“We come from a generation where women empowerment, individuality, equal opportunity and independence are encouraged and valued although this is only a relative thing in the past 5 years or so.
It has been normal for a woman to leave her job immediately after her marriage and let her sole focus be only on her home while the same has not been expected out of men. Although the men are the sole breadwinners of the family, there is a disparity present that cannot be ignored. Her dreams and wishes have been ignored for far too long.
Now with this new wave of acceptance and independence, those women too want to reclaim their dreams, independence and aspirations but are unable to do so because of the gap they’ve had in their mid-20’s and 30’s where they have not been part of the workforce or do not have the sufficient educational qualification to do so.
This is where; my cousin and I wanted to build a space where we can include women of all ages to experience their freedom and fulfill their dreams in a way they haven’t before. ” say Roshni and Wiseline, Co-founders of Jay Spice Blends and Seasoning.
Check out our conversation with the team…
- Please tell us a little bit about yourself? What made you take the entrepreneurial leap so early on in life?
We are Roshni & Wiseline. We are actually first cousins and we pretty much grew up together. We are currently doing our Bachelors in Microbiology and Psychology respectively.
Growing up, our family has always encouraged us to be fearless and not to hesitate when it comes to work. We come from a hardworking family, who work continuously and meticulously, both in and out of the house.
So when we had this idea form in our minds, we immediately started it without any second thoughts and just got to work. We didn’t hesitate to think about our age or being an entrepreneur.
- What is the quick pitch for Jay Spice Blends?
We are a startup based out of Chennai with a passion for enriching the food we eat. With this in mind, we created this service out of our own home kitchen where our mothers, aunts and grandmothers cook, create and share our special spice blends and seasoning, which we make using the finest ingredients and without adding any preservatives. With the help of our team, we work to get these spices from our kitchens to your homes safely.
- What is the story behind your startup?
Roshni’s mum – Mrs. Indumathi Prasanna has always been a great cook with a knack for making traditional recipes perfectly, using her own homemade spices, which has always been in demand with our friends and family. Although she has always wanted to be a part of the food industry, she felt held back by her lack of education, experience and being a mother and homemaker.
Since the both of us have grown to be a part of the digital age, we saw that there was great merit in her idea and officially began this startup with her guidance along with those of our elder female family members. We wanted to create this space for women to feel empowered and not feel held back by anything. We want this to be a non-judgmental zone where they can finally have something for themselves.
- What have your accomplishments been so far?
Apart from our initial funding, we haven’t had any need to borrow money even for our own supplies. The fact that we have enough for our rotation, being able to slowly save and invest in certain necessary equipment and see a little more as profit is in itself a big achievement to our little middle class hearts.
Being able to be self-sufficient monetarily is a huge thing for us since we haven’t even reached our first anniversary yet. So that has been one of our biggest achievements.
- What are some short term/ long term goals for you?
Some of our short term goals are to employ some more women, with similar mindsets, to work alongside us for the betterment of all our lives. Another one is to secure a (homelike) warehouse where we can all work together, side by side and be able to store our fresh ingredients.
Our long term goal is to become a huge brand associated with purity, trustworthiness and taste of home. We want to eventually open restaurants filled with sweets, savories, full course meals and even chaats made with good ingredients (we are college students after all).
We also want to start food boutiques to make spice and food shopping just a little more exciting and bring joy to the mundane things in life.
Our mission is to attain all these goals slowly but surely, without compromising our quality, women filled workforce and affordability.
- What is your mission, and do you see yourself continuing with this effort even after graduating?
Absolutely!!
We have already started to learn about time management by balancing our course loads with the demands of a startup.
We have huge plans and do not intend to stop at the beginning. We know it’s a long road ahead of us, but we are determined and we also have the support of our family, so we are really looking forward to the journey ahead.
Our mission is to execute our vision of getting our products to be a part of every household while maintaining the purity of our products, without adding any additives, color or preservatives and maintaining our affordability.
- What was the source of your initial funding for Jay Spice Blends?
We started Jay’s with our pocket money and a little bit of help from our family which added up to be the sum total of Rs.5000.
- Who all have been influential in this journey?
Jay’s Spice Blends & Seasoning was actually named after our late grandfather Mr. N Jayaraman. He was a well-educated man in those times itself and gave immense importance to the education and employment of women.
He himself had three daughters and while his extended families were worried about all three being daughters and not having an heir, he was busy raising those women to be confident, capable, independent, well-educated and illustrious members of the society.
The little time we had with him, he encouraged and motivated us to be the same way. So we hope this venture honors his sentiments and we aim to inspire and lift others, the same way he did us.
- What are some of the challenges you see in being a student entrepreneur?
Time management is definitely a big one but we have slowly gotten into the groove of balancing our workload with our course load.
Then there definitely is being underestimated due to our age and lack of experience.
But where there are challenges, there definitely are advantages too. Whether or not people believe in us, our abilities and our vision, they are usually impressed by our zeal and determination which gives ways to opportunities.
- Tell us about the time you encountered rejection/Challenge because you are a student. How did you overcome?
Thankfully we have never faced complete rejection due to our age, only snide remarks and seemingly good natured talks.
We’ve overcome them by just listening and never justifying them or us. We wanted our work to speak for ourselves and it has.
With vendors and such, when we usually start speaking logistics, they realize that we know our stuff and stop with the snide remarks. We also have a couple of people we know, vouch for us to build their confidence in us.
Now, those very same people support and encourage our ventures.
- How much time do you and your team spend working on your company?
We spend a portion of our day on our respective online classes, individual studying, completing our assignment and course-loads and in helping out with house work.
Other than that, every waking moment (and occasionally the sleeping moments too) is spent in our company.
Our teams work on certain days and hours as per the work demands and as per their own responsibilities. We are all pretty close so we understand how and what everyone can pitch in. We have found our own rhythm which works well for all us.
- What is the one thing that keeps you going?
We are both pretty straightforward people who expect quality and purity in everything we own and have. And we grew tired of seeing labels promise us one thing and then deliver an impure or adulterated product.
So the mission to create an honest and authentic brand, sourced locally and benefitting everyone involved in the process truly brings us joy and fuels our drive. Seeing people rave about and enjoy our products really excites us to keep continuing even during the hard times.
- What are some things you learnt as part of your journey?
Like all other businesses we have had to improvise a lot of our operations due to the COVID lockdown and its implications. Something we have started to get better at is telemarketing.
We are used to selling our products either in person or through our social media pages. We didn’t realize we could tackle sales through the phone but we have been able to manage it quite well.
Therefore, I guess we’ve learnt that there is no good or bad times/ situations to beginning a startup, just determination and being able to adapt as the situation calls for.
- How do you prioritize your activities in a day/ week?
As mentioned earlier, both our studies and work is equally important for us, so we prioritize each equally as per its needs.
We also have a team follow twice every week, where we all meet up and follow up on our marketing, preparation of orders, shipping and reviews. This really makes it easier to know the tasks we each have lined up every day and reduces miscommunication within ourselves.
- What do you think you need at this point, to scale this venture? (Funds, mentorship, etc.)
For the past month or two, we have been trying to serve the food industry filled with restaurants, caterers and canteens. But since we are new to this business and do not have contacts in high and mighty places, it has been a little difficult to expand in that area despite our best efforts.
So if anyone from this industry has a need and are searching for a brand like ours, we’d love to sit down and talk business with them over a hot cup of filter coffee. It would really help us to travel the next mile in scaling this venture.
- Anything else you would like us to know about you or your organization?
We come from a generation where women empowerment, individuality, equal opportunity and independence are encouraged and valued although this is only a relative thing in the past 5 years or so.
It has been normal for a woman to leave her job immediately after her marriage and let her sole focus be only on her home while the same has not been expected out of men. Although the men are the sole breadwinners of the family, there is a disparity present that cannot be ignored. Her dreams and wishes have been ignored for far too long.
Now with this new wave of acceptance and independence, those women too want to reclaim their dreams, independence and aspirations but are unable to do so because of the gap they’ve had in their mid-20’s and 30’s where they have not been part of the workforce or do not have the sufficient educational qualification to do so.
This is where; my cousin and I wanted to build a space where we can include women of all ages to experience their freedom and fulfill their dreams in a way they haven’t before. So we started this startup, under the guidance of Roshni’s mother.
We think this is a very important to know what our start-up is based on to understand why we do what we do and what drives us.
- What is the one quote you live by?
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”- Peter Drucker
Find them on Instagram @jayspiceblends
