Thank God I Failed
7.
PANKAJ JUDGE
Chai pe Kharcha
Cash, says Pankaj Judge, is king,
queen, jack, ace and joker. He learnt the worth of moolah the hard way after a
venture he started in May 2011 left him on the brink of penury.
Jiyo India, Judge's maiden startup,
shut down in three years, just before his marriage in February 2014, courtesy
of the sudden exit of its cofounder in October 2013. By then Judge had sunk
lakhs into the venture, a quick service restaurant chain for health food
(sandwiches, salads, juices, shakes).
“Health food was more of a fashion
statement four years ago,“ recalls Judge. The timing was right, Jiyo had
expanded to five outlets in Kolkata, it was profitable, and poised for growth
-via a fresh dose of funding -when the co founder quit.
“It was a bolt from the blue.
Everything happened so suddenly that the business had to be shut down,“ is how
Judge, a graduate from IIT-Kharagpur, puts it. The man who quit an IT job to
turn entrepreneur didn't break the news to his parents, kept his in-laws in the
dark, choosing to inform only his to-be wife who stood by him.“It was a blow,
not a knockout punch. I had to move on,“ he says. Immediately after marriage,
Judge met Nitin Choudhary through a common friend and they both decided to
start Chai Thela.
A kiosk-based tea startup, Chai
Thela serves a variety of teas, starting from `10 to `25. The Noida-based
company has opened six outlets in Delhi-NCR in just five months, and serves 500
cups from each outlet. Last month it closed its first round of undisclosed
funding, which it would be using to open 20 outlets by the end of this
financial year and over 500 outlets by 2020.
Starting up soon after tying the
knot is not for the fainthearted, which is why Judge is quick to point out that
had it not been for his wife, he would not have made it till here. “She was the
`man of the house' during my days of struggle.“
ETM26JUL15
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