Having heard stories from her husband about difficulties in procuring the right material for use in various industries, and knowing how important and at the same time troublesome this process is, she decided to change the situation. Aware of the intricacies of the industry, she firstly narrowed down on the problems of the industry and then started this venture in hopes of alleviating them.
THE IDEA
Lavanya Natarajan found that this industry was plagued by these three problems
- Sourcing genuine / authentic goods
- Accessibility of product technical information
- Ease of procurement.
After careful deliberation, she decided to launch Steelsparrow hoping to overcome these problems. Steelsparrow is an e-commerce startup supplying a variety of complex industrial products to the industry. Currently, it deals with more than 200,000+ industrial products and has secured more than 1,000 customers in just a span of 2 years. The startup focuses only on genuine and quality industrial products and ensures its customers have access to hard to find quality products in the market.
MEET THE MAKERS
The Bangalore-based startup was an initiative by husband-wife duo - Lavanya Natarajan and Venkatesh.
Lavanya Natarajan is an MCA graduate and has now been working at Steelsparrow for three years in the capacity of a Managing Director. She has done an enormous amount of research work on the e-commerce domain and is a natural leader.
Venkatesh is a Mechanical Engineer and has more than 20+ years experience in the oil and gas industry in various positions. He is a strong product engineer having exposure to a great domain of industrial products with a good commercial acumen.
USP
This industry is not that organized yet and most of the transactions are done through individuals or firms who have a monopoly and hence have the freedom to set the price. This startup is an initiative to organize this sector and ensure some order. They sell only genuine industrial goods and ensure quality goods are delivered on time. They offer the lowest prices for the goods in India and it is guaranteed. They ensure availability of goods to the industrial customers when they need it desperately. Apart from just providing material in a completely transparent method, they also provide technical support to their customers whenever they need.
FUNDING
They have a seed funding of Rs.24 Lakhs which was completely done using the founders' savings in 2013.
TARGET MARKET
Steelsparrow.com serves a wide variety of industries starting from running textile mills to large construction sites. It enables the users in any remote areas to search and order quality industrial products and they are shipped mostly within the same day. This enables customers to source their industrial needs and it is a new experience for the industry.
PLAN OF ACTION
Without any external investments, the company has grown and established itself as one of the favorite brands in the industry. They have already exported industrial goods to more than 10 countries in the world with great praise and success. They have a regular clientele of more than 1,000+ customers already. A great point for budding entrepreneurs to note is that they have been very careful in burning cash. They haven't spent money on any sort of paid advertisements so far and their cost of customer acquisition is very low.
They are currently focusing on adding more products before they launch their much awaited marketing campaign. Next they will soon be upgrading their website and expanding their product line. They will also be looking for Venture capitalists to invest in their company for the planned expansion. Their target is to offer a record value to their investors in the shortest time frame.
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