At BrilliantRead Media, our aim is to bring to our community some of the unique and compelling stories from the start-up ecosystem. As part of this endeavour, we interviewed another young and passionate social entrepreneur Siddharth Bajoria – Founder of Re-bag. Before taking a plunge into entrepreneurship, he worked with JP Morgan Chase for over 3 years to gain corporate insights and to learn the fundamentals.
He is also a mentor and career counsellor for many youngsters. Let’s learn more about his exciting journey, his advice for our community and the way forward:
Excerpts from our exclusive interview with him:
Tell us a little bit about your background and about Re-bag, please;
I’m Siddharth originally from West Bengal but moved to Bangalore in 2008. I have done my schooling and higher education from Bangalore itself. Before plunging into entrepreneurship, I worked with JP Morgan & Chase for about 3.5 yrs.
It was in the year 2017 I started Re-bag with the support of my younger brother Rishav and my dad. I come from a business family, which is into tobacco manufacturing, though we never wanted to join that business but create something of our own.
My brother is a Computer Science Engineer and works full time on his digital marketing and IT company in Bhubaneswar. He takes care of business development majorly for Re-bag on his part time.
Re-bag is almost 2.5 years old now and is seeing a growth of almost 350% growth YOY basis. It’s like a baby to me, as I have built it from scratch and every single thing required in this business is handpicked by me.
Why did you choose entrepreneurship over a job?
So I was the first one in my family to take up a job over our well settled family business.
I always wanted to experience the corporate life to gain insights from the corporate world. It teaches you a lot in terms of discipline, work etiquettes & culture and gives you a great exposure. However, never wanted it to be my lifetime profession, as I always wanted to create something of my own. Something which gives me meaning and fulfilment. And it cannot be achieved while working for others.
Seeing your family with a great legacy of 100+ years, you always get motivated to set a new benchmark.
What gets you out of bed in the morning i.e. what’s your source of motivation?
My vision is make an impact in the lives of those around us. My venture is a socio-environmental venture, which generates employment for the bottom section of the pyramid (underprivileged women) who do not find many opportunities to work and are abused in their household in one way or the other.
Through Re-abg, we create an opportunity for them by training them and providing with work which they can do by being at home and utilise their resources within. The day they dont get any work disappoints me.
If you look around, our world is dying everyday and one of the major causes is Plastic; our product which comes out of these women is a major substitute to plastic and is required in our everyday use. I’m trying to work for both the planet and the people.
What challenges/obstacles did you face in your journey so far?
I started this venture from scratch with limited money & resources so I had to encounter many challenges. Some of them are as follows:
1 – Firstly had no idea or prior experience with the industry as I had a completely finance background. I had to take many inputs from my aunt who runs a boutique.
2 – Getting leads and making them switch to a product, which is 10-15 times costlier than the plastic counterpart was a major challenge. Competitors started using synthetic material to sell more at cheaper price points, but we decided to stick to 100% cotton, which is organic and biodegradable.
3 – Setting up an industry in Bangalore with zero know-how is very tough and finding the best area where I could run operations smoothly was a major challenge along with finding the right section of people who could work.
4 – Even now, delays in payments cause a direct impact to production cycles and thus the turnover. I am still learning on the journey and trying to make things as organised as possible.
What comes first for you – money or emotions?
I am an emotional person. And when you are dealing with that segment of the society, emotion always overpowers. But without money you cannot function, and for the betterment of my people I always try to keep my emotions away. But at the end we are humans so you have to balance it somehow.
How do you handle the pressure and manage stress?
It doesn’t matter where you are working, pressure & stress will keep coming into your path. You have to keep your calm and go with the flow.
Pressure tests the best & the worst you have, I chose to work on the best I have in me by keeping calm and dealing with it in a better planned way.
What is one strategy/trait that you believe has helped you grow as a person?
Patience is what I have always believed in. It has immensely helped me grow as an individual.
In your opinion what are the keys to success?
Even after working years together some people do not consider them successful, some atane it by working a few years. I feel successful, everytime i see a smile on the face of people who are working with me. Self belief, patience and ability to create a difference is success for me.
What advice would you give to someone starting out?
Don’t run behind success or money. Run behind your dreams, goals and fulfill them, you would see success and money following you. Whatever you are doing give it time, have patience.
BrilliantRead is committed to bringing stories from the startup ecosystem, Stories that reshape our perspective, add value to our community and be a constant source of motivation not just for our community but also for the whole ecosystem of entrepreneurs and aspiring individuals.
Note: If you have a similar story to share with our audience and would like to be featured on our online magazine, then please write to us at [email protected], we will review your story and extend an invitation to feature if it is worth publishing.
