It’s always a pleasure to catch up with Mom Entrepreneurs who are are bidding goodbye to corporate lives to be budding entrepreneurs and create a mark for themselves. In this edition of #KSPConversations we caught up with Nidhi Mehta of Needybee.com to understand her entrepreneurial journey and owning a brand that dishes out world class accessories. She shares her story on juggling her role as a mom and fueling her ambitions.
- Tell us about yourself and how NeedyBee came into existence?
Nidhi: This goes back to the time when I was studying in a Business school and the internet/email phenomenon had just started. I was sitting in a computer lab creating an email address for myself. A friend of mine came up with the name NeedyBee (Needy – Nidhi and Bee for my maiden name Banthia). I loved it! It was creative and thus the name NeedyBee was born and stayed with me for years. I was very sure that it would be a brand name I would use if and when I start something of my own someday and so here we are with “NeedyBee.com as a thirteen year old online store that dresses Kids Head-to-Toeâ€_x009d_.
My first child is a baby boy. After two exciting years of trucks, trains, planes, dirt and searching colourful tees in the boys section, I was gifted with a baby girl on 07-07-07. Overnight we were surrounded with beautiful clips, bows and the fun experiences of dressing up a girl. Ever since then, I have been obsessed about my daughter’s hair accessories. Through this journey I have met more moms with baby-girls and so I was struck with the realization that all of us moms were constantly in search for something beautiful, cute and unique accessories as gifts for the tender and beautiful babies gifted to us as well as our friends.
After carving out a career into Marketing & Programme management in Semiconductor industry for a couple of decades, when my husband thought of relocating to India, we both decided to use this opportunity to cater to our respective interests. I got into designing hair clips, fun handmade accessories, with paramount stress on quality that make your heart go simply awe! He got into creating an organization that would help us contribute our community while fulfilling their needs.
NeedyBee products make special gifts for birthday’s, party-favours, party-themes and giveaways. All of the products from NeedyBee are handmade, organic and environment friendly, right from raw material to processing to packaging. We believe in the mantra- functionality and comfort are as relevant as the style itself.
2.     Where does the inspiration to drive NeedyBee come from?
“TO CREATE A LEGACY THAT CAN CONTINUE AS AN ENTITY FOREVERâ€_x009d_. We all know that global boundaries have diluted. The power of internet allows you to be present everywhere in the world and conduct and manage your business from anywhere. When we relocated to India, with a penchant for starting something new and creative, we decided to tap into the nascent accessory market in India and worldwide.
The guiding principle for NeedyBee is to create opportunity for people to have flexible career paths, to have a choice to work from home and become entrepreneurs themselves. We are making our products handmade and eco-friendly. We want to be a socially responsible company.
3.     Where do you see NeedyBee in near future?
To put it in simple words, we want NeedyBee to be the brand that parents think of when they think of shopping for their kids. We want to be the company that people enjoy working for and be on their wish list of a dream job.
4.     How do you bring about a balance in your work and personal life?
I‘ve always been an entrepreneur. It’s a choice to allow flexibility with kids and at work. When my kids are at home, I try to cut off my work and be involved in their activities and homework. We have an excellent office staff, who handles the operational work and I am mostly needed for strategic decisions only.
5.     After successfully completing years in the business, we would like you to share some tips on entrepreneurship with our readers that no book does.
Entrepreneurship requires instant action. Whenever an idea comes to my mind, I pen it down in my book of ideas. I’ve always believed in low investment business to start making it easier to gauge whether an idea will is likely to succeed or not at an initial stage.
6.     Our readers would also like to know about your BollyBeatz venture and how is different from NeedyBee?
Very different! BollyBeatz is a dance fitness studio model. I am very passionate about dance. I left my career at McKinsey & Company to start stepz.com and later BollyBeatz.com in USA. I’ve been travelling to conduct corporate dance team building workshops, opening franchises across the world. The model is very specific to my skill set. It needs me to run it. It’s creative – I am constantly creating new routines, choreography and dance styles.
NeedyBee.com is different in the sense that it is a corporate. It’s not depending on just me – infact I would not want that. Whether I am present or absent, the show has to run. It’s the same creative process, but here it’s more of my mind power that I engage with, more business skills and marketing skills that I’ve learned over all these years.
7.     Elaborate your experience of running a business in India after having dealt with countries worldwide?
India is relatively unstructured for the developing nature of our country. In most developed countries of the world, to set up a company is a five-minute process with a click of the mouse. Here to need to engage somebody to ensure that the paper work is in order for you to establish a company. Besides there are small/ niggling issues like untimely payment, logistical hurdles, inconsistency in rules and regulations etc. that because what I would call unnecessary inefficiency in our system. But even through all this, I see India having immense opportunities and thus I believe that everyone today can become an entrepreneur. It’s workable and much easier to run a business in India than it was 5-10 years ago. I am sure with every passing year this will only get easier- given the kids fashion scenario which is a burgeoning market in India. Parents is India have a lot of spending power these days and love to spend on their bundle of joys- be it education, wardrobe, toys or general welfare. In fact the spending by Indian parents is much higher as compared to the parents in USA. Kids are very fashion conscious today and they choose what they want. Each of their outfit has to have matching accessories.
8.     When it comes to India being an unorganised market, what is your approach in reaching out to a target audience, majority of whom shops offline?
E-commerce is a big part of our business and that’s how we started, but we’ve realised the potential of the offline shoppers as well. These are parents who want to have a guarantee on the touch and feel before they buy a product and so I have made the NeedyBee brand made available at all the Brick and Mortar stores around the country. Mom&Me a part of Mahindra retail stores is one such example in India. In addition, we sell our products in various kids’ speciality stores and boutiques in different cities across India.
9.     In one word:
- Being an entrepreneur is – our being.
- Fashion is – your personality.
- Being mommy is – the best feeling in the world.
- Pursue your passion because – that’s what will really make you happy. It will be your biggest stress buster, the reason you will truly be satisfied of.
- Be on a digital platform because – that’s where the world is headed and you can be present globally while sitting in any 1 corner of the world.
- Parents in Jaipur – spend on their kids.
- Kidsstoppress is – a great stop for kids’ related information.
- Favourite fashion brand for kids – Tommy Hilfiger and Gymboree
- Favourite country to shop for kids is – USA.
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