It’s a common feeling for fogeys to need the world for his or her little ones. This can be manifested in elaborate preparation of every little thing from garments to toys and different equipment for newborns and younger toddlers.
Rhea Rajan, who grew to become a mom through the pandemic, tells HerStory that within the first two years of getting a toddler, “one may have a room filled with stuff”.
“We have been in New York and shopped for every little thing a toddler would want within the first six months and it was a truck filled with stuff. After coming again to India, she outgrew every little thing we had purchased in six months,” she recollects.
Rhea and her husband felt there needed to be a method for folks to make some money again as they have been making an enormous “funding” for merely just a few months of use. Noting the hole and a extremely unorganised market, Rhea based , a market for fogeys to purchase and promote new and used child and kids merchandise like toys, garments, books, and different gear.
She began work 4 months in the past with a workforce of 5 folks, together with herself, and the Mumbai-based platform has been stay for practically two weeks now.
Born and raised in Mumbai, Rhea joined her household enterprise of ice cream shortly after finishing her grasp’s research in advertising from Warwick Enterprise Faculty within the UK. Entrepreneurial at coronary heart, she labored in virtually each a part of the enterprise together with gross sales and buy, recruitment, advertising, and branding, which concerned frequent visits to kirana shops to gauge the model’s market. She additionally rebranded the corporate to optimise for each offline and on-line markets.
She says her first six to seven years of labor have been full of classes that now assist her in constructing a startup of her personal.
How does Uptot work?
Rhea says Indian mother and father would both discard the merchandise, move them on to different members of the family, or promote by way of social media teams. Mother and father needed to navigate a extremely unorganised market that concerned a number of discussions with sellers simply to finalise a purchase order. Not having a set format to observe was additionally an preliminary problem for the startup.
As a working guardian herself, she knew the method needed to be seamless and fast. The platform now claims to permit customers to enroll and put a number of merchandise on the market inside 5 minutes with data like product sort and situation (whether or not model new, gently, or closely used), model, and pricing.
Though customers can even share private particulars like title, place of residence, and telephone quantity, the startup made a acutely aware choice to maintain vendor particulars confidential as there’s nonetheless stigma related to promoting one youngster’s belongings.
Uptot expenses 20 % of the worth as fee, of which 10 % is the delivery price. Sellers may also leverage {the marketplace} to succeed in a selected viewers of oldsters.
“For the primary three months, our focus is Mumbai alone. Though now we have the infrastructure to ship throughout India, we need to iron out all the problems that we could face and make sure the buyer will get the product inside a day or two,” Rhea explains.
All of the 45 orders obtained to date has been fulfilled inside a day by way of supply companions like Dunzo and Shiprocket.
Merchandise on Uptot
Mother and father for a sustainable world
Not having a set format or market information to observe was additionally an preliminary problem. The entrepreneur regarded by way of Fb teams promoting such merchandise to grasp the cultural sentiments mother and father share relating to reselling. This, together with mother bloggers and influencers, helped get the phrase out.
“It was additionally vital to teach the mother and father on shopping for pre-loved and the environmental advantages. They’re doing everybody an enormous favour by shopping for such merchandise as a result of mother and father eat a lot and create a lot wastage,” she says.
Rhea could have solely simply launched into her entrepreneurial journey, however she is not any stranger to gender bias. There have been situations the place folks assumed her work ethic will likely be affected now that she is a mom.
“However I proved them flawed by establishing Uptot in lower than 4 months. I can elevate a toddler and nonetheless focus to get my work finished,” Rhea says.
