"Pizza is the Most Competitive Segment in the F&B Industry Today"

At the sidelines of the recently held Startup Summit 2019 event, in Delhi, Restaurant India spoke to Pushkal Dharmendra, CEO, Aether Hospitality, where he spoke about his five distinct brands, how all the brands fall under different categories and why his brand ‘Naples Pizzeria’ has a Unique Selling Point of serving healthy flour-free pizza.

 

 

How is your offering different from others in the market?

We have a Mumbai based brand, we started in 2018 and it has been one and half years in the market. Within this time we have launched five food brands in Mumbai. We have a total of 12 outlets in Mumbai and Pune right now. Right now with this event we want to expand in the north India. What we have done differently is that all of our brands are focusing on the health aspect of the food.

We have five brands with us, The Lite Kitchen, Naples Pizzeria, The Comfort Zone, Bohemia Lounge and The Liquid Fantasy. So, for our primary brand ‘The Lite Kitchen’, we cater of a lot of celebrity customers. We have a brand called Naples Pizzeria, which is a healthy pizza brand. There we serve pizzas like Broccoli pizza and cauliflower pizza. We don’t use any flour or maida in our pizza. So, the carb content and calories content goes 90% and 60% down. The store is running quite well in Andheri area. I think this brand could do well in Tier-II cities as well because people are getting more conscious of their health than ever.   

Do you see opportunities in Tier-II and III cities as they are growing at a very fast pace?

Yes, but acceptance of something new is obviously takes time and pizza is the most competitive segment in the F&B industry today. From international to local brands there are a lot of brands that have come up in the market. However, with our brand we have a Unique Selling Point (USP). We have low carb and healthy pizza options which is quite distinct from others. Apart from Brocolli and cauliflower pizza, we also serve keto pizza made from almond flour. And we also have charcoal black pizza. Besides these our two other brands are Comfort Zone, it is night delivery brand, which runs from 6 AM in the morning to 6PM in the evening and Bohemia Lounge, which is based on the lounge concept.

What kind of franchise models you have and how much does it cost?

If you go for the dark Kitchen concept, the cost is Rs 2-3 Lakhs and if you go for QSR model, the franchise fees is Rs 4-5 Lakhs. The café model also costs Rs 4-5 lakhs. We have 6 franchise stores for The Lite Kitchen and Naples Pizzeria in Mumbai and Pune. The royalty is 6%, which is very competitive in the market and we also provide complete end to end set-up from our side.  

 
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