How Dedication and belief did wonders.

Instagram: @yekaherbals

“Being an advocate by profession, I always had a thirst for being a change-maker in the society. With over 10 years of expertise and knowledge gained in the civil service exam preparation, I decided to change my path but not my ambition.”

A Law Graduate from Madurai Law College, Nandini started with a free IAS study center in Anna nagar, Chennai, with the motto to empower micro, small and medium women entrepreneurs. She also found the “PeNPassionates”, a women entrepreneur association. The Group consists of talented passionate women doing small scale businesses. They provide them with periodical training, mentor sessions for them. There is exchange of ideas and experiences too. But this wasn’t it, Nandini always had a personal inclination towards self-care & skincare. And that is when she realized cosmetics had become a twin word for chemicals. With over 85000 chemicals in the Industry, everyone is still unaware of how many toxic ingredients get into our Skin, owing to break the myth of only chemicals drive quick remedies, with the confidence Civil Services preparation gave Nandini, the expertise, confidence & a great team of Siddha Experts & Cosmetic Consultants, she founded YEKA.

The first challenge they encountered while building YEKA was finding out the right product. It took almost 2 years to find out the best ingredients and curate the right product. After the rigorous research and development, they had the products test-marketed with the customers and the customers were highly satisfied. Then came up the next challenge, indeed the biggest disappointment in the journey of YEKA — Marketing. Getting the product to the retail was an uphill task. Placing in just 20 stores across Chennai was itself a challenge as retailers always entertained only known brands. Despite all this they, however, managed to place the products, but reaching out to the customers was again difficult. It required investments on store campaigns, sales teams, etc. However, even after these efforts, the output was very minimal. That’s when they turned out to Social Media and realized it is the best platform to reach out to customers directly. Now, over 90% of the YEKA business is through Instagram & Facebook and they have around 20,000 Customers across India & it is increasing rapidly.

ENTREPRENEUR IS ALL ABOUT BEING A JACK OF ALL:

It is always interesting when you do the job you love. That is what is called passion. Being an entrepreneur means being aware of every work from a lower hierarchy until the topmost decision making. Though they have an in-house team for designing and content writing, Nandini enjoys personally getting into these and contributing her own designs and content writing.

“Do Business On Paper First!” Before starting any business, we need to plan every minute part as well. Think about every aspect. Fore think about the problems that may arise and come up with a solution for every problem. And being an entrepreneur is all about being a Jack of All. If you are good at Product making, your line of business doesn’t just stop with manufacturing. You must be aware of finances, accounting, people management, logistics, administration, etc.

And it may sound like a cliché`, but don’t get demotivated with Failures. Every failure teaches you a lesson. You must try till the end before you give up an idea, says Nandini.