Praween KR (21, Bihar) and Sindhuja K (21, Hyderabad), students from NIFT, thought up of an idea of setting up a clothing brand, targeting young audiences. They set up “Young Trendz” in 2015 and till the end of 2018 is estimated to have a profit of ₹20 crore.
Startup story
It all started during their seventh semester in knitwear design, bachelor’s degree of National Institute of Fashion Technology, Chennai; when they decided to build something on their own.
Meanwhile learning about fashion and clothing Praween KR and Sindhuja K decided to put it up as a business. They planned to start up with a clothing brand targeting the young audiences of 18 to 28-year-old.
This is when in September 2015, with the startup culture on its peak, “Young Trendz” was on its wheels, running, with the tagline saying “Stay Young, Stay Trendy.” Their products feature quirky graphics that resonate with the youth.
Starting with the capital of Rs.10 lakhs, within two months the business went online on several e-commerce marketplaces like Flipkart, Amazon, Voonik, PayTm and very soon they had one of their own websites.
By their 8th semester, with the collaboration with more than 100 colleges across the country, the business seems running quite well.
Starting with as minimum as 10 orders per day, the number has reached till 1000, generating a GMV of Rs. 20 crores despite any VC funding.
From providing customized T-shirts in college fests till generating a value profit of Rs. 20 crores, the brand never compromised on the quality and thus have always left an impression, positively.
The journey
With the hike in profits and growth in demand, the duo decided to take it one step further, by putting up a proper channel for manufacturing and development. Tirupur, being the manufacturer and knitwear hub of India was their next designation. In spite of facing problems in their initial phase, they knew that they were in a city with a source and manufacture of one of the best quality products and raw materials to provide with.
Tirupur, we got the right people with the best skills in the garment industry for product development; we got talented IT professionals from Coimbatore for online web operations,” Praween says.
Expanding their business from two 21year old students, ‘trying to achieve something on their own’, has expanded now to the team of 30 people with having warehouses in Telangana, Karnataka, Haryana, Maharashtra, and Tamil Nadu, and will soon open one in West Bengal. They also have three designers working for them and outsource photoshoot and ad campaign shoots.
With a huge hike in the competitive market of other youth monitoring clothing websites, the journey has been quite an adventure for Young Trendz, competing with almost 1.5 lakhs products domestically and internationally. But with their quality products and a wide variety of attractive features, they still seem to stand on the road quite well.
Starting with introducing the concept of couple clothing (popular in countries like China and Korea) to India was a huge success and enough to compromise the total 20% of the sales today.
In 2016 during Valentine’s day, they thought up of this idea and started with limited stock but because of huge demand and response they made additions in supplies later and the concept is running still so far, so good.
Sindhuja describes that being their targeted audience limited to youth, they have customized their products likewise. With the pocket-friendly price range from Rs. 200 to Rs. 600 to the unmatched quality of products being provided.
With having more than 3500 products displayed on the e-commerce market makes over 70% of their total revenue.
Praween says: “In Flipkart, we were recently awarded as one of the top brands in terms of performance during this year’s Big Billion Days. The response during this festive season sale was so good that we sold around 25,000 units in just 5 days.”
Success bites
They claim that the journey so far has not been a piece of cake. Starting up with the time when in spite of being from a non-business background they had to teach themselves about a lot of business statistics, be it some kind of small tricks relating business, studying class 12th accounts, learning a new language or understanding taxes. Everything was new but they never gave up.
After all the hard work they have put in- this year, they are reaching a turnover of Rs 20 Crore, which Praween says is four times that of last year. In 2018, Young Trendz will set up offline stores and add new categories to their collection. But they have no plans to raise funds and want to continue likewise. The co-founders are positive that they will be profitable in 2018.
Flying high already, “Youth Trendz” is determined to admire more. Going like this, for sure it’ll make a mark in the industry.
