Monsoon Kitchens: Consistent, Safe, and Financeable

A lot of founders can tell you how they made something delicious. Swati Elavia can tell you how she made it consistent, safe, and financeable. Swati is the founder of Monsoon Kitchens, and her story runs from a PhD in nutrition to the unglamorous disciplines that actually scale a food business: standardization, HACCP, co-packer execution, and working capital planning.

We talk about the moment a university chef said Indian food was “too complicated” and needed a turnkey solution, and how that single comment turned into a product strategy. Swati shares what it took to land an early customer at Harvard, why quality consistency and food safety became non-negotiables, and how family life and entrepreneurship collide when you are building a CPG brand while raising kids.

Then we get practical on financing: founder capital, negotiating faster payments, managing the cash conversion cycle when co-packers want to be paid in days and receivables arrive weeks later, and why personal guarantees are often part of the journey. Swati also breaks down the shock of losing 90% of food service revenue during COVID, how PPP and EIDL kept the business alive, and what changed when Monsoon Kitchens leaned into smarter distribution and modern credit options.

If you care about food entrepreneurship, CPG financing, co-packer growth, or scaling Indian food in food service and retail, this conversation delivers real lessons. Subscribe, share this with a founder who needs it, and leave a review with your biggest cash flow question.

Connect with Keith on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/keithkohler1/

Transcript

Episode Introduction

Keith Kohler 0:03

Hello, it's Keith Kohler, your financing man here with the latest episode of How I Financed It. Again, I, as your financing man, I help you get the right financing at the right time. That's Transaction Me. And I can meet you where you are and guide you along your financing journey. That's Transformation Me. So transaction and transformation together is Financing Man. Today I get to welcome to the stage a woman who has a very, very interesting journey. And I can't wait to hear more and more details about it because I know a little bit, but I can't wait to see what else we get to learn today. So please help me welcome to the stage Swati Alavia from Monsoon Kitchens. Swati, welcome. Welcome.

Swati Elavia 0:55

Thank you, Keith. Uh Friday afternoon. Um you are the last one I'm talking to in terms of the professional work today.

Keith Kohler 1:02

Well, that's good. Well, I hope I'm the best one at that.

Swati Elavia 1:05

Yes, yes, we're the best for last, you know.

Keith Kohler 1:08

I hope so. And really excited to have you with us, Swati, because um as I think in the way I've gotten to know you, you have such an interesting background and profile as a founder and what you're seeking to achieve in monsoon kitchens. And I can't wait to dive into more of that. And the way we get to start is as you might expect, can you share with us a bit about how you conceived of monsoon kitchens and what initially got you motivated to found it?

Swati Elavia 1:36

Um, I mean, Keith, uh, I've been um in the field of nutrition and food for a very long time. Um, so how monsoon started came very late uh in life, you know, before I actually thought about ever starting my business. So I came to the US to do my PhD in nutrition. So I was a young graduate student, and then I was married, and I came here and uh did my PhD. But during the PhD, what was interesting was the campus I was at, uh, the professors found um that there was a student over there who could cook Indian food. And if I don't know if you remember, but um in the 80s there used to be uh supper clubs, and these professors uh used to have a supper club um in on on campus, and one guy was tasked to do an Indian uh menu, and he had some recipes, and he brought uh those to me and said, Um, I don't know you, I don't know if you are a good cook or if you need to make some extra money. Um, I mean, the money was very tight at that time, I have to say that. I was a graduate student, and um I said, you know, I'll look at it. Um and uh I made it and I loved it, and uh I got, I think, probably, I don't know, maybe $80 for it.

Keith Kohler 3:02

Um in the 80s when we were students.

Swati Elavia 3:05

Yeah, $80 was a what was a lot of money at that time. But I I did that and I enjoyed it. And for the first time, I actually realized that I was a half-decent cook. Because when I was growing up, you know how when you hear some of the uh entrepreneurs saying that they grew up with the smells and aromas in their mother's kitchen, you know, I don't have any of that story to tell. I'm sorry. Um my mother was a working woman, and yes, she cooked every time, uh every day. Um, but it was not like I was dying to be in her kitchen. I wanted to go out and play with my friends. I I did not care to sit there and make food with her or you know, smell it. But what what I have always asked her was, why do we have to eat this with this? Okay, in in Indian food, like any other food, you always have combinations, the way you create your menu. And it's not just like you take um uh spaghetti and meatballs and then serve something totally kind of crazy with it. Um, so in India, it was like, okay, if you have a lentil dish, then you are going to have the flatbreads with it, and then you have the rice with it. And she had this thing that if you ever cooked a chicken, she would not put any fat on the flatbread because it was too much fat. She was a you know teacher of home economics. So she was very thoughtful cook. My question to her was never, what did you put in it? I was like, why do I have to eat it with this? She would always say to me, Because this makes the complete protein. Her thing was if you eat the rice and you eat the lentils, then it makes the complete protein. So I was never the person who said, Oh, I want to cook, but I was like, why does it have to be? And that continued on. And that became my goal to then learn more and do research, and then did my PhD and then went and worked at General Mills in Minneapolis. And I have to tell you, when I was uh doing my PhD, I would drive from um uh Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to Greensboro, which was 35 miles, one year in the country, a small little stick shift car that my husband bought me because he said you are a graduate student, we can't afford a thousand dollars extra for automatic transmission. I would go there and uh didn't have an air conditioner in there, did not have as a cassette player in there, because it was like you are a student, you can do, but just having a new car for a you know young graduate student was like a dream come true. My god, I'm in America. How fun can it be?

Keith Kohler 5:45

You know, that that makes you look good going around town.

Swati Elavia 5:48

You're God, yes, of course I did in a nice little car. But every time I got an egg, it was quite often I would stop by and pick up at a McDonald's, and you didn't hear this from a registered dietitian, okay? But at that time, I was 102 pounds undernourished, and I would pick up a McDonald's French rice because I wasn't eating beef at that time. And guess what? I'm so ancient that McDonald's did not have a chicken sandwich at that time.

Keith Kohler 6:18

Both you and I knew that time, yes.

Learning Consistency At General Mills

Swati Elavia 6:22

Um so so I would pick that up and I would order a little milkshake or something like that. And then no matter where on the highway I pick that up, the McDonald's French fries always tasted the same. And I would ask my husband, I said, How can they do that? How can it be so consistent? And I'm leading, I'm talking to you about all this because it's leading up to something that we have tried to achieve in our business. And he told me it's called um consistency, standardization, and all that stuff that every food manufacturer or any CPG firm has to hope for in their life. And then when I landed at General Mills, we moved from North Carolina to Minneapolis. And when we got there, and I got a job at General Mills, I did not want to end up teaching. I didn't enjoy teaching. I did research, but I didn't enjoy teaching. So I got this job, and um, one thing that was drilled into us that every box of a cereal, especially Cheerios, has to taste the same no matter what. And that was consistency. So there were three things that we learned: quality, consistency, and food safety. These are the three cornerstones of any good successful company, because you can have a great product, but if it's not consistent, people don't know what to expect. If you have a great product and it's not safe, you're done.

Keith Kohler 7:56

You know, I really appreciate the way you you introduced that, Swati, because as you said, and I really appreciate that you made the contrast, which is yes, a a prevailing story in consumer is the romanticism of grandma and me in the kitchen making things happen, and I wanted to know how to make it and all of that, or I had a specific condition to address, like the world I knew in celiac and gluten-free people approaching that. And here your story is about I wanted to know the reason why, and I was, and you were captivated again by the importance of consistency and food safety right from the beginning. Very different than hey, I've got a recipe or I've got this type of other purpose.

Swati Elavia 8:42

Yeah, yeah. And and that's what when I started to then cook, of course, when I quite came to America, there was no cilantro at that time. People used to cilantro. No cilantro. They used to call it Chinese parsley.

Keith Kohler 8:56

Even I didn't know that.

Swati Elavia 8:57

That's right. So at Kroger in Winston-Salem, there was a Chinese parsley, and I was like, oh, this is cilantro. We had to go to Charlotte to pick up any spices, and so life was very different at that time. Um, but the fact is that I had to cook because there was no other way for me to get the food that I enjoyed. And of course, I took the cookbooks out, and there was no Google and no all recipes, so it was always the cookbooks. That's right. A couple of my friends had given me some cookbooks as a wedding gift, so I brought those with me. And uh then there were some cookbooks that I would borrow from friends because we didn't even have the money to go to get the cookbooks. Then I would go to the university library and pick up some cookbooks, and that's how I learned to cook. But that made me an extremely disciplined cook. I became a very disciplined cook. So, reliability, discipline, thoughtfulness was all a part of my learning to cook in America.

Keith Kohler 10:01

You're coming from a very very highly structured approach, right?

Swati Elavia 10:05

Yeah.

Keith Kohler 10:05

Dedication to the process and the um I just I just love it because it's the first time I've heard a story like this, Swati.

Swati Elavia 10:14

Yeah, and you know what? I I knew what the taste needed to be because my parents were both good cooks. My father learned to cook because they moved from he he was a kind of a product of partition between India and Pakistan. So when he landed in in India, he was in 10th grade and he was alone. His parents were somewhere else, and he had to learn to cook. So he taught me how to kind of get the flavor, but I never wanted to spend time learning about it. But I knew what the taste had to be, and then when I learned it and it matched the taste, I'm like, bingo, we've we are here. Uh, but then it took me a while, and you know, I mean, you have met Tony, and my husband has this like a almost like a five-year itch of moving his job, and it's all in the job, okay? We are married now 43 years, so it's like that everything is great over there. There's no five-year itch. And then we moved to Boston from Minneapolis. We moved to Boston, and when we moved to Boston, I was like, what am I going to do over there? There was no company like General Mills.

Keith Kohler 11:24

No, not at all.

The Move To Boston Sparks A Business

Swati Elavia 11:25

There was Welch's grape juice. Um, they had only one dietitian. There was no need for a big story about it. I mean, the grape story has been hijacked by red wine, so forget about the grapes, correct? Nobody talks about the grapes being healthy, but yeah, red wine is very healthy. Um, so so I thought, do I go back to being a physician? I mean, a dietitian in a hospital, do I apply to Tufts to teach? I'm like, no, I don't want to do that. I said, what do I do well? I cook Indian food quite well now. I know a little bit about CPG. I should start my own. Oh, I did I get so much flack about it. People laughed people laughed at me.

Keith Kohler 12:10

Oh my goodness, really?

Swati Elavia 12:12

Yeah, yeah. Tony gave me that somebody gave Tony a book which said, My wife wants to start a business, ha ha. So and of course I read that, Keith. And then you read it. I read it, and it was all about it. It was not all about that she cannot start the business, it was all about how you can help her and how you can survive her going through the business uh journey.

Keith Kohler 12:41

Well, whether it was about support, it was about support, but it was that okay, because the title doesn't imply that, right?

Swati Elavia 12:48

That's right. So I was like, the when I saw the title, I was like, this is not right. Why are people you know poo-pooing over all of this? But then when I started reading, it just seemed like, and then my husband gave me a book called uh Accounting for Dummies.

Keith Kohler 13:02

Oh, I remember when those series came out, all the big yellow books, right?

Swati Elavia 13:06

Correct. Now I I never really knew accounting. Tony had his undergrad in accounting and then PhD in econometrics. So the guy lived by numbers and I lived by food. So for us, it was like a nice partnership. He kept doing whatever he was doing, but he taught me, he said, you need to understand what business means, not just because you cook well. You can cook well for me, but business means you need to make money. So it took me some time, and then in 2001, our first child went to college. And I went to uh, and it was a really rough time in America. It had 9-11 had just happened, and I drove her for 16 hours a day, one day to reach Chicago. 16 hours. That's right, thousand miles from Boston to Chicago. There were no hotels available. We drove. So then we went back in October for the parents' weekend, and I went to the dining hall and I saw that they were serving Mexican food, they were serving Chinese food, they were serving all kinds of other ethnic foods, but there was no Indian food while there were a lot of graduate students there and quite a few undergrads who were of Indian origin. So I asked the chef, I said, Chef, why aren't you making any Indian food? And he said, You know, Miss, I would love to make it. I love Indian food, uh, but I don't know how to, and it's too complicated.

Keith Kohler 14:40

It's too complicated.

Swati Elavia 14:41

It's too complicated because there are so many spices, and so many spices that they are not used to. I mean, you have basil and rosemary and thyme and all those herbs, pretty common because of Italian food having been around for so long.

Keith Kohler 14:58

Yes.

Swati Elavia 14:59

Correct. But Indian spices, coriander, cumin, codamum, all kinds of warm spices, when they all come together, is not something that had been um exposed. I mean, America was not exposed to that before.

Keith Kohler 15:15

Certainly not at that time.

Swati Elavia 15:16

Correct. True. And the chef said, and there is no turnkey product that I can just open and add my chicken to it.

Keith Kohler 15:26

Like a pre-blend uh spice blend or something else.

A Turnkey Indian Sauce For Harvard

Swati Elavia 15:30

That's right. And guess what? I didn't even know the meaning of turnkey at that time. So I asked again, I asked Tony, I said, What does turnkey mean? And you again laughed at me, but he explained to me, and then I said, Okay, that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to create a turnkey product.

Keith Kohler 15:51

It's exciting as I hear you, because that was the next why, right? That's right.

Swati Elavia 15:56

So that was the why for me, that my daughter would not be able to get the food that she was used to at home. Not that she was craving it all the time, but at least, you know, there are times when you are missing home, you want mom's uh chicken curry kind of thing. Correct.

Keith Kohler 16:12

Absolutely. And I think that's a brilliant thing. And it's I'm so excited to see that maybe others in that position would never be the one to approach the chef and ask why. And yet that was you, the little girl asking mom, asking why.

Swati Elavia 16:28

And I was always the why person, always the why person. Why does this not happen?

Keith Kohler 16:34

I love that because having that sense of purpose, yeah, and knowing you're gonna find the structures and the behaviors that support that.

Swati Elavia 16:42

Correct.

Keith Kohler 16:43

It's really fascinating.

Swati Elavia 16:44

So then, because we were in Boston, I made a spice blend and I took it to the executive chef at Harvard, which was right in our backyard, of course. And I went there and he said, you know, Swati, I'm sorry, I I we are already using somebody's paste, but we are sending it out to different cafeterias. They had about 13, 14 cafeterias, and they are all adding ingredients to it, and every single uh cafeteria taste is different. So he said, then what they did was they took it to their central commissary and they started making sauce out of it to ship it to everybody, which added a lot of cost and labor to that. And he brought me this bag, and he said, if you can bring me a sauce that my chefs can just add the product. And eight weeks later, I was back in his office with the sauce. I love it, and that was 20 years ago, and we still have that, and he's become a great friend now. And he loves telling this story more than I love telling this story.

Keith Kohler 17:58

It no, it's a brilliant story. You launched at Harvard.

Swati Elavia 18:01

I launched at Harvard, I literally did. I mean, that's where our first customer, single customer, was, and then we had to find out how to you know get it to them.

Keith Kohler 18:12

And then there was making it in a commercial kitchen at that time, or so yeah, so that's what happened.

Swati Elavia 18:18

I went to one of our friends who had a restaurant, and I said, I want to do this. There isn't there is a room for it, there is an opportunity here, and we opened a 2,000 square feet facility. And um, he knew the restaurant business, so he got us a little small, like a 200-pound kettle. So we invested a little money. Both of us invested, and uh we started it. He didn't understand CPG, but he said, if you want to run with it, I'm happy to join the ride. And so we did that, we hired two people and uh we started making the sauce there, and then we went to kind of start looking for what else could we do? And they started asking us for samosas, and we're like, How do we make samosas? He said, I can make it in my restaurant and send it. We got some handmade samosas there, and I'm like, uh, that's not safe. That's when my mind started, like, this is not safe.

Food Safety First With HACCP

Keith Kohler 19:18

Yeah, right from the beginning, you were thinking that, and a lot of other founders would not go down that food safety or quality consistency path as you mentioned.

Swati Elavia 19:25

That's right. So I then I, of course, you know, immediately went to the Department of Agriculture, Department of Public Health, um, and I started asking them questions as to who do I meet. And they connected me to a um food science lab. And this lady was a food science uh graduate who had started this lab to test products, and she said, I will come and look at your commissary because your commissary needs to be approved and have a HACCP plan. And I was like, What is HACCP? And of course, at that time she explained to me, and then you know, I learned a lot about it. Then I became a good student of HACCP. I became HACCP student and I got that credential done. Um, and then we did that from 2007 to 2012. And then in 2012, we we had grown, like we had reached about a million dollars. Um and uh it was through a small specialty distributor. And then we started selling to many other hotels around and say Boston College and other places, so it was growing, and then we hired this gentleman who said, You need to shut this thing down. Whoa, you need to shut this commissary down because you can't grow with a great product like this, you can't grow.

Keith Kohler 20:51

Oh, okay. So wow, that he recognized that there was upside opportunity and that you needed to be in an expanded facility.

Swati Elavia 21:00

Yeah, so so I have to tell you, Keith, there are so many angels sitting on my shoulders. People have come in my life and they have helped me, and then they've gone, and I still remember everything that they did for me. So this gentleman said that I was at a show, and there was a gentleman who said he can make all of this product because he went and took our products to the show. And I said, Okay, I'll go, but let's let's wait a few months and see. And he said, No, we are going now. The show was in March, and we went to this manufacturing partner up in Pennsylvania in April.

Keith Kohler 21:40

That's quick, yeah, just like that.

Swati Elavia 21:43

Very quick, and then when I went there, they did not know what cumin was. They had a very Italian family running the business, but ready to learn. And they had a pretty big business. I mean, that's a that's a very nice size uh. Place like most almost more than 100,000 square feet. And they do a very good job and they love the product. I taught them in their test kitchen. And in August, we shut down the commissary. And then it's like, you know, rest is history. And now we have five copackers.

Keith Kohler 22:16

Amazing.

Swati Elavia 22:17

So it's been, it's been a it's been a wonderful ride. And uh all along it was like raising three daughters, making sure that they were well educated. And as I told you, fortunately, they're all off our payroll.

Keith Kohler 22:32

All are off the payroll, yes.

Swati Elavia 22:34

They're all doing well, and as my husband says, that they are all three of our daughters are either NASDAQ or uh, you know, DAO KP kids. They're just working for these big firms, and uh it's it's it's very rewarding because if that hadn't worked out, I wouldn't have been happy in Mountain Kitchens.

Keith Kohler 22:54

As I as I listen to you, Swati, what um I really appreciate what you're saying about the angels. And that um, and I thank you as that that's a wonderful reminder for me myself to reflect upon that too, and call to mind all of those people who've supported me along the way. And I think if you don't mind me saying this, I think knowing you as I do, because of the person you are, I'm not surprised the angels show up.

Swati Elavia 23:23

I mean, it's it's it's just you know, sometimes I feel like that Hindu philosophy, maybe the karma of my parents, karma of myself in the past life is like paying off now. I mean, you don't have to, you don't have to treat people just because you want something from them. That's right. Well, so and and some of these people have, you know, things didn't work out with them, but I can never forget what they did for us.

Early Financing And Fast-Pay Terms

Keith Kohler 23:51

Yeah, that really is Maya Angelou, right? Yeah. You know, you people you'll remember how people made you feel and and what they did for you. I think that's beautiful, a beautiful reflection about the angels on your shoulders. I wanted to go back quickly. When you got to that million over those years, how did you finance the business in that initial period, initial growth phase?

Swati Elavia 24:12

So the initially, uh, my partner and I, we put in money and we we ran the commissary and we ran it very lean because the commissary had like I would say at that time $1,000 or even $800 rent, and we would make it, and we talked to the distributor, and then we said, Can we get paid quickly? Because we have to pay these people. So we had added both of us started with $125,000 investment in the beginning. And um, as soon as we talked to the distributor about getting payment early, immediately he said, Well, we can do 2% 10. And I'm like, What's that?

Keith Kohler 24:55

Oh, yeah, that was your first lesson on terms.

Swati Elavia 24:57

I mean, I'm not kidding you. If somebody had seen this, they would have said, This business, this woman has no business being in business. But but he said, 2% 10, and we can give it to you. You know, 2% 10 is like in 10 days you get it, and then by the time you give the ingredients vendors money, and and we were producing literally just in time.

Keith Kohler 25:22

Yeah, to meet the demand of your of your distributors.

Swati Elavia 25:26

Yeah, not like now where we have to carry inventory, finance the inventory, and all that good stuff. But but the fact is that um um that 2% 10 at that time seemed very, very kind of important to us. Now we never sign that.

Keith Kohler 25:45

Yeah, because again, it had been your own money to put in to start it, and you were relying on income from operations.

Swati Elavia 25:52

Yeah.

Keith Kohler 25:52

And I really appreciate you introducing that, Swati, because a lot of probably our early stage founders, certainly under a million, might not think to say, again, here you're is this is why your curiosity continues to point out, right? You asked why, and how could I? And sometimes our early stage founders will just accept things that this is the only way you can get paid, there's no remote negotiation, you can't ask why. And yes, that's harder with the larger distributors, but if they're if I'm sure they loved your product and your customers loved your product then and now, and so why not ask the question? The worst they can say is no or not now. And but that as I as you mentioned that that importance of shortening that cash conversion cycle, so that helped reinvest it. That was a huge win.

Swati Elavia 26:42

Yeah, and then um in um and then Tony suddenly got a job in New York. And I'm like, we just started the business and now you're moving again.

Keith Kohler 26:54

And now you're moving again.

Swati Elavia 26:56

Really?

Keith Kohler 26:56

It was a five-year itch again, yeah.

Swati Elavia 26:58

That's exactly what happened, and uh and it was always good. It was never like he had to leave for some reason, it was always he was ahead of the game. So I said, that's fine, you move, but I'm not moving because I have to I have to run the business. And my two younger daughters were still in high school, so we were like high school and middle school, so we I just could not leave. And so we so there was a lot of personal sacrifice. We lived apart for three years, and he would come home every Friday, leave every Monday morning to go to you know, that Delta shuttle that used to go from Boston and still goes. Oh, I remember that. Yeah, I mean, we did that for three years.

Keith Kohler 27:44

You know, bringing it, yeah, and bringing in Tony to the mix, if you don't mind. I think what's interesting, how when you think about when you were first starting, right? Yeah. And then when you got to that point when he moved, what did his support look like for you in the business? Did it change? Did it evolve? What was there anything different?

Swati Elavia 28:03

He just said, I mean, by then we were like we were growing, we were not profitable, but we were growing. Um, profits come a little later. I mean, we were just like our if we were not efficient, it was a small commissary, it was just not efficient. So he said, okay, you know what? As long as you don't lose money, I think we can do it. Yeah, and and my partner also, he didn't ever participate in business, he was not an active participant because he was running his restaurants, and he was always very helpful too. So I said, Okay, then we'll continue to do it, but making sure that every weekend we were together as a family.

Keith Kohler 28:48

That's a beautiful agreement.

Swati Elavia 28:50

Yeah, that was very important, and then talking every day, you know, whenever like you have to talk at that time, it was not so much FaceTime, but we did we did talk a lot. The kids talked. Uh, we were doing um um what was that on the computer that we were doing at that time? Now nobody even does that. What is that? Uh why am I forgetting it? Um as well. I I know it was a Wi-Fi thing, remember?

Keith Kohler 29:18

God, I don't even remember. So I think yeah.

Swati Elavia 29:21

So so we used to do the video conferencing on the computer. Okay. Um, and then um Tony, of course, went to New York, but did come back and forth. And every weekend I would make him dinners and put them in little plastic bags. In three years, unless he went out to a restaurant, he did not eat out or did not do takeouts. Every day he ate the same food that we ate at home, sort of. And he would he would carry that. And at that time, I think the TSA was not that hung up on frozen food being carried out.

Keith Kohler 29:59

Oh, that's true.

Family Sacrifice And Samosa Testing

Swati Elavia 30:02

Yeah, so so it was, I worked very hard, and God, with God's grace, I've been given this incredible amount of endurance. Yes, and and the reason why my endurance was when I was deciding on my dissertation topic, my professor was so funny, she said, Um, Swari, even if it's not an earth-shaking research, at least it will create a tremendous amount of endurance for you. And it showed it. You know, in PhD program, the professors are always knocking you down. It's like, you know, or something doesn't work, or you thought that this hypothesis was going to work and it doesn't work. How do you pivot at that time? What do you do? Your patient base that you are testing on, suddenly, you know, two people die. Or somebody says, somebody said, I don't like this, I don't want to be a part of it. You can't force them. So I learned to do that very early on, pivot very quickly, and immediately go and you know, recruit another patient or another Ayyak Rihad patient with who I was studying. So it was it was okay. So that endurance was given to me. I had the strength, and I would probably function at five hours of sleep. Not anymore, but at that time I could do it. Raising the girls and cooking food and working and all that stuff, it was all good.

Keith Kohler 31:33

Um were you sharing just now? Were you sharing that your girls all were aware of what was going on in the business as well? Oh, very much so.

Swati Elavia 31:43

They were my testers. Oh, brilliant. Because, you know, the reason these girls were grown up here and their friends would come and they would say, Mrs. Elavia, how about a samosa? It it just like you know, they would come and I would have samples for them and they would all eat it, and then I would be taking it to the Girl Scouts meeting and get the feedback from the parents. Was it too spicy? Was it not spicy? They loved the chutneys. Um, my my girls, two of my daughters did debate. So we were doing a lot of dinner debates and we were hosting outside teams to come. We used to live in Lexington and we would do hosting for a lot of kids who would be coming from out of town for debate tournaments. And we always had samosas for them.

Keith Kohler 32:29

Everyone wanted to stay at your house, that's for sure.

Swati Elavia 32:32

And they all love samosa. So we knew that samosa was something that was going to be kind of the most popular Indian appetizer. And why not? It is the most popular Indian appetizer in India.

Keith Kohler 32:46

Oh, it is, okay.

Swati Elavia 32:47

Correct.

Keith Kohler 32:47

So every Americanized version of anything like that.

Swati Elavia 32:50

No, no, no. And it is, it's at every corner in India. There are there are vendors standing with like little samosas. They probably make thousands samosas, they bring it and they sell it and they go home. And then even in the in the restaurants, the samosas are always on the menu. So we knew that samosas were there. The girls were very much, and they were very proud of it. Um, there would be articles about it sometimes in Boston Globe, sometimes in other places. There would be some other um little, little articles somewhere, and they would be like, It's my mom's article.

Keith Kohler 33:27

Well, I think so because you're the cool mom.

Swati Elavia 33:30

I I always was the cool mom.

Keith Kohler 33:32

You are and was and has been and will be.

Swati Elavia 33:35

Yeah, yeah. And now you won't believe my nine-year-old grandson can eat spicier food than my husband can. Oh, really? Yeah, he said to me, he said, Nani, your chicken samosas are not too spicy. Ah, I mean, this is this is the kid who is who is an American kid, and all the kids in his class are going to be in future eating this food.

Keith Kohler 34:01

And that's one because they're more used to a more diverse, that's right, exciting world of flavors and cultures and everything.

Swati Elavia 34:09

Yeah.

Keith Kohler 34:12

Which was here, you're introducing a palette of flavors in your university setting that people have not seen. One thing I was excited when you mentioned cumin, I knew that growing up because my mother, are you ready? Since the 1950s, would make her own enchilada sauce. My mother, a Polish-Hungarian woman, yeah, Polish German out of Pennsylvania, but living in San Diego. Yeah, I'm gonna make my own enchilada sauce because the Mexican food, I love it, and I've got to figure it out. So cumin was a key ingredient, and I always ask my mom about that.

Swati Elavia 34:45

Yeah, cumin and cilantro are the two common ingredients in Mexican and Indian food, and that's why a lot of people say that Indian and Mexican cuisines are culinary cousins.

Keith Kohler 34:57

I never heard that before.

Swati Elavia 34:58

Yeah, so if you take, like just now today, uh one of my salespeople, she was at a meeting in Los Angeles, or I think she's in uh San Francisco, and she did a show, and there was a Highliner Foods card that they were showing, and they made the curried taco using the card, and then they they drizzled it with her cilantro chutney, and she said, It's a bomb, people are loving it. So, right away, you can make like how the Korean started the Kogi, yeah, you know, the the taco, Korean tacos, yes, trucks in Los Angeles, correct, and now the same thing is with Indian tacos. There is like a tika masala taco, you can do the nachos, tanduri chicken nachos, uh things like that. Well, I think it's all mashed, it's all kind of melting pot, it all started as that, but now people are mashing up the cuisines and it's kind of fun, isn't it brilliant?

Keith Kohler 35:57

Um, and I think it comes from that curiosity, right? And excitement about trying new things. And um again, as you said, I was not aware of the mix of flavors. So if you like Mexican, you have a predisposition to liking Indian.

Swati Elavia 36:12

That's right. I mean, you can you can even make really nice pasta dishes with with Indian sauces. Why not?

Keith Kohler 36:23

I'm ready. When are you gonna write the cookbooks?

Swati Elavia 36:26

Well I know I'm telling you, I I'm not, I don't have the patience to write a cookbook.

Keith Kohler 36:33

Oh, you don't? Okay.

Swati Elavia 36:34

I don't think I have a patience to write a cookbook. I have patience to cook, but I don't have a pay, you know, again, it requires to be a very good cookbook. It has to work for people. I've I've seen so many cookbooks that don't work. So it has to be a really well standardized recipes. But one of these days, but if you come, I'll cook for you. That's not a problem.

Keith Kohler 36:55

Oh, I'm excited. And you know what? Everyone wants that invitation, I'm sure.

Swati Elavia 37:00

I'm I'm sure, and they'll get it if they are if if they are as nice as you are. But you know, going back to the girls, um the the all the three girls are good cooks. And um we've talked about anybody interested in the business, and as I told you, I can't afford a single one of them. You can't afford a single one, I cannot afford my daughters. Um, and I think most of them have they all three of them than their MBAs, they've gone more into like dad's side of the business. Do you think management?

Keith Kohler 37:36

Not was that a natural attraction? Or was it hey, they understood entrepreneurship, they understood a more corporate role, and they thought for some reason or another corporate was more suited to them, or was it a conscious choice? Or I'm curious if there's anything.

Swati Elavia 37:51

You know, just now they I mean you you went to the you you are an MBA product, correct? Yeah, and um you yeah, that big University of Pennsylvania, Wortland, Britain over there. But but you did work in the corporate world for many years before you branched out on your own. I did. So um we think that they need to develop some really good uh professional learning experiences, they need to learn from the best. Unfortunately, all three of them are working for phenomenal companies, and that's that's what helped me. Learning those disciplines at General Mills has helped me being disciplined now.

Keith Kohler 38:33

Yeah, I appreciate you saying that because in my own corporate journey, um, even though it you know I wasn't a great employee, but I would I felt really privileged to be in settings where I was a good analyst. Yeah, develop good analytical skills. So I can't imagine that you are not a good employee because you know I would I was horrible, SWAT. I'm I'm I'm embarrassed to tell you. And it's mainly because I was not good at structure. I was not good at um, I love to do the work, I love to do the analytics and the constraints. That's it, that's it, and the discussion of it, or the findings like you and I are doing now. I couldn't wait to present. Yeah, but if you once you said to me something like, Well, but you have to work at on this from this time to this time, or we have to have a meeting to that's what was hard for me. Um I I was not predisposed to to enjoying structured environments.

Swati Elavia 39:30

Work from home suits you perfectly. It suits me very well, yes. I think uh I wouldn't be surprised if the one of the girls or two of them they become entrepreneurs later. They are still young, they're not like at the age where they have to become, they're not the ones who felt that they wanted to take a risk like like I did. And I think one of the reasons I could take the risk was because of Tony. We had one income steadily coming at home.

Angels Investors And Working Capital

Keith Kohler 40:02

Yeah, and yes, what a blessing. And that initially helped you, as you said, start with the initial financing, and it got you. If we just went back a little bit in time, Swati, again, when you got into the Copackers, right? Yeah, and now you're expanding. What was that next phase of growth and expansion? What did that look like?

Swati Elavia 40:20

So at that time we needed to raise money. And um we didn't go the round, like you know, we did not go for seed money or anything. We had friends that we talked to, and one of our friends uh said, Okay, I'll ask some of my other kind of associates. And he said, Let's see if you if if we can get them together and you can tell them your story and then see if they'll be interested in it. So we had these people, um, we had five, six of them, they all came. We had a little breakfast, and uh we raised $500,000 with them. So we could so we could hire some people and be able to have some working capital. Because working capital was very important given that the copackers wanted to get paid quickly, and then there was a you know, receivables were coming later.

Keith Kohler 41:20

So that cash conversion cycle from when you were doing your expenses, right? That's right. You got paid. What was it at that time? Maybe 60 days?

Swati Elavia 41:29

Um no, we the the copackers were getting paid within two weeks. Some of them were like one of them was 10 days, but we never really agreed on that. So we said two weeks. I would say more 45 days, and which is still very good. Yeah, it was still very good, but that 45 days to borrow money at that was was hard, especially you don't have a kind of a you know 5% EBITDA or anything like that. Banks don't want to give you that money. Um, but but the fact is that yes, there was a really good banker who also happened to be of Indian origin in Boston, and he said, Okay, I'll give it to you because of, you know, I know you guys, and you've done the business, you know the business. There are a lot of accounts in Boston that buy from you, so we feel comfortable doing it. But again, personal guarantees were involved. So it was not an easy road that way. Financially, as you know, Keith, is the hardest thing for any business.

Keith Kohler 42:32

Often it is for sure. Yeah, I would say for most people it is the first, is the most difficult or the second one. Yeah, but it's definitely always on the on the podium.

Swati Elavia 42:41

That's right. So then uh we we got this 500,000 and we have really good people, they're very supportive. None of them are in food business, none of them are in food business, they are very, very supportive. Um and they've been again, as I said, many angels on my shoulder. And then after that, we started growing the business and we stayed in food service.

Keith Kohler 43:09

Stayed in food service with continued with universities and other private accounts.

Swati Elavia 43:13

And we wrote, we we signed contracts with the group purchasing organizations, with management companies, and it all helped out a lot. And Indian food had also started becoming very popular. People were craving more boulder foods, and we became smarter about selling as well. So then from Boston, we moved to New Jersey, we got a distributor in New Jersey, and then we moved to New York. And then when we signed the contracts, that's when people started saying you should be selling to the Cisco in California, you should be selling it because that's the only way we'll do it. And then the first break we got in 2013 was with Gordon Food Service. With Gordon, and and that was we went to a cater source show. There was a First cater source show in Las Vegas. We went there, and there was a gentleman from Ohio Valley Division of GFS, and he had brought his customers, they always bring their customers, and he had his customers try our food. He was looking for an Indian line. And he himself never wore a badge, never showed up at the Twitch, at the booth, at least I don't remember him. And a week later I get a call from him saying that I want you to come and present it to our office in Ohio. And this is the broker who will pick you up and you'll hire these brokers. I mean, how how often does that happen?

Keith Kohler 44:42

Well, you're getting your angels on your shoulders, right?

Swati Elavia 44:45

That's right. So then I was like, okay, I go to Ohio, and I was never afraid to drive because I had driven that 35 miles.

Keith Kohler 44:53

You'd already did a thousand miles, you can do anything.

Swati Elavia 44:57

But it was a it was a it was a great feeling. I went there, the broker picked me up at the airport. We went there, showed it to them, and they said, okay, uh, we are ready to bring in five products, but you have to go with us. And they thought that the opportunity was in colleges because that's where our success was maximum. And he said, We are going to take you to five different colleges, and we want you to present it to the chefs there and the managers and see what they like. We went to five different colleges, every one of them liked the products, and it was very smart on their part to do it this way. They were trying to make sure that they were not going to bring a line that would be set up for failure unless they had already done the pre-selling.

Keith Kohler 45:46

Yeah, for example.

Breaking Out Nationally With Dot

Swati Elavia 45:47

They did the pre-selling, and that was in June, and then come August, they were writing their menus. These marketing people from Gordon Food Service said, okay, we are ready to go and work with them and get their forecast and their demand, and we'll bring in the product. So that's how it worked. And then in 2015, things really changed when we got Dot Foods.

Keith Kohler 46:16

Oh, tell me more about that.

Swati Elavia 46:18

So Dot Foods, I'd never heard about it, but uh a friend of mine that I ran into somewhere, she was in food business as well, and she said, Have you talked to Dot Foods? And I said, I don't know who Dot Foods is because you know you you don't hear about Dot in normal conversation like you hear about Cisco, yeah, Cisco or US Food Service or Performance Food Group. You just don't hear about them. So I said, Okay, um I'll if you can connect me to somebody, I'll be happy to talk to them. So I talked to them, and right around that time, we started to need money because Gordon Food Service had grown. We needed to hire more people who be and at that time we asked our um investors who were there, like angels, they were angel investors, of course. And they said, you know what, we really don't want to put any equity in it. How about we give you a loan?

Keith Kohler 47:10

Brilliant. And that's that rarely happens, as you know.

Swati Elavia 47:14

Um that's right. Um, so we said, fine, we will take the loan, and uh, we took the loan from I think not every not every person participated in that loan. Um three people invest the three people gave the loan, and then we gave loan too, just because Tony said it it'll look good if you are also putting some money in.

Keith Kohler 47:36

All correct, I agree.

Swati Elavia 47:38

Otherwise, it just seems like there's no skin off your back, correct?

Keith Kohler 47:42

Yes. So well, and it's exciting that you had that initial investment, and then you also, again, as a family, decided we're supporting this.

Swati Elavia 47:51

That's right. Um, so so we had the loan, and that helped out a lot. And we are still not raising money in a professional sense. You know, if I had my MBA, I would have gone and raised money professionally. I just wasn't smart enough to do that, Keith.

Keith Kohler 48:10

I also think if if you don't mind me adding to that in a different way, I think again, going back to your angels on your shoulder theme. Yeah, I think you did something that was more remarkable and harder.

Swati Elavia 48:23

In some ways, it was hard.

Keith Kohler 48:24

I yeah, because you got that friends and family money and you got the bank loan well before many other people would have gotten it.

Swati Elavia 48:33

Yeah, and I mean we didn't have any family money at all. Like we didn't have family here that had money to give. I had a younger brother who was, you know, just starting his job. There was no way that I was going to ask him. Um, so we didn't really have a family money. So it's only the friends that we could talk to. And that that worked out quite well, but it also made us very aware. I I I really felt, and this was drilled into me by one of our um uh friends that you have a fiduciary responsibility to be to be really honest about the whole thing. You you cannot blow this money away. So we were very scrappy. I did not take salary for until I would say probably 2019, 2017. Um, I took very minimal, like barely any, and then some days, some years I didn't even take any salary. So we were scrappy, and we we made uh everybody else, but we never ever shorted anybody in terms of pay me paying our employees.

Keith Kohler 49:44

I really wish to honor that for a minute, and it's it's a reminder. Um, a couple things. One is because it was that you again to all decided together this is what you were going to do, that was going to be your contribution. I appreciate that you understood and that you really um internalized the fiduciary responsibility of once you take money from somebody else, um, you have a you have an ought and and and I'm really glad that you said about paying your employees. Yeah. And I think many people they called they call that to mind when I might ask them the question, but I appreciate you offering that up because it is a solemn responsibility that we have as business.

Swati Elavia 50:27

These people need their money all the time. I mean, they are working with a good faith that they are going to get paid at the end.

Keith Kohler 50:34

That's right.

Swati Elavia 50:35

And and you just can't you just can't uh not honor that. And then in 2019, guess what? The bug to get into retail business was like biting me, like okay for the first time, right? Or yeah, yeah. So we of course created the product that we always had in food service, and we created it into retail, and we we were at the um uh I think it was October, September, September 2019. We showed it at Expo East. Okay, it takes a while to get that runway.

Keith Kohler 51:16

Yeah, it wasn't like Harvard that happened.

Swati Elavia 51:19

No, no, not at all. And by now we are profitable, okay? We're profitable, not making boatload of money, but we were not losing money at all, and we were not even breaking even, but we were profitable, which is still a big deal at that time. And I think it was all because dot made it possible for us to go national. So dot is a redistributor, going back to Dart. They are a redistributor, and it's such a smart business, it's a super smart business model. I don't know if you know much about Dart.

Keith Kohler 51:52

I don't as much as I could, I must confess.

Swati Elavia 51:54

Yeah, and I don't know if we even have time to talk about it, but they basically bundle things, and they could have probably 20 different products on one palette to deliver to a distributor.

Keith Kohler 52:06

Oh, I see.

Swati Elavia 52:07

So they don't so not you don't have to deliver two pallets of monsoon kitchens, but you could have two pallets of monsoon kitchens and an ice cream and this and that and whatever. And that's the only company that has trucks with all three zones: ambient, refrigerated, and frozen.

Keith Kohler 52:25

Oh, wow.

Swati Elavia 52:26

So that way they they create their pallets this way, and and that's what was like an immediate key for us to become national.

Keith Kohler 52:34

So clever.

Swati Elavia 52:35

Yeah, we went into dot and that made us profitable. Our our our cost for freight went down, our cost for shipping went down, our cost for everything went down. And also, when we shut down our facility and went to the Copacker, a lot of people say your margins disappear, our margins improved.

Keith Kohler 52:55

You were the outlier.

Swati Elavia 52:57

We were the outlier, our margins improved because you that tells you how inefficient we must have been. I mean, in 2000 square feet, what do you expect? Yeah, you are cooking here, you are making it was a mess. I felt like I was in a big kitchen. Um so I'm glad that we got out of it. It made it made my life easier. I didn't have to worry so much about it. Somebody else was taking responsibility of managing it, production employees, making sure the food safety was taken care of. My job just became to sell, create, create, sell, create, sell.

Keith Kohler 53:33

I like sell, create, create, sell.

Swati Elavia 53:36

Yeah, I mean, that's that's what we do, and we continue to do that. And of course, we you know now manage the business exactly with uh, and we had only just now seven people, and um, you know, we we kind of have felt that we have gone over the hump of you go over the hump of one million, then you go over the hump of five million, and then people say, Oh God, you need to go over the hump of ten million, and then you go over the hump of ten million, and you feel like, oh my god, good. Now you have to go over the hump of twenty million. And I'm like, Oh my god. It's coming up, it never stops. But you know what? That's what you it as one of my friends who was a dietitian, she said to me, She said, Swari, why are we working so hard? And I'm like, I don't know, Julie, why are we working so hard? She said, Yeah, but what are we saving ourselves for anyway? Let's just work hard. I it was I'd never heard that ever before, but she was an incredibly hardworking dietitian, and she told me, she said, Yeah, what are we saving ourselves? So let's just work hard. Does that make sense to you? It still doesn't make sense to me at some point.

Keith Kohler 54:47

I've ever heard anything quite like that, and that's why I had to pause because that was your mic drop moment. We've had several actually here. I'm glad, thank you for introducing that.

Swati Elavia 54:59

I mean, I still talk to her sometimes, and she just says to me, She said, Well, I stopped, so you are still working hard. I said, Yeah, because you told me to what am I saying? That's great.

Keith Kohler 55:10

So I appreciate that too, because it does tie to the fact that you know, Swati, I'm doing what I'm doing now, which is my favorite stuff. Yeah, and I'll be 60 soon. You didn't start when you were 20 years old, no, you started farther down the line. And so both what we're doing and where our growth plans are and expansion, a lot of people might say to us, Well, wait a minute, shouldn't you be slowing down or other things? And I don't see that that's you anyway.

Swati Elavia 55:40

Not no, not yet. I think the best is yet to come.

Keith Kohler 55:45

Thank you. Yes, I receive that and I send it right back to you.

Retail Ambitions Meet COVID Reality

Swati Elavia 55:50

And that is and and then Keith, you know what happened. So we went into the retail. Yeah, people love the product, they love the packaging. Another stupid mistake on our part. The timing was really wrong. By the time we started getting some placement, COVID happened. Yeah, our food service business, we lost 90% of the business.

Keith Kohler 56:19

90%.

Swati Elavia 56:26

Everywhere. Everything shut down except healthcare. But even healthcare did not want to deal with Indian food at that time. They wanted to just put macaroni cheese and all, because I I still remember how difficult it was for the chef managers or the chefs to actually just put out the food.

Keith Kohler 56:44

To put out a piece of food, not something that required preparation or anything, right?

Swati Elavia 56:49

If we had gone into retail three years before that, things would have been very different. But then the buyer started saying, We don't want to talk to anybody new just now, we just want to keep our shelves full filled.

Keith Kohler 57:03

So it's just the supply chain issues and everything.

Swati Elavia 57:05

That's right. And then we, of course, at that time the PPP loans and the EIDL were the saviors.

Keith Kohler 57:13

Yes.

Swati Elavia 57:14

And I I have to say this: if the US government had not done that at that time, you and I wouldn't be talking to them. No, and I would I would have been out of business, absolutely out of business, because we were we were not going to put any more money. I could not go back in all good faith to my investors and say, I need more money.

Keith Kohler 57:37

Yeah, I appreciate you introducing that. I myself had PPP and Idle for my consultancy, and that was fundamental as well because um a lot of my lending partners shut down and only did those loans because they were actually highly profitable for banks to be the processors. That's right. My ability to get financing done went to near zero. Yeah, and um, those were fundamental in getting me through a time as well, certainly not anywhere near the scale of you.

Swati Elavia 58:05

Yeah, I mean, we I remember talking to you in 2021.

Keith Kohler 58:09

Yeah.

Swati Elavia 58:10

First time, and you asked me about the banks, and I said, I don't think our banks are going to give us any more money. They already have, you know, given us the original loan, which was funded through uh when which is guaranteed by SBA and then personal guarantees. Yes, but EIDL loans are essentially SBA loans. They are so there is no more money left now. There's no more money left for for us to go after. So it was like, okay, you manage it with that. So then at that time, we decided, oh, we got a huge big order from one of the largest grocery store chains. And by when we got that, and by the time we were ready to start selling, the supply chain had become very difficult. The prices had gone up, we could not increase our prices. But the I would say what the attraction of being a being in a big big retailer was kind of sexy.

Keith Kohler 59:16

Yeah, very alluring, right?

Swati Elavia 59:17

Oh my god. It was like, oh my god, we are getting into there. We lost our shirt on that. And that's when my quantitative husband got in and he said, You are shutting this thing down.

Keith Kohler 59:31

Oh, he had suggested he won, yeah.

Swati Elavia 59:33

No, he said you'll shut this uh retail side down.

Keith Kohler 59:37

Shut the retail side, yeah.

Fintech Credit Lines And Payment Discipline

Swati Elavia 59:38

Yeah, you can't make money, focus on your core strength. And we did that, and this happened, like it ended in 2022. In 23, we grew 40%, in 24 we grew 35%, in 25 we got 35%, and now we are back to where we needed to be with two retail products in a large grocery store chain in Southeast, which is fantastic. And now we are starting to think that okay, now we have co-packers that can support us. We've also developed some really good co-packing relationships, and now we feel like our food service business, we are cash flow positive, and then you came in between. I have to say this. I mean, when I was introduced to you, um, I was like, I don't know what kind of you know things can he do because banks are not going to give me money. And then you introduced us to other agencies. And um when you first introduced us to Waveflyer, that time they gave us $300,000 limit. Now they have upped it to $1 million. Yeah. And we we we don't barely use it.

Keith Kohler 1:00:54

But it's nice to know that you have that capacity, right?

Swati Elavia 1:00:57

Yeah, yeah. So my thought is that if if you are a good paymester, you pay back regularly, and you are managing that money because that's literally for working capital, you're not using it to you know do anything else, they they can see that.

Keith Kohler 1:01:17

Yes.

Swati Elavia 1:01:17

And they they are constantly looking at our APAR ratio. Yes, and um we're always beating what their expected number is.

Keith Kohler 1:01:27

Yeah, and you're bringing up an important point is that um in the larger fintech space, right? Wow, when they do their analytics, some of it is algorithmic. You're you're it's very formulaic, it spits out yes, no, maybe anywhere in between. And yet I've also learned, and I'm happy and I'm pleased to get a look behind the curtain, that their number one indicator becomes payment history. That's right. The other ones could fall down the list because they're like, you know what, we may these may have limitations. Yeah, but if Swati and team are paying us on time, we want to stick with them. And and it really goes back to the person and the people you as a family, you as a company are that you've always taken that and happily you've been able to do it, the payment responsibility very seriously. And that has gotten you to the very favorable capital structure you have now.

Swati Elavia 1:02:22

That's right. And the the beauty about these companies that you introduced us to, they are not CPG-specific lenders.

Keith Kohler 1:02:30

No, not all of them understand that perfectly. Yeah.

Swati Elavia 1:02:33

No, they lend, and and uh some of them are not even from America, so they don't even understand. They would ask us, Well, can you explain to us the geopolitical situation? I'm like, I'm not getting there at all. But I did tell, I do talk about what we see, you know, like the tariff situation certainly affects the pricing. For sure. So, so, but they are interested. The the beauty is that they are interested in learning about our business and why this is happening in the summer. Why are you needing money in the summer? And why are you so the seasonal um effect that you have on food business is it's quite real, especially for food service. So they want to understand, and we take our time to explain to them, talk to them. They love our staff accountant, and uh it's it's been wonderful. So if you had not come at the time that we needed someone like you, again, the same angel theory, we would have had a very hard time uh uh scaling it up to the level which put us over the hump to the next hump, I would say.

Keith Kohler 1:03:43

Well, thank you. I really received that. And um that's my highest calling, right? Is to be there for you, for Tony, by extension, your family and your employees, and think about okay, here's the situation you are in. I'm blessed that I get to live in a world where I can work across all the potential solutions and be creative and not just, and again, it's just the way it is, not just only thing one type of financing or one type of way. And again, what I really appreciate about you and Tony is your your thoughtfulness, um, your analytical abilities. You're you really you were not capricious or whimsical, or you really were I was not him.

Swati Elavia 1:04:28

Oh, okay. I can be capricious. Yeah, I take that all but that's what that's what makes an entrepreneur tick, correct? Sometimes you you do want to take risks, and he in his life has been so risk-averse because he has always dealt with asset management. So he's like, I'm his calling for fiduciary responsibility is the highest somebody else's money they are managing. And I I'm like, I would take a little risk here and there.

Keith Kohler 1:04:58

Well, in the and isn't that a beautiful combination, right? That I think you you have this honest communication, and even if you might be more risk of risk tolerant and he's more risk averse, it seems like you've always come together.

Swati Elavia 1:05:11

Yes. Yeah, and you know what? I have to really now be careful that I can't keep counting for more angels to come in sometimes. My coupons are not.

Keith Kohler 1:05:22

They're gonna keep showing up, SWAT, because you continue to invite them in with your energy and your curiosity. And again, I keep writing down the word why. Um yeah, such a lovely theme when you think of the professional and personal growth uh from that little girl in the kitchen to the woman, the manager, the entrepreneur, the wife, all of that you are. It seems like that's a common theme that we've seen.

Swati Elavia 1:05:48

You know what, Jasna, the the person who's most excited about all this is my mom. Yeah, my mom's 91, and I see her twice a year, and I talk to her every Video on FaceTime, she said, What new products are you doing now? What are you doing again? And um, I um when when I wanted to start, she said, You're going to sell samosas and you did your PhD in nutrition? What a waste! And I'm like, No, I think it'll be a lot of fun. And you know what the interesting part is that I still use all of my education. And I continue to be stuck, I mean, I have to continue to study for my credentials for RD. So I do my continuing education credits. So now we are going into the school K-12 business, and we actually find there is so much nutrition focus on K-12 business.

Keith Kohler 1:06:41

Yes, more than any other area.

Swati Elavia 1:06:43

Yeah, and and I think that even as you uh look at the trends just now, protein and fiber are the two macros that are trending. Indian food can provide you great protein, but it is one of the highest, tastiest fiber that you can get.

Keith Kohler 1:07:01

Brilliant. You're the right woman at the right time now.

Swati Elavia 1:07:04

Yes, we'll be we'll be able to do some things around that. Uh, but now I think we'll come back to you again, Keith, one of these days, and we'll sit and talk about how to go about raising money professionally to just see. And I know that you have ideas, you may not be able to do it, but you know people, you have ideas. We talked about it. More than just the money, I want some good advisors on the board. I want some people who will give us some guidance. We have we have reached this much on our own, but I think it'll be really good to have somebody who's smart in CPG and has done it and has been successful.

Pride Advice And How To Reach Keith

Keith Kohler 1:07:48

Well, I'm here, and um, I'm here to do all I can to support you and Tony and the entire monsoon kitchens team. And it's clear that we'll be having a part two of this podcast sometime into the future that chronicles that next phase of monsoon kitchens. And Swati, really want to thank you for joining us today and joining our viewers and our listeners with a really remarkable story of the why, the angels on the shoulder, your endurance, so many wonderful themes. And as we conclude, I get to ask you a couple of questions. It's on my tradition here. I would love the first one is what are you most proud of?

Swati Elavia 1:08:28

I think I'm most proud of my three girls and and my employees just now. They are having such a fun time doing what they're doing, and they are helping me grow the business. I just feel like you have to hire people who are smarter than you so that you learn from them. And I mean, I just I just look at my team and I'm like, you, five of you have done such a good job. Not many people can say that a six people, seven people team can can uh have revenue beyond $10 million.

Keith Kohler 1:09:04

It's extremely rare.

Swati Elavia 1:09:06

Yeah. So I I think they're doing a phenomenal job. Um, and they and and and I think just the way we have served our customers, our chef, I'm very proud of him. I mean, he jumps up every time we have to serve a customer. So I think just the people I'm proud of. What I'm what I've built is secondary because it's because of who has worked with us. Otherwise, I couldn't have done it. I could have had a phenomenal recipe, but unless there were people to help me build it and get to the finish line, none of this would have mattered. So very proud of my girls, my my team, and of course, very thankful to Tony. Thankful in the sense that it's been a just a fun thing. I've known him since I was 17. Not a good, I shouldn't be saying that he always says that was illegal. It's not illegal.

Keith Kohler 1:10:03

It's illegal to know someone at 17.

Swati Elavia 1:10:05

Yeah, but I mean, I was like, you know, we were we were kind of early college sweethearts. So, and it's still a lot of fun. A lot of fun.

Keith Kohler 1:10:15

I appreciate you saying the word fun because um Danica, our producer, will know for sure in the time I've done these. I haven't heard the word fun that much.

Swati Elavia 1:10:24

Um it's been a lot of fun, and you know, Danica is very young, um, but you have to work hard at it. You have to, if you're lucky to have a partner that makes you laugh all the time and educates you at the same time, it's a rare combination. So I've been lucky that way.

Keith Kohler 1:10:46

It is, and I just have one final quick question for you as well. Yes, what would what would be Swati today? What would you tell Swati when she was first starting out monason kitchens in 2001?

Swati Elavia 1:11:00

When I was going to start, or if I had not started it, what would I do?

Keith Kohler 1:11:05

What would you give advice to that to that at that time in the beginnings?

Swati Elavia 1:11:11

I think first my my my advice to anybody who is starting it, don't start it because of money. Don't make money as the main objective to start the business. Like, you know, a lot of people feel like, oh, I'm going to start a business and I'm going to sell it for so much and I'm going to become rich.

Keith Kohler 1:11:28

Yeah, a very romanticized version, right?

Swati Elavia 1:11:31

Yeah, yeah. So don't think about money. Of course, I did not really, I mean, as I told you, I didn't even have this kind of a passion that mothers smell and you know, kitchen, kitchen aroma that got me. You have to you have to know why you are doing it and do you have the resources to do it? Think about it. Whether it is resources, not money only, do you have the network of people around you who are going to support you? Are you willing to make the sacrifices that are required? So I think a few things that are important, and for me, this was the biggest thing. When I was told, when I told myself that I was going to start a business, it was the money was not even in the thing. I was like, okay, we'll start something. I'll start something, I'll do Indian food because that's all I know about. But I know enough from and then lean on your network. I I called so many people at General Mills to just get some sense of was I on the right on the right track. I would call the QC people because I used to work with them. There were people in the marketing department that used to work on labeling. Um, people in my own department used to work on nutrition labels. I I did a lot of nutrition labeling for general mills. So I just called on people and learned from them before I did actually make the first product even viable. So I think people have to do it for not the money, for the passion, for the why, I guess. And um, passion is something that you know people say, oh, follow your passion, but it has to be realistic. So be pragmatic, be consistent, and the last thing be resilient.

Keith Kohler 1:13:18

Yes, be resilient.

Swati Elavia 1:13:20

And I have to tell you this this is my favorite quote. I I live by that quote, and this is by Eleanor Roosevelt. And she said that a woman is like a teabag. You never know how strong it is till she's in hot water. I've been in hot water many times, and then I've just come out, you know.

Keith Kohler 1:13:48

Yeah, I really, I really appreciate that. So many wonderful moments, Swati, with you today. Um, lessons, uh, perspective, fantastic stories. Um, all part of this journey of monsoon kitchens over 25 years, right? So yeah, yeah.

Swati Elavia 1:14:04

And you know what? It is harder for women, not because the world makes it harder, I think we make it harder on ourselves because we want to worry about everything else. We worry about our parents, we worry about our children, we worry about our husbands, we worry about are the dishes clean, are the laundry done, all that stuff. I think we do that ourselves. So if you're willing to sacrifice some of that in terms of, you know, if there are dirty dishes, that's okay. It's it's okay. You live, your family will be there, you give them lots of love and they'll be there. Um, so I think it's harder for women. So women have to be even more resilient than men. Um, so my my special advice to women is be pragmatic, be strong, and and call other women.

Keith Kohler 1:14:53

Yes, the value of that peer-to-peer network is so critical.

Swati Elavia 1:14:58

Yeah, and then call Keith.

Keith Kohler 1:15:00

And call me for financing. I'm in.

Swati Elavia 1:15:02

If you need money, call Keith.

unknown 1:15:05

Thank you.

Keith Kohler 1:15:06

Hey, I am your financing man after all.

Swati Elavia 1:15:08

Yes, you are. You are, and you are you are you are a very realistic financing man. You tell exactly what it is.

Keith Kohler 1:15:15

Thank you, Swati. That's important to me because um it's so critical that I do my best to make you feel that whatever choice you make, that you feel well well informed.

Swati Elavia 1:15:25

Yeah, and you you don't you are very you're very candid. You don't just say, Oh, this will happen. You don't give any false promises.

Keith Kohler 1:15:34

No. So happily, I've done this long enough that I have a good chance of understanding what the likely outcome is. Now I get surprised too, and sometimes things don't turn out the way I hoped for or or that I thought it would be. And yet, happily, with our experience, right? You know, all this road time on the road, we we have a best chance of understanding what's possible and how we can get things done.

Swati Elavia 1:15:56

So yeah, because if if things didn't work out and you just were selling something, then people won't recommend you. Like today, if somebody were to call me, I I don't know how many people I've given your name to. Like, call me, you know. Thank you. I appreciate that. That's that's what is important. You're you're doing what you need to do, and you're doing it well and honestly. So thank you so much. Great Friday um closing today.

Keith Kohler 1:16:21

Friday, it's happy hour somewhere, and um, thank you again, Swati. Really such a beautiful, wide-ranging conversation. And I really just want to honor all the all the way you showed up today and all that you shared with us on your journey, Tony. You and Tony together as a couple, your family, your team, all the wonderful people, and all the angels and will continue to show up for you.

Swati Elavia 1:16:46

Yes, they they are they are the ones I'm very thankful for.

Keith Kohler 1:16:51

Beautiful. Thank you again. And this is Swati Elavia signing off on this episode of How I Financed It. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining me on this episode of How I Financed It. I encourage you to reach out to me on LinkedIn at Keith Kohler1, and I look forward to connecting there.