Meet PC Musthafa, the IIM-B alum who brought ‘trust’ into his iD Fresh Foods retail business

Imagine walking into a residential complex, software park and corporate office, picking up goods from a store, and dropping money into a box. Nobody to even collect your money. If you don’t have enough money today, you can always come back later and pay, and unlike the local banya, nobody judges you! In the man’s own words, ‘no one’s watching, except the Almighty’. In the age of business automation and high-tech security, this seems too good to be true. Fun fact, it’s working.

iD Fresh Food, a ready-to-eat food company founded by IIM-B alum PC Musthafa has been in the news for its revolutionary iD Trust Shop it rolled out in Bangalore. The company has 17 Trust Shops across Bengaluru, and will be launching them in Hyderabad, Chennai and Mumbai in about a week and around 1000 Trust stores in the coming 6 months.

Musthafa says this alternate model struck him by February end, and by March 11th he launched the first store. As incredible as it might sound, people are paying!

“Collection rates are close to 90%. On some days it’s over 100%. The beauty of the model is that you can pay later, so some day you pay in parts. We hope people remember, and pay for it, and they do”, Musthafa says.

What happens if the collection is below 100%, does he plan to keep it going at a loss? Musthafa argues there will be no loss. “Our products are sold at MRP. Whatever margins there are, we’re passing it onto the retailer. Whatever the amount not paid for may be, the retailer margin is always more than it. This is actually better than the traditional retailer model”, he says.

When asked about funding Musthafa is non-chalant. “I don’t need funding. It’ll make money in itself. This is a sustainable business model. I’m not losing money, so I don’t have to ask for more!” he says.

iD Fresh is backed by Helion Ventures, and claims to have crossed Rs 100 crores in revenues last fiscal, and is targeting Rs 250 crores in 2016-17.

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