Manvir Singh Anand, Founder, and CEO, Knight Gourmet
- Manvir is the founder and CEO of Knight gourmet.
- He is a food business expert, and he’s an author.
Podcast
Overview
Manvir Singh Anand is a Food Business Expert, Serial Entrepreneur and a Bestselling Author.
He is the Founder & CEO of Knight Gourmet – is a pan India presence Award-Winning Event Hospitality Solutions Company with 3 local offices in Delhi, Mumbai, and Chennai and a presence across 11 states, and 30 cities having experience in serving over 1.35 million people for event properties like India Premier League, Indian Super League, IIFA awards, etc. His experience spans serving some of the most demanding palates across the world
00:29- About Manvir Singh
- Manvir is the founder and CEO of Knight gourmet.
- He is a food business expert, and he’s an author.
- His book is titled ‘Catering Your Way to Financial Independence.
- He’s been a Forbes 30U30 Nominee (2020) and Food Business Advisor to the Ministry of MSME, Government of India.
01:00- About Knight Gourmet
- In 2003, Manvir happened to start one of the first cloud kitchen businesses in the country called Nine bytes, which was later sold to a private investor.
- Further research into the matter led Manvir to think about Knight Gourmet.
- Knight Gourmet is one of the partners of all major sports leagues in the country. Out of the nine sports leagues, which happen in the country, six of them are done by them including IPL.
- Knight Gourmet has a very good portfolio of government, corporate and sports events, which they do all across the country across three local offices catering to over 1.3 5 million people.
02:59- What is the role of the Kitchen?
- The essence of the company is Event hospitality, which is nothing but catering essentially. The end-to-end catering aspect of an event is what the company typically does.
- For a big event they have typically three scopes which are the VIP lounges, the players catering, then comes the crew catering then comes the entire aspect of the general concessionary pour across the stadium and so on and so forth.
- For an event like that, the company manages the entire catering and kitchen activity.
06:43- About the Book!
- Back in 2013, when Manvir was evaluating opportunities, he came to a juncture about which perpetual readers would love to read.
- Along with that, there was nothing around the food business, per se, or the catering side of the business, there’s a lot of content around, like how do you make recipes and so on, so forth.
- During the pandemic, while building his company, he had the idea to convert this entire content into a book
09:03- What makes a restaurant business stick?
- There are basically three essentials in the restaurant business.
- One is, of course, the food which is the soul of the entire restaurant. Second is this Service. And third is the hype.
- If you falter on any of these three elements, which is either the food, either the service or the hype, the business will not stick.
11:16- How to tackle menu fatigue?
- The menu fatigue aspect is not a big concern, that aspect is building consistency.
- Manvir says that you can play around with a couple of recipes, but somewhere or the other, the standardization is what people really come to you for.
13:14- How do you bring diverse India to the Indian palate?
- According to Manvir,45- 60% of the menu should be favourites because that is what gets people inside the restaurant.
- The remaining menu should have newer items, which you think will gain you recognition.
- If 30% of the menu is for just experimentation for making people try something new, there’s a certain proportion of people who are willing to take that risk on you.
19:55- Three lessons to take away from the conversation?
- The first lesson would be, ‘never take yourself too seriously’. Probably take a few calculated risks.
- The second aspect is being very authentic. Entrepreneurship is a relationship-building exercise and not a transaction-building exercise. That’s why being authentic, being very true to your profession really helps you.
- And the third would be to give back to the community.
RESOURCES:
You can connect with Manvir Singh- LinkedIn
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Profile
- Manvir is the founder and CEO of Knight gourmet.
- He is a food business expert, and he’s an author.
- His book is titled ‘Catering Your Way to Financial Independence.
- He’s been a Forbes 30U30 Nominee (2020) and Food Business Advisor to the Ministry of MSME, Government of India.
