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The pain and agony of losing my startup

By Roshan Desarda on 24 Comments / 6165 views

Belonging to the Marwari community, taking up a job was never on the cards for me. In fact, I was the first one from my family to ever take up a job. By sheer accident, I landed up in IT industry, but was never happy in a job and wanted to move out.

I was looking out for an idea to start an online business. In 2011, I started selling apparels online. On the side, I used to run a ‘deal aggregation’ business which was making money; but I wanted to do something different. It was in September, 2012, that a family friend committed to invest Rs. 11 lakh in the online grocery business I was planning to launch. We launched www.punexpress.com on 26th October, 2012, in Pune: delivering groceries to seven different neighborhoods.

Around this time I was also about to get engaged [in September, 2012]. A few relatives of my fiancée visited my place to finalize things, and were surprised to learn that I was serving the notice period at my job. I was asked to continue my corporate job; but I knew if I decided to back out, it would be difficult to start all over again. Instead I declined to continue with job, and the relatives left, disappointed. My family, too, was unhappy with the outcome and no one talked to me for a few months. My family was not at all happy with my selling groceries online; and continued to pester me to get married and continue the job. Finally, they relented, after much convincing from my side.

We finally launched in October, 2012, and we received our first order the moment we went live. It was difficult in the initial days with just three-five orders a day; but things changed in a couple of months. We were getting popular in town, and were getting a lot of enquiries from areas where we did not operate in. We started off with an initial capital of Rs. 3.5 lakhs and were running an inventory led model. Soon customers demanded more depth in each category; and also demanded more categories. We slowly added more products: from 500 products on day one to 2000+ in three months. We tied up with local suppliers for new products; and we used to procure the products just-in-time. We were featured on online and offline media, and started getting enquiries for investment.

Punexpress 2

I stayed at our warehouse for the first three months. I visited my parents’ home only three days before I was to get married in January, 2013. My family was still not happy with me and wanted me to quit. We got our largest order, in terms of cart size, on the day I got married. I was more excited with the order; and was thinking about how we would fulfill the order the next day, since we had no delivery boys. My co-founder and I were doing deliveries since December, 2012 as we were unable to hold on to any delivery personnel to work for us beyond eight days. That is why we ended up doing it ourselves. I skipped plans to travel after marriage; and decided to start expanding our delivery areas.

Our investor had committed to put in more funds once we achieved a certain number of orders – on a daily basis. In the mean time we refused offers from two angel investors who wanted more than 50 per cent stake for Rs. 10-15 lakhs. To our surprise our first investor refused to give us more money; rather, he asked us to return his original investment. He was investing in an offline store and was no longer interested in Punexpress. I remember one of my relatives calling my father and asking him to consult a psychiatrist for me.

Both my co-founder and I were left clueless and decided to look for more options to continue the business. We started pitching to angels and family friends; and in parallel were delivering the daily orders ourselves, since we were running out of money. At times we were unable to fulfill orders, but decided to carry on somehow. From March, 2013, we started buying goods from D-Mart and Reliance on credit cards and delivering to customers. For the next three months Citi Bank and HDFC Bank credit cards were our so called investors! Both of us lost weight (more than 10 kgs. each) but somehow we managed to deliver the ever increasing number of orders.

Let’s fast forward to May, 2013: I got a call from a VC firm for an investment. At the same time two startups [in the same space] from Mumbai called us for a strategic alliance, and another one for possible investment. We visited Mumbai and were in talks with all three of them [in parallel] for possible investment. While things began to look up and move in the right direction, my wife survived a miscarriage, and we lost our child. It was entirely my fault as I never really took care of her. Everyone at home was angry. I didn’t know what to do next. I had lost my child. It was painful.

The following week, when I was in Mumbai for a meeting with the founder of a startup, I got a call from another startup in Pune. The startup was backed by a large IT company listed on the BSE. We were excited. We met the founder and discussed possible opportunities. He said that they were looking to strengthen their product offerings, and wanted to add grocery as a category. They were doing multiple categories including ‘FnV’; they had corporate tie-ups and access to a number of large corporates. They had been in business for three years; they offered us an offer of acquisition. We were now confused with the multiple options on our plate. The other three prospective investors were taking time to complete the formalities. So we decided to join the Pune startup; also, we were left with no further credit limit on our cards now. We decided to run both websites in parallel; we added grocery as a category to their website. We closed our warehouse and moved to their office; but continued to run Punexpress. We started delivering across Pune and PCMC. We started doing close to 60-70 orders a day and had big names from Pune as our customers. Within one month of this new operation we started doing 100+ orders, and finally, we were happy with our decision.

Punexpress 1

Two months into the operation, one fine morning we were informed that our investor had written off his investment – and we were left looking for funds. Our half of the team didn’t turn up to work the next day. They didn’t even return the assets they had (laptops, phones, etc.) In two weeks we were down to five people. I, too, decided to quit as there was no hope or scope to continue the show. That’s how I lost my second child – Punexpress. I took up my old job again, and decided to wait for things to normalize.

This week we’ll be celebrating the first birthday of my son ‘Riaan’. Things have normalized now; and in the mean time I started a milk delivery business in a few areas of Pune. I scaled it from 10 liters a day to 500 liters a day. I sold this delivery business to a family friend. Now I’m considering taking risks by starting up once again.

This was first published here and I thought I should share it with rodinhood community.

Connect with me on Twitter @roshya

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24 Comments

  1. hi roshan,

    thanks for sharing your incredible story with us. 

    i clearly remember reading your story on YS – i remember how i could actually feel your pain while reading it.

    milk delivery is extremely challenging – ‘coz come rain, come shine – YOU HAVE TO DELIVER THE MILK IN THE MORNING!!! you just can’t let people down! i wish you all the best.

    pls connect with rituraj (the paratha post guy) – read about him here – https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/therodinhoods-unmeetup-hyderabad-a-meet-up-to-remember

    do wish little riaan on our behalf. and do take time out to play with him – otherwise he’ll grow up without you knowing it!!!

  2. ps: pls add your twitter handle at the end. it helps me mention it while tweeting.

  3. Thanks Asha. 

    We have tied up with newspaper delivery boys for milk deliveries and offer them Rs.1/liter for delivery. We have no full time delivery boys and utilize the ones already delivering.

    For me, next will be in food (outlet + delivery). Will post it once we start

  4. perfect! even our milkman and newspaper man is the same person. then he gets confused (goa!) so he employs a boy for the newspaper and sticks to milk delivery – the time varies though :)))

  5. ‘That’s how I lost my second child – Punexpress.‘  Too much pain in this sentence.

    I read your story on YS and shared with my partner as we knew about PuneExpress when I was in Pune. That time we were planning to start something of own from college and night food delivery for college students was one of the idea we were considering.

    I am glad things are normalised now. Wish you success in new venture. Once an Entrepreneur, always an Entrepreneur.. 🙂

  6. I actually felt the shiver in my body when I read that you actually lost your un-born baby. It becomes really hard when the investors suddenly pull out the money as they find ‘other lucrative options’. It is always better to have exit clause discussed and decided upon before taking money.

    Best of luck for the next one!

  7. Thanks for sharing your story Roshan. We need more people like you to share stories of their struggle and failure rather than those only of success. I believe there’s a lot more to learn from such experiences. Good luck with everything! 

  8. Guys sorry to reveal that apart from selling milk , he is back to job full time with hefty salary

    I am happy to know this

  9. vikas – what is there to “reveal” ?? 

    if roshan has a full time job with a hefty salary i think it’s commendable. 

  10. Hey Roshan,

    That was a really touching story and it takes guts to share that in a community. Do take time out for your family. Most successful CEOs are people who have a strong bonding with your family. I am glad that things are back to normal now and you are working on the next venture. I wish you all the luck to succeed. 

  11. Hi Roshan
    Do startup with pune express again. Not sure whether you intend to revive, but for records its GUI was one of the best ever I have experienced till date for any grocery website. Would be happy to help.

  12. Hi Roshan,

    Best of luck for your next start up.

    I think i’m in a situation what you were back in 2011.

    #I am first from my family to take a job.

    #Left my job in 2014 Dec and started freelancing meanwhile helping my brother in his business.

    #Within 3 months i got engaged

    #Started NewKirana online grocery store in Gandhidham with my friends Divayraj and Divyang.

    #We are delivering 2-5 orders a day.

    Only thing that differs is that i am not yet married.

    Oh i forgot to mention that i am also working in Dairy in morning hours 6am-9am.

  13. Good Ride. But I guess this is the new normal. Welcome to Planet Entrepreneurship

  14. Yes. I want to start the ride again without repeating earlier mistakes I made.

  15. Thanks Mubaid. 

  16. No plans as of now, as the likes of Grofers are busy offering discounts (subsidy) on groceries which government couldn’t and this will make it difficult for us to survive without offering similar discounts.

  17. We share a similar story. What a coincidence.

  18. Thanks Sridhar

  19. Yes Punexpress shutdown in Oct 2013 and since them I’m working full time and helping revive our family business.

  20. Thanks Arpit

  21. Thanks Mohit

  22. Roshan, really parenting and starting up are two equally difficult stages of life. All the best to both of your children. They now have a lot to learn from you.

  23. Amazing stuff !

  24. Kudos to your fighting spirit buddy. I was moved by your story. The loss in business to any extent is no big deal compared to loss in one’s personal life. I wish you strength and good luck for your future ventures. Currently I am cooking up a few ideas which I am planning to scale up in near future, if interested, please connect with me on LinkedIn for updates.

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