CEO of Home Jiny.
The startup is an on-demand ecommerce aggregator for frequently-used household products as well as services focussed on housing societies and micro-clusters.
(LtoR) Arvind Raina, Kuldeep Pandit, Sanjeev Kumar Bhiduri, Navita Srinet, co-founders of Home Jiny
Run by Surajkund(Faridabad)-based Gravitas Home Solutions, Home Jiny enables users to choose and select products and services across dairy, grocery, fruits, vegetables, etc., along with frequently-used household services like maids, drivers (full-time and on-demand), cooks, tutors, laundry, dry cleaning, beauty, home cleaning, electronics repair, banking, and travel on a single app.
Kuldeep claims that the platform provides more than 1,000 frequently-used products in 16 categories and over 200 frequently-used services in 19 categories that are not offered by any ecommerce platform so far.
How it began
Indian households spend around time equal to almost 45 days every year to procure frequently-used products such as milk, bread, fruits, vegetables, non-veg items, and FMCG products, as well as avail frequently-used services such as maids, drivers, cooks, laundry, dry cleaning, electronics repair, beauty and much more, estimates the entrepreneur.
Kuldeep tells us that he and his friends felt that even though everything was readily available, it still took a lot of time and effort to get things done.
The four aim to organise these unorganised sectors to meet the unmet need of having a one-stop solution for all household needs – both products and services.
“This is how we came together and launched Home Jiny, which is the first app in the world where instead of juggling with multiple vendors, shops, service providers and apps, the customer will have the freedom to get everything on one app,” says Kuldeep.
The startup has built the entire inventory-based model for perishables and almost 70 “top quality” service vendors.
It started in Faridabad at Omaxe Heights, where almost 30 percent of the society downloaded Home Jiny in just two months, says Kuldeep.
The startup’s strategy is to expand by building micro-clusters of product and service-based ecosystems.
“We focus on targeting housing societies and building density and penetration,” says the CEO.
He adds that the app has already serviced over 10,000 orders.
Leaders to entrepreneurs
All four founders have had leadership experiences before Home Jiny.
Navita led management boards of startups and has served as the MD, India and Board Member at APCER Life Sciences, which she also co-founded. Arvind has managed services P&L ranging from Rs 500 to 1,000 crore with various companies managing their end to end service delivery and supply chain.
Sanjeev, also known as Sachin, is a serial entrepreneur with 20 years of experience in building businesses in areas like education, warehousing, and mining. Kuldeep has 20 years of diverse leadership experience in companies such as Coca Cola and Johnson and Johnson.
Quality and Vendors
Home Jiny ensures quality services and products by following three different supply chain models.
Kuldeep explains, “For perishables such as bread, milk, vegetables and fruits, we follow an end-to-end supply chain. This implies that we visit the source of manufacture, buy the products, grade them, store them, keep it fresh, and deliver.”
For FMCG products, Home Jiny follows a hyperlocal model. “We have multiple tie-ups with hypermarts wherein we procure products on a just-in-time basis and supply to customers on demand. We deliver all the supplies between 5 am and 7:30 am, and have a record of 99.5 percent on-time delivery so far,” says Kuldeep.
“For services, we work on vender-based model” he adds.
The Home Jiny chief claims that while there are hundreds of vendors available in the market, the startup works with a select few based on certain parameters such as experience and track record.
“We ensure the quality of vendors by following a process of initial screening based on certain specific criteria, followed by further shortlisting by our well-qualified and experienced in-house services team. Out of these shortlisted vendors, we train a select few, and finally enrol only the highest-rated ones on our vendor app. These vendors are trained and certified by Home Jiny,” explains Kuldeep.
Market and Business model
Kuldeep estimates that the grocery market in India is worth $500 billion and the services market around $700 billion. And Home Jiny’s business model involves almost everything that a household needs.
“We are unique as we provide the largest width of portfolio, which is unmatched in the world,” he adds.
The CEO claims that almost 50 percent of the company’s sales are from private labels that include fruits, vegetables, eggs, non-veg items, and services.
“We can build serious profitability in private label over a period of time. The balance 50 percent is from branded products, where we would be able to build profitability and gross margins as we scale,” tells Kunal.
Funding and plans
Home Jiny received funding of Rs 2.5 crore as soon as it started from 12 investors, including Mukul Sareen from Rustx, Kunal Pandya from NCrypted, Vineel Nalla from 50K Ventures, amongst others. The four co-founders have also invested in the startup
At present, it operates in Delhi-NCR, including Faridabad, South Delhi, and Gurgaon. In terms of growth, Kuldeep claims that the number of orders is doubling every month. The startup claims that it is currently doing 5,000 to 6,000 orders per month from 10 societies. The most trending services include home cleaning, beauty, laundry and dry cleaning, and domestic help.
It also plans to start operations in Noida early this year and move from 10 to 1,000 societies in the next 18 to 24 months.
“The idea is to be fully operational in Delhi-NCR in the next six to 12 months. We also plan to scale up from the current 10,000 households to around 1,00,000 households by the next quarter,” says Kuldeep.
The startup is now in talks to raise another round of funding of about Rs 10 crore to expand its operations, build a talent pipeline, and invest in technology.
“Our vision is to provide households freedom from the negative labour and extensive time spent on daily buying from unorganised markets and vendors,” says Kuldeep.
(Edited by Saheli Sen Gupta)
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