Meet the brother-sister duos who joined hands to build successful businesses
As we celebrate Raksha Bandhan, these four brother-sister duos have together scripted successful business stories.
Siblings know you better than anyone else. So, how would it be to run a business with them?
We have heard of unreasonable fights between brothers and sisters, but eventually, it’s their bond that grows stronger day-by-day, and it is this togetherness that helps them run a successful business.
As we celebrate Raksha Bandhan, SMBStory lists out five brother-sister duos who have built successful businesses together.
Stuti Gupta and Agnim Gupta, Amrutam
Stuti Gupta and Agnim Gupta
Brother-sister Stuti Gupta and Agnim Gupta came to the rescue of their father’s loss-making ayurvedic business and revamped the same to build Amrutam in 2017.
From supplying herbal medicines to medical stores and doctors for over 10 years, the duo revived the family business and started selling premium personal as well as healthcare OTC products online, through their website, and directly to the consumers (D2C). They also repackaged the products and labelled them differently.
Stuti says the company was running conventionally till then. When they entered the business, the first thing they did was to make an online presence.
Agnim and Stuti started social media advertisements along with influencer marketing in 2018, which they say garnered them customers. Today, Amrutam gets around 4,000 orders in a month, and as per RoC, it made sales worth Rs 69 lakh in FY20.
Stuti says the brand clocked a turnover of Rs 2.78 crore in FY 21, with its products starting at Rs 500.
Almas Nanda and Amin Virji, Inc.5
Almas Nanda, Founder, Inc.5 and Amin Virji, Managing Director, Inc.5
After finding a dearth of comfortable footwear options for women, Almas Nanda decided to solve this problem. She says that many women give up one for the other: a pair of sexy heels that pinch your toes, or a comfortable pair of flats that has nothing by way of style going for it.
In 1998, when she was 24-years-old, she started Inc.5 to provide women with stylish footwear that did not compromise on comfort.
In an interview with SMBStory, her brother, Amin Virji, who is the Managing Director of Inc.5, shares that Almas wanted to break the myth that fashionable footwear cannot have the comfort element. She used to travel a lot and after seeing the trend in other places, she wanted to incorporate them into her footwear brand.”
Amin expanded Almas' vision of a concept footwear store to being one of the home-grown market leaders in the footwear category. The family credits the present success to the hard work and team spirit of all the family members and employees.
Inc.5, which now has a strong presence in Tier I and Tier II cities, including Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Kanpur, Lucknow, and Pune, records an annual turnover of Rs 163 crore.
Neha Kanodia and Meet Kanodia, GoGaga
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Neha Kanodia and Meet Kanodia, Co-Founders, GoGaga
Finding a sweet spot between the legion of dating platforms like Tinder, Bumble, and Happn, and popular matrimonial services like Shaadi.com, JeevanSaathi, and BharatMatrimony is GoGaga, friends of friends dating app founded by brother-sister duo Neha Kanodia and Meet Kanodia in 2018 in Bengaluru.
Incepted to bridge the gap in the Indian market to cater to singles looking for a serious relationship, the duo is using innovation to help a generation, who, much like them, have struggled when it comes to finding their significant other (SO).
The GoGaga team today is six members strong (including the founding duo) with the app claiming more than 40,000 users, of which over 30 percent were brought in through word-of-mouth.
“Owing to the concept driven by matchmakers, GoGaga’s user base has more or less equitable distribution between men and women,” says Neha, noting the platform has been growing at 22 percent MoM in terms of its user base.
Rohan Sharma and Prakshi Sharma, RK Jewellery
Rohan Sharma (right), Managing Director, RK Jewellers with Kiara Advani (centre) and Prakshi Sharma (left) at an event
Rakesh Sharma and his wife, Sunita, founded RK Jewellers in Delhi in 1995 to serve customers with the best gold and diamond jewellery designs in the market.
In 2011, their children Rohan and Prakshi stepped into the business and wanted to build on top of their parents’ achievements. They wanted to transform RK Jewellers into a brand that offers aesthetic design collections, catering to an audience beyond India.
“Earlier, people used to buy jewellery as assets, but now people consider it fashionable to wear designer diamond and gold jewellery. Hence, my sister and I stepped into the business to cater to that niche audience and make products with international aesthetics,” Rohan Sharma tells SMBStory.
While the brand caters to women of all age groups, manufacturing diamond and polki jewellery, the brother-sister duo, in 2014, decided to corner the millennial segment with the launch of another label, Prakshi Fine Jewellery. It offers diamonds and gemstones jewellery designed to appeal to millennials.
The siblings now plan to capture a niche audience and tackle competition from brands like Tanishq, Kalyan, Malabar, and others.
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Edited by Megha Reddy
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