Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in food and beverage but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Harshit Gupta, co-founder of Madhu Chocolate, located in Austin, TX.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
We're an Indian inspired bean-to-bar chocolate business based out of Austin, TX. My husband Elliott and I are the partners in this business and our love for food, flavors and chocolate came together to create this line of unique sweets. We source our cacao from the Tumaco region of Colombia and Idukki Hills region of Kerala, India, then roast, crack, winnow, grind, flavor, temper and wrap all our bars by hand. From the beautiful packaging inspired by Indian textiles, to the gorgeous bars themselves, Madhu chocolate is a true labor of love.
Chocolate lovers who enjoy experimenting with new flavors, tastes, and spices are the customers we really love to share these artisanal chocolates with.
Tell us about yourself
I grew up in Mumbai, India and moved to US for further studies. I currently work as a lead software engineer with Salesforce (before Tableau, Microsoft). I met Elliott in Seattle in 2014 and since then we have been together. Elliott has a degree in Food Science from University of Hawaii, and we started making chocolate as a hobby in our home kitchen in Austin, TX. We bought a small refiner/melanger and some cacao nibs and cocoa butter from Costco to play around with, and were amazed with what could be done with a few simple ingredients.
On Elliott's first visit to India, we attended my cousin's big fat Indian wedding, and that was where he got introduced with a world of different Indian sweets and desserts. This was the "aha!" moment for us. We thought, "why don't we take these beautiful flavors and incorporate them into chocolate?" Americans are always looking for the next fun new flavors, and this seemed like there was a lot of untapped potential. Elliott worked on a business plan for this business and the rest is history.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
Getting a Good Food Award for our very special chocolate bar - Idukki Black Pepper - 68% Cacao is our biggest accomplishment so far. For context, the Good Food Awards are equivalent to the Academy awards for food products, and there are a lot of very high bars to clear to even be in the running for them. This bar is special to us - very first bar made exclusively with cacao beans from southern part of India and Black Pepper sourced from the same region in India. To us this bar is an ode to India.
What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?
Where to source every small and tiny part of your business and expectation to be jack of all trades.
There's an expectation as small business owners that we should be experts in every aspect of running the business, and it's an unrealistic standard when you look at the diversity of duties. People have 4 year degrees in things like marketing and accounting, so the notion that we would be able to learn these skills and execute them at a professional level while maintaining the million other things we do, and also trying to have a life outside of work, is laughable. Doesn't stop us from trying though!
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
1. Write a very thorough business plan. This is one of the advise we give to every aspiring entrepreneur.
2. If you don't have a huge capital, try to start at your local farmers market level. It is a great place to get your word out, for customers to see a face to a product, to get an instant customer feedback.
3. Be flexible and be able to pivot quick and fast.
Where can people find you and your business?
https://www.madhuchocolate.com
https://www.instagram.com/madhuchocolate/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/madhuchocolate/
https://twitter.com/madhuchocolate
https://www.facebook.com/madhuchocolate
If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solopreneur that you'd like to share, then email community@subkit.com; we'd love to feature your journey on these pages.
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