NSRCEL Startup: Supply6
Do you grab a banana in the morning instead of a hearty breakfast because you want to beat that rush-hour traffic? Are you constantly stuck in meetings or on the go during lunch hours?
An average individual needs about 2200 calories a day with 6 macro & micro nutrients in a set ratio. While the macro nutrients like carbs, proteins & fats provide energy, micro nutrients vitamins & minerals are necessary for body functions like bone growth, metabolism, building immunity, etc.
Vaibhav Bhandari, the co-founder of Supply6, always knew this. However, during his MBA in London and professional life after returning to Bangalore, he would constantly find himself strapped for time to grab a nutritionally complete meal 3-4 times a day. So much so that he started blending his meals into shakes to be able to have it on the go.
That is when he came up with the idea of Supply6 Meal 1.0 – a nutritionally complete & convenient meal in powder format. Each single-serve meal sachet contains 20g Proteins, 49g Carbs, 18g Fat and 27 Minerals & Vitamins – this constitutes about 20-25% of the daily recommended nutrients required by a healthy individual. All you have to do is add water, mix well and drink while on the move.
Image: Supply6 Meal v1.0
According to National Family Health Survey 2018, 1 in 4 urban Indian skip breakfast almost daily, and 3 in 4 Indians eat unhealthy snacks or fast food for lunch at least twice a week.
This can increase tiredness & stress at work, and makes it difficult to focus, apart from having long term health effects.
For a professional in urban India, there are very few healthy & nutritious meal options. There are some new age restaurants that serve healthy salads or display nutritional values on their menu items. But they do not come cheap. An average healthy salad costs around Rs. 250- 350.
The other problem is time. Eating out at a restaurant or the office cafeteria takes anywhere between 30-45 minutes. If you order in, 1 hour. People end up having to skimp or even skip meals in a hurry to reach office, during long-drawn meetings or even dinner.
Cut to the pandemic, and the nutritious options further shrink for people working from home. Cooks are still not allowed by many RWAs in metros and there are apprehensions around hygiene and sanitation when eating-out or ordering-in.
“The idea is to always have a packet of Supply6 handy, in your backpack or at your desk in the office. Whenever you feel like you cannot carve out 20-30 minutes to eat a traditional meal, just empty a pack of Supply6 Meal into a glass or a shaker, add water and consume on the go.” Says Vaibhav.
Started in 2019, Supply6 currently has health & nutrition products like 100% Diet Oats and Vegan Protein Shakes for people on Keto diets. They have done 50 lakhs in revenue till date with a run rate of 5 lakhs per month in the first quarter of 2020 before the lockdown.
To craft Supply6 Meals, Vaibhav got in touch with Bridreth Khokhare, a veteran nutraceutical researcher who has worked with companies like Abott and British Biologicals in the past.
After months of research and trials, they came up with a blend made from real food ingredients – proteins from Peas and Rice, Carbs from Oats and Fat from Sunflower seeds. Bridreth has since joined Supply6 as the Chief Product Scientist.
Initially incubated at NSRCEL at IIMB, Supply6 has recently been selected for the 2020 Cohort of Silicon Road Food Tech Accelerator.
Starting with the powder format in a smooth Vanilla flavor, the company plans to launch Supply6 in ready-to-drink and bar formats soon to give users more convenient options. The CMO, Shambhu Agrawal, says “Apart from convenient formats, we also want to do a lot of experimentation with taste and texture. In the pipeline, we have different flavor blends including savory Indian cuisines to ensure mass adoption and avoid flavor fatigue with our users”.
“Priced at around Rs.120/meal, Supply6 will be equal to or cheaper than the cost of eating out in most urban centers. With higher volumes and efficiencies in the supply chain, we are hopeful of bringing down the price to sub-100 level and make it affordable for as many as possible. We do not want to price it at a premium and make it a niche product like health supplements or meal replacements for weight loss, which is what most of the current products in the market are” says Rahul Jacob, COO.
Supply6 plans to launch Meal 1.0 in the first half of August. Users can also purchase meals from their website, Amazon, Flipkart and grocery retailers like BigBasket, Grofers and Dunzo. They are also in talks to retail the product in some 200-odd vending machines in tech parks and apartment complexes in Bangalore.
Please visit https://supplysix.com/ for more details..
