ID Fresh Food is looking at better growth with batter, chapatis and tavas

• A dosa-making tava and relaunch of chapati -- iD fresh food has an aggressive expansion plan for this year.
• iD Fresh Food also announced its seventh round of ESOP worth ₹46 crore earlier this week.
• The Bengaluru-based food brand will be leveraging its expanded portfolio and tapping new markets to drive up growth as it targets revenue of ₹700 cr this year and ₹1000 cr next year.

iD Fresh Food, the consumer brand known for idli and dosa batters, is looking at expanding its product portfolio aggressively by launching new products and relaunching an old one in India and across the world.

It is planning to relaunch its chapati brand, as P.C. Musthafa, co-founder of iD Fresh Food, believes that they haven’t been at par with the company’s standards.

“We're relaunching chapati as it was not a great product from iD, to be frank. I know I'm talking against my brand itself. It was not a super product like other products. Over the last 3-4 years, we worked on it, and managed to launch a great chapati in the UAE market,” Musthafa told Business Insider India.

After the relaunch of chapatis in the UAE, iD Fresh Food has tripled its revenue in the west Asian market. It is now relaunching chapatis in the Indian market and Musthafa is confident that it will be a game changer.

Its strongest markets are Bengaluru, Dubai, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, Delhi and Kolkata. It is now working on strengthening its presence in Tier II markets.

Bangalore-based iD Fresh Food is also launching a dosa-making tava this quarter, after seeing a good response for its prototype last year.

“We have orders for the next one year of production,” said Musthafa.

Pandemic gave a push to ready-to-eat market

The pandemic saw swathes of Indians switch to ready-to-eat (RTE) and ready-to-cook (RTC) brands, as they sought convenient options to ease their burden during the long stay-at-home and work-from-home periods.

As per market research firm Statista, RTE market in India amounted to $50.15 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow annually by 9.59% CAGR and become a $90 billion market by 2027.

Apart from convenience, iD Fresh Food offered another unique selling proposition (USP) to these consumers. Their products were healthier and cleaner - or free from artificial additives or preservatives.

So, it was during the peak of the pandemic that iD Fresh Food started adding new customers as more and more people were willing to spend a premium on healthy products and increased convenience.

“During the pandemic, we managed to add some new customers who were not willing to try our products earlier. They became even more health-conscious (due to the pandemic),” shared Musthafa.

Becoming a ₹1000 cr company

Founded by P.C. Musthafa, Abdul Naser and his brothers in 2005, iD Fresh Food is currently valued at ₹2000 crore. Premji Invest and NewQuest Capital Partners are investors in the company.

Home-grown brand iD fresh Food will leverage its expanded portfolio and tap new markets to accelerate growth as it targets revenue of ₹1000 crore for the next year.

“This fiscal, we are looking at a ₹700 crore revenue target. With the current run rate, we should be able to cross our ₹700 crore target. If we are able to, then ₹1000 crore should be our target for the next year,” said Musthafa.

It reported a 47% growth in the quarter ending June 2022.

iD Fresh Food also announced its seventh round of ESOPs (employee stock option plan) worth ₹46 crore earlier this week, which Musthafa says, is not generous but just what their employees deserve.

“They are the people who built the brand, not me. They have supported me during the most difficult times, even when we were not able to pay salaries on time, they did stand by us and supported us. So far, we have given away ESOPs to 73 employees and its total worth is around ₹300 crore. Our dream is to make 100 crorepatis totally in the next two years [in our company],” said Musthafa.