"Once You Start, You Always Find the Way" - Anurag Prateek

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1. Tell us more about your company and your journey.

I am a first generation entrepreneur. Nysa Naturals started way back in June 2019. As per our assessment, we have been able to sell more than a million cups of tea till now. Our motive is to be the sole destination for beverages in the country. Everyday new innovation is what we focus on. We strive hard to present a new form of products. 

How do we define us? - As Food Mixologists. You must have heard the term Beer Mixology. We derive the essence of the underlying theory of mixology and focus it on Foods and Beverages segment. Currently, we are more focused on tea mixology with an intention to move to coffee and other Indian beverages by the end of the year.

Tea in India is mostly experimented with the Camellia Sinensis i.e, the inherent terminology to describe shrubs used to manufacture tea. But, in western countries, they have conducted a lot of experiments on Tisanes. We want to bring that tisane culture to India by mixing with ingredients that we as an Indian devour for and take those teas to the global market.

The journey has been quite exciting. The first 100 customers are the backbone of the company. We are happy to say that more than 90% of those customers are still a repetitive buyer of our products. Currently, we are bootstrapped. Although some of angel investors did approach us. But, we are more focused on building the products and not losing current set of our customers. As per our current data, we have around 10000 subscribers. We are selling through Nysanaturals.com, Amazon, Nykaa among others. We have customer base in 22 countries mostly in Americas and Europe. Out of the total 800 daily visitors, 600 are new. On an average, we are looking at more than 120% of month on month increase in our customer base for the past 10 months.


2. How did you come up with this idea and go about executing it?

I love drinking Green Tea. But it tasted bitter every time I took a sip of it. This led me to realise that we are actually served inferior quality of tea in the market. There is no denying that there are some good start-ups who are filing this gap. There is a drastic difference in the tea being sold in local market to what is available by newer start-ups. This led me to move to premium quality of tea. But as the love of tea grew further, I visited many tea estates and met tea experts in Assam, Darjeeling, Siliguri, Coimbatore and Kangra region to learn more about the tea. 

Then, we decided let’s try to mixing a few ingredients with tea and see what happens. Many a time, it tasted weird. You can’t do anything with that other than throwing it. But, these in-depth research helped to develop one product to another. Mixology is not about randomly mixing anything, every ingredient has some percentage defined which gives it the Right Aroma, Right Taste and Right Liquor. It took us around 6 months of research to develop our first product which would not have been possible without the help of tea experts in India. This is NYSA NATURALS - providing the premium quality of products with innovations by Food Mixologists.

Looking at the execution part: Being an MBA, we have been taught to start a project by undertaking a market survey. During initial discussion for 3 months on the field, taking data from around 1000 customers. We realised that there is some gap. We conducted some experiments and prepared blend in our lab. We reached some of those customers. To our surprise, more than 80%, accepted our product.

To understand the types of tea liked by westerners, we did some research in European countries such as England, France and Germany. We always keep on conducting experiments on tea preferred by westerners. Also, whether those teas will be acceptable in India or not. In recent times, we have introduced 11 new varieties of tea in India as well which are mostly prevalent in Europe. By the end of this month, we are introducing new category.

We keep on innovating and launching new delectable foods and Beverages every week which you may not have tasted in your entire life. And once you do, either you would want more of that or you will try new ones to fill the void in your life.


3. What has been your biggest challenge that you faced and how did you overcome that?

Your team is the most important asset. If you have dedicated one, half of those challenges are won. We have stringent criteria for hiring individuals. A happy set of employees leads to more conversion. Every individual plays a role. They must complement each other. While hiring, we keep in mind whether that individual will help in maintaining the team cohesion.

There is a saying in Hindi: “Dilli ab door nahi. Ek Kadam utha karke toh dekho”. It simply means that if you put step forward towards Delhi. Delhi will be nearer to you with every step. This statement keeps me motivated to deal with any issue that I face.


4. What do you think are the most important qualities of a successful entrepreneur?
3P’s – Patience, Perseverance and Persistence.

There is no rush. You are doing your best. You are spending logically whatever that 24 hours of time you have in a day. You will see the light of day in time to come. Have patience, Hard work and Smart work never go to waste. You will reach somewhere. It may or may not be where you wanted to be but you will reach somewhere. It’s not a matter of sadness that one could not achieve what he intended for. But it’s something to be cheerful for that you are a better person then what you were yesterday.


5. What are some of the most important factors for running a successful business?

• Be unique – There should be some uniqueness. Either from product side or supply chain process or the way we market the product.
• Be good at effectively showing your differentiating factor – If you are good at something, learn how to show it effectively.
• Keep Innovating – Read, Read and Read and Innovate after looking at the current and futuristic market demand.

6. What are your tips for first time and aspiring entrepreneurs?

Entrepreneurship is similar to one man going alone on a so called haunted road. It is evident that you will face a lot of difficulties. Sometimes, it can also become disheartening. But, it is also certain that you will find your path. You should always have a bigger goal in your sight. Break it down to smaller ones. Because every small task takes you nearer to your goal. It’s a process, It’s a journey. At the time of starting up, do not think about angel investors or VC’s .Try to Bootstrap instead of looking for investors.

Start it as a side business. Check the feasibility. Then go for the full time.


7. How can one overcome a hurdle of lack of funds when starting up? 

Lack of Funds can be overcome by only two methodologies: One is obviously Bootstrapping and other is Time investment. Family and friends do help us in the time of need. They can provide us money at a lower rates of Interest. But I would suggest to go for Time Investment:

• Start it as a side business – This helps you to meet your initial expenditure from your savings. But it does take a toll on your daily life.
• Upskill yourself – Instead of investing money on third party vendors or hiring more people, upskill yourself and do the work of 3-4 people.
• Have Cofounder who can have skillset which you don’t possess – One should effectively choose cofounders. They should complete us. They must not possess only those skills that we already have. You will save enormous sum of money.
• Hire Effectively – Don’t go blindly on hiring.

Do Always Remember: Once you start, you always find the way. Keep yourself motivated.

- Anurag Prateek (Founder: Nysa Naturals)

Interview by - Shivaansh Tiwari