JOIN USTravelKhana, a three-and-a-half-year-old online meal booking platform headquartered in Noida, is aggressively looking at the southern market to further fuel the company’s growth.
“We started off our operation by focusing on the north Indian market, and now the growth will happen from the south. The high internet penetration and tech-savvy youngsters have made it a fertile ground for growth,” said TravelKhana co-founder and CEO Pushpinder Singh in an interaction with DH.
Singh said currently the south contributes one-fourth of its revenues. “We have to solve the issue of language diversity and also the growing demand for regional cuisine. We are planning to add more stations from the current 165 railway stations,” he said.
The company’s virtual QSR business model is further standardised by systematic authentication of the food vendor and items served.
“We want to reach out to a maximum number of users by our technology platform, which will predict customers’ eating habit, and how they browse to reach out to TravelKhana,” he said.
Customers can book their meals through an app, mobile website and desktop website. It can be accessed in an offline mode with an assurance that their transactions will be completed within 30 seconds.
TravelKhana, which is focusing more on food delivery to train passengers, says that growth is picking up among flight and bus passengers availing its services. “We have more inter-city travellers using flight and bus services in South India. We also serve travelling groups,” he said. When asked about entering into city delivery service, he said, TravelKhana has piloted the project and introduced it in Mumbai.
“Most customers prefer this but there is a trade-off between cost and quality. We are delivering breakfast, lunch and dinner as part of it. We will be launching it in New Delhi, Chennai and Bengaluru soon,” he said.
TravelKhana has three lakh downloads and registers growth of around 40,000 on a monthly basis. “We serve 4,000 meals a day through 700 restaurants. The number will increase once we expand our footprints from the current 120 cities,” he said.
The company has 65 employees. “We have a 20-member tech team. We have also a captive call centre facility for real-time engagement with customers. Now, we plan to expand our analytics team,” he said.
As part of its market expansion plan, the company is mulling raising its third round of funding. “I started off my journey with Rs 22 lakh and raised Rs 8.5 crore from domestic investors and venture-capital firms. We are configuring our business plan and it might require $3 to $5 million,” he said.
TravelKhana has tied up with IRCTC to cater to 23 million passengers travelling every day. As per a recent report, the Indian train food market is estimated to be worth about Rs 2,000 crore annually.