Deepak's Musings #119: Sauce is the biggest unsung hero of the plate

September 11, 2023

All things consumer & insurgent brands. What I am currently reading, thinking about, and reflecting upon. You can follow me on Twitter at @dishahdadpuri or follow DSGCP at @dsgcp.

🍅🥫 Sauce is the biggest unsung hero of the plate - Veeba’s Viraj Bahl

A fascinating deep dive by Forbes India looking back at the last 10 years at Veeba as Viraj Bahl was building the foundations of a leading CPG business. A case study on how to build an #insurgentbrand #brickXbrick.

Appetite, Food And Hunger: Is There More To Veeba's Secret Sauce?

With a failed restaurant business, a disastrous comeback debut and an unenviable task of punching above his weight, Viraj Bahl fought many odds to make Veeba India's biggest homegrown sauce and condiments brand. Can he now make it a consumer goods company?

🇮🇳🫱🏻‍🫲🏾 A long-term partner of DSGCP, Verlinvest continues to be excited by India

I had the privilege of first meeting Frédéric de Mevius, the founder of Verlinvest, in 2009. The following year Verlinvest invested in Sula Vineyards. Since that meeting, Verlinvest and DSGCP, have worked closely to identify and partner the best entrepreneurs building insurgent consumer brands, and together have partnered with Veeba and Epigamia in addition to Sula Vineyards.

Why global investment firm Verlinvest is committed to evergreen investments in Indian startups

Verlinvest, which invests in Indian startups, continues to bet on the country’s startup ecosystem, focused on medium- and long-term prospects.

🥘👨🏽‍🍳 FoodTech: Remember it is FOOD not tech

I love this piece in the recent issue of Queen Green on the biggest challenges facing the plant-based industry. And lessons we can learn from the last cycle. Remember consumers are adopting plant-based but we need to go back to the fundamentals.

Plant-Based 2.0: Addressing the Industry's 10 Biggest Challenges

These are the 10 biggest challenges faced by the plant-based industry and how to fix them, by two sustainable food experts.

👕👚 India’s digital-first brands to drive apparel market

Bain & Company has just published a detailed report on India’s apparel market. Bain research suggests that the digital disruptor segment will grow rapidly. With a large current market size of approximately $2.4 billion and a projected annual growth rate of around 35%, digital disruptors have the potential to reach a value of $10 billion by FY28. A must read for anyone who wants to launch at insurgent apparel brand,

India’s Digital Fashion Disruptors

Navigating the future of fashion.

🥛🐮 What are retailers doing when consumers throw products past their use-by dates?

Too much wastage is due to consumers throwing away products that are safe to consume just because they are past their use-by dates. I like what UK grocer Sainsbury is planning to do for milk.

Sainsbury’s adopts ‘sniff test’ as it ditches use-by dates on milk

The retailer will transition 44 products to the new labelling between January and February 2024

🍺🍷 No and low-alcohol beverages continue to see strong growth and retailers are giving consumers more choice

Leading UK grocer Waitrose is giving the category 60% more space. Most interesting for me was that over the past year sales of low-alcohol and alcohol-free drinks have grown by 20% at Waitrose, with sales of beer continuing to grow the fastest. This echoes my personal behaviour where I buy as much 0.0 or 0.5% beer as I buy regular or craft beers.

Waitrose and Diageo launch dedicated low and no-alcohol drinks areas

UK supermarket Waitrose is working with Diageo to introduce ‘bold, dedicated areas’ for low and no alcohol drinks in 253 shops across the UK.

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