BENGALURU: Onions form the base of nearly all recipes, irrespective of the cuisine and only those who cook, know the copious amount of tears that are shed to add flavour to the dish that finally turns into a hot meal. It is these very tears that led to the formation of EGK Foods (Everyday Gourmet Kitchen) in
December 2014, which offers freshly fried onions to commercial and residential kitchens.
Recalling the incident that sparked the idea to start EGK Foods, founder Satyajit Roy says, “My mother, a very busy and qualified social entrepreneur has made sure for the last ten years, every Sunday, we have a big pot of mutton biryani in the house. And this meant that when the maid didn’t show up, she was the one who had to chop onions and fry them for biryani.”
One such Sunday, Satyajit who went out, returned home to find his mother all-teary eyed. “The culprit that caused those tears were the onions! Like any son, I didn’t like to see my mother crying and thought this problem was something that would affect everyone. With this in mind, we started to test out the market. The first exhibition we did, gave tremendous validation for our product and the mothers from South Bombay area immediately took to the product, hailing it as a much-needed and a tear-free
solution to tastiness!”
Besides being a saviour to thousands of homemakers and chefs, EGK Foods directly addresses the onion wastage problem in India. “India, despite being the second largest producer of onions, has a massive 25 per cent wastage figure annually which amounts to five million metric tonnes,” Satyajit says.
“We propose to solve the wastage issue by applying unique food processing practices and adding value across the supply chain for all the stakeholders involved, ranging from the farmers we work directly with to the consumers for whom we add value on multiple fronts,” he informs.
“We have seen sustained growth over the past few years. The company procures onions directly from the farmers in Nasik. I was the only founding member when we started. Along the way, I have had two rounds of investment and co-founders have also come on board,” shares 32-year-old Satyajit. The co-founders are Jagdish Gothi and Pradyumna Kokil.
They set up the first kitchen with an initial investment of Rs 5 lakh. “Although we set out to sell directly to consumers, we soon realised that consumer education was an expensive affair, even through retail and
e-commerce channels. We made a very conscious pivot to a B2B model where we sell our product to restaurants, caterers, hotel chains, flight kitchens and government canteens,” informs Satyajit.
The company has 50 permanent employees and processed more than half a million kilograms of onions last year. “We hope to be a major FMCG company, whose strength lies in backward integration, which we have set up with farmers, providing them with buyback guarantees and supporting technology,”the CEO adds.
With more than 500 restaurants across Mumbai, Hyderabad,Bengaluru and Pune subscribing to EGK, they plan to expand further. “As per the feedback received from our existing clients, we plan to expand our product line to gravies and pastes as per their requirements. Ginger-garlic,garlic, ginger and onion paste are in the pipeline,” says Satyajit.
In a nutshell
Everyday Gourmet Kitchen was started by Satyajit Roy in 2014 with an initial investment of `5 Lakh
Over the years they went through two series of funding, during which two co-founders joined in
They are a B2B product that sells to restaurants, food chains and even government canteens
They currently have 500 restaurants on board and are planning on expanding to other food essentials