DUmmy well with well-made batters

KOCHI: When P C Mustafa and his cousins started the ‘Id Fresh’ batter business in 2006, they only had Rs 25,000 and a small hope in their hearts. A nearby store in Bengaluru was selling a few small packets of idli-dosa batter and the cousins decided to adopt the same business model. Mustafa, who hails from a small village in Wayanad, had just completed his masters from the Indian Institute of Management in Bengaluru and he was looking for a business that could strike gold.

“Back then, idli and dosa batter were just entering the market. There were no major players and people were only beginning to get used to the idea of the ready-made mixes. But, we were in for a big surprise. The batter started selling. We soon found a space where we could set up our small business- a 550 sq ft. area, with two grinders, a mixer and a sealing machine. It is in Bengaluru that we found our footing,” says Mustafa, who now runs a Rs 100 crore business in several parts of the country.

Most recently, the company set up businesses in Kochi and Kozhikode. And he says, the Kerala market surprised him. “We always felt it was a smaller market. But, Kochi has given us very good business over the past one year. The lifestyle has also changed and people have definitely opened up to such easily available mixes,” said Mustafa. Jesluck, the founder of Homespring, one of the pioneers of the ready-made chappati and porotta business in Kerala, says it is the idli-dosa business that is raking in good money. 

“Every household makes idlis and dosas at least thrice in a week. We have tried selling palappam mixes, but that has not clicked. The popularity of ready-made appams is yet to catch up. However, we are reading the market and hope to introduce more similar mixes in the near future,” says Jesluck, who started his business in 2010.

So what are the reasons behind the success? “Most of the population in Kochi are working families, where both husband and wife are bread-winners. They also stay in a nuclear setup, so sometimes there is no one at home who can prepare a batter. This is why, such batters come in handy,” adds Jesluck.
 Most recently, other brands have come out with unique batters including pazhampori mixes and uzhunnu varieties, bringing food in comfortable platters to the Malayali.