Sharing their stories of start-ups

Bhartesh Singh Thakur

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 11

It all started from building a toned body to impress girls. Daily Nutrition Diet (DND), which has two present and two former engineering students of Panjab University (PU) at the helm of affairs, is now earning Rs 15,000-Rs 20,000 per day, amounting to Rs 4.5 lakh-Rs 6 lakh per month.

The start-up was launched on September 4 last year and has now been working for over six months. It has reached the break-even point.

Ashutosh Upadhyay (22), who is in the fourth year at the University Institute of Chemical Engineering and Technology (UICET); Akash Upadyay (23), who has passed out from the University Institute of Engineering and Technology (UIET) last year; Yashwant Upadhyay (21), who is a third year student of the UICET; and Nikhil Kansal (22), who passed out from the UIET last year, were at the PU today for "Udyami", a national summit on entrepreneurship.

"The idea germinated from the need to have a toned body and nutritional diet," said Ashutosh Upadhyay.

The team during its presentation said all meals had been carefully designed by dieticians. The DND helps in selecting a category and choose a plan that is right.

It has already catered to over 10,000 customers with about 500 subscription served till date. A set of dieticians and gyms are on board with the DND.

"We have a base kitchen at Sector 26, Chandigarh. We are planning to open centres in the tricity," said Ashutosh.

"We work in a way where we are creating an enclosed market for diet services and masters of the health industry through our customer base," said Yashwant Upadhyay.

"For advertising, we have so far invested our efforts on social media and bloggers world which has given us quite a good name in the food field. With advertising on platforms like Zomato, Uber Eats and Swiggy, the sales have been greatly boosted," said Ashutosh.

Two anthropology students of Panjab University (PU) have started a start-up, "Piyakad", for selling fresh and pure natural juices, smoothies, anti-cancer juices, shakes and salads at doorstep of customers. The orders can be placed through a web portal.

Vipan Bansal, who is doing MSc from the Department of Anthropology at the PU; Diksha Sood, a BSc third-year student of the Department of Anthropology, along with two of their college friends, Sukh Chain and Ganesh Sood, presented their idea at "Udyami" at the PU today.

"We have already completed a trial run for a month and received orders," said Diksha Sood.