With the vision of bridging this demand-supply gap and bringing convenience to the locality, Hearty Mart was started in February 2004 at Vishala Circle near Juhapura. It was modeled as an ideal neighbourhood store and positioned as ‘Sabse Khass Ghar ke Paas’; as it was a store which was equipped to cater to all their basic needs. A convenience store, Hearty Mart aimed to establish itself as a one-stop-solution for the daily needs of groceries, cosmetics, food grains etc.

I believe that the failure is synonymous to enterprise building and earlier one faces the failure the better it is for him. Many entrepreneurs who fail initially make it big with their venture later on. Hence to fail in this journey is to reach your hidden and uncovered strength. My journey was no exception. In an effort to make my Juhapura store succeed I did everything possible. I launched an innovative idea such as rural retail franchise model and in the early 2007 the first franchise of Hearty Mart was launched at Ilol. But still the efforts were not enough to bring the store into a profit making mode.

I had left my lucrative job with an MNC advertising agency in 2006 to focus on my business. The situation was really bad as the business was not doing enough to sustain itself and thus to expect anything from it was unthinkable. Also, the business required my attention and going back to job was again out of question. I was stuck up and I saw a no way out.

On one such day, not feeling comfortable with my business results I casually went to a friend’s office with the idea of sharing my business woes and gaining a few tips from him.

During the course of conversation, he offered me a decent job in a renowned PR agency. He felt that my business lacked potential for growth and I would not be doing justice to my qualification and experience if I continued with it.

“I need some time to think”. I told him and left his office. The offer was tempting as I was in need of money then and it took every ounce of strength of argument to shun the offer. I needed to hold on. This experience reinforced my faith in my business. My will to succeed got stronger.

The entrepreneur is a leader, it is his vision and passion which has helped him in creating an enterprise and hence in the hour of crisis he needs to hold his nerves and should be able to take faster decisions to face it. If he loses his nerves the entire team can break and the employees might lose the trust in the enterprise.

Sometimes when you mull over your past experiences you dug out a solution which helps you mold your future course of action. While working with an advertising agency I remembered visiting a management school for a guest session. I recollected the experience and remembered I had enjoyed my one hour with the young and vibrant B-School students. Suddenly I realized that I had a potential of teaching B-School students, I had the experience and passion for the job. In case if my venture failed, even then I could continue as an academician and have an alternate career. This idea seemed to be God sent, and I started approaching B-Schools in Ahmedabad. My idea was to bring in, my hands on advertising experience to the lecture room and teach the students with a practical approach.

Soon I was taking lectures in few of the B-Schools. My strength of subjects were advertising, marketing and retail wherein I spent 5 hours per week and was paid around Rs. 500/- to Rs. 1000/- per hour depending on the payment policy of the respective B-School. This gave me some respite as far my sustenance was concerned and I could focus on my business without worrying too much about how to make my ends meet. It is said that every failure teaches you something, I too learnt how to teach and mentor my students and if I quote Steve Jobs connecting the dots here, then this became my connecting the dots experience as later I turned mentor to my employees at Hearty Mart. Today, I work to mentor them and provide them with my ideas and guidance to take the enterprise further ahead in our entrepreneurial journey.

I taught for 6 years from the period 2006-2011. Eleven years down the line my business has flourished and branched into 12 rural supermarkets besides having created private brands like GoodTime spices and Day Break Tea. Hearty Mart has also forayed into bulk supplies of Food & Grocery to hotels, restaurants and caterers. Now I visit B-Schools like EDI, IIMA to deliver guest sessions on my journey of creating a retail brand – Hearty Mart. It is true you need to fail once to succeed more.