In 2019, Jehan founded Tandy’s Creamery along with his school friend Soham Jhaveri. They set up the factory in Mumbai’s Prabhadevi area from where they delivered orders. Now, the brand has 13 sale points around the city from where customers can pick up their products as well servicing most of Mumbai through its dark outlets on Swiggy & Zomato.
Ice cream sandwich for the masses:
Jehan and Soham invested around Rs 75 lakh in total to set up an ice cream factory to bring in raw materials, and the required manpower.
In January 2020, the duo began selling their ice cream sandwich online.
“We started out from Prabhadevi in Mumbai, advertising through social media, and of course, word-of-mouth helped too. We started getting a good response,” Jehan recalls.
Within the first two months alone, Tandy’s had sold around one thousand ice cream sandwiches.
However, before Jehan could start distributing to other areas, the pandemic hit India, followed by strict lockdowns that led to the closure of many businesses.
Jehan discovered that local retailers were experiencing a shortage of milk. So, using his network and resources, he collaborated with a dairy farm in the outskirts of Mumbai to supply milk to his factory. Since this accidental foray, there has been no looking back.
Tandy’s Creamery soon started supplying milk and paneer to restaurants, hotels, bars, and more. And once the restrictions started easing and markets opened up, Jehan saw that ice cream sales were increasing too.
Today, Tandy’s Creamery sources a large amount of milk for its daily manufacturing consumption and receives around 700 retail orders for ice cream every month.
With around 50 clients in its B2B business, the brand has also introduced regular ice cream packs, cups and tubs for consumers and ice cream bulk packs for B2B sales.
Tandy’s wafer ice cream sandwich prices start from Rs 50 onwards. “We want to cater to the masses hence, we operate at a nominal price,” says Jehan.
Tandy’s Creamery uses all natural flavours and is a vegetarian brand with no preservatives and artificial colours in its ice creams.
Challenges and the way ahead:
Jehan is candid when he talks about his challenges, and says that the supply chain is one of the biggest problems for SMBs like them in the industry.
“In the initial phase, we had to suffer a lot due to lack of cold-chain supply infrastructure for a small-level business like ours. But, we worked on it and now we have bought our own refrigerated van and delivery boys through which we deliver our orders,” he adds.
Although the brand has expanded in every way, Jehan is clear that his initial goal is yet to be fulfilled — he wants to ensure Tandy’s sandwich ice creams reach the nooks and corners of Mumbai and other cities to follow soon!
Apart from Ice – cream sandwiches and tubs, Tandy`s has recently launched their 125 ML cups which they plan on introducing in the FMCG route through stores and supermarkets.
Over the last 2 years they have also been recognized by big publications like Mid day, YourStory, Vogue and WhatsHot Mumbai to name a few!
Social Media – www.instagram.com/tandyscreamery
