This is the story of Abhinav Mathur, a Bengaluru resident who built a successful business in just six years. His startup is called Something's Brewing, and its foundation was laid during the Covid lockdown. It is a platform that gives coffee lovers special machines, equipment and selected speciality coffees from around the world to make cafe-like coffee at home.
The startup has become a one-stop destination for coffee lovers, and it has crossed Rs 15 crore in revenue. The journey from a lockdown idea to a Rs 15 crore business shows how a crisis can be turned into a big opportunity.
A difficult start in 2020
Abhinav started his startup in 2020, when the pandemic had brought his B2B coffee equipment business to a standstill. With cafes closed, demand had shifted completely towards consumers, and Abhinav spotted the change in time.
He realised that coffee lovers in Indian homes had no easy way to buy good quality international equipment. To fill this gap, he made his website live on International Coffee Day, October 1, 2020.
Early challenges and winning trust
In the early days, importing products and samples from international brands during the pandemic was a big challenge. Creating new customers was also difficult because the website had expensive products ranging from Rs 50,000 to Rs 2 lakh.
Instead of going to marketplaces like Amazon, Abhinav decided to build his own platform. He started showing customers live coffee brewing over video calls, and slowly people's trust began to grow.
In-house brand opens the mass market
International products were very expensive, so the business remained limited to a particular segment, which blocked expansion. To solve this, the company launched its own in-house brand Budan about a year later, with a starting price of around Rs 15,000.
This step made it easy for new and lower-budget home brewers to buy a good espresso machine for home use. The move expanded the company's reach rapidly across the country, taking it from a niche premium store to a brand for coffee lovers everywhere.
