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MY ENTREPRENURIAL JOURNEY

The only thing worse than starting something and failing, is not starting something

Entrepreneurship is more about survival at tough times, I was sent to boarding school when I was 8 years

of age and since then have lived out of my comfort zone struggling and striving hard to achieve small

things which now I see, laid the foundation for my Entrepreneurial Journey.

My Entrepreneurial journey actually started when I was in 12th

standard and wanted to make a difference

by doing something that makes people around me proud. Inspired by Indias economic and social

prosperity and vision by Dr. Abdul Kalam for a super power by 2020, I started writing a book entitled

Young Guns, Conscientious Shots which was about the upcoming statistical concerns in various sector

and responsibility of youth towards the Nation. It was not an easy road though. There were lot of

discouragement but also some motivation from family and friends which kept me going and finally after a

year I was ready with the transcript of the book.

Finally got them self-published and initially got 150 Copies printed. The biggest challenge was to sell

them. I approached the principals of various schools to allow me to speak to students during morningassembly which was actually my sales pitch! I sold all in 10 days donating the revenue to poor kids.

Since the book had statistical facts, its actual span was 1 year as technically most of the statistics change

in a year.

Entrepreneurship is basically of two types: One, Need based Entrepreneurship and other Opportunity

based entrepreneurship. During 2nd year of my engineering, my sisters wedding was fixed and my father

was too busy with the preparations. I got an opportunity to look after my family business, proving the fact

of Opportunity based Entrepreneurship! It was a challenging responsibility and before getting into

decision making, I utilized the time in training myself to know the details of the business and understand

the practices that apply on a daily basis.

When I returned back to college, I was more fascinated towards Entrepreneurship. Every day spent in my

family business made me learn things that I see now, built the foundation of this Journey.

Entrepreneurship was something I got addicted to and finally during my 3rd

year in Engineering, I started

a company (DriftMill India, which is now Craftila) with my two school friends, an idea that framed and

got strong with time. Inspired by 123greetings.com, which sends virtual cards, we wanted to do the same

in physical way. Being a Computer Science Engineer and technically sound, we created an Internet Store

that showcases cards and took orders through phone, We reached break-even in 5 months. The excitement

and passion got more and then with a little initial investment from family and friends, we renamed it as

Craftila and went above cards adding gift items with a motive to be the next Internet Archies of India.

Craftila allowed me to make mistakes and learn from them whereas in my family business i.e. NM Metal

Works, there was margins for zero errors as one wrong step can take the company several leaps behind.

My constant learning in Craftila allowed me to visualize the future path of NM Metal Works and the

practical working trends in NM Metal Works helped me grow Craftila.

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