How Mukesh Bansal got the idea to start Myntra from a Pune mall visit

Mukesh Bansal is known for building billion-dollar companies like e-commerce platform Myntra and fitness technology firm Cult.fit. Myntra is one of the top direct-to-consumer brands in the country but it is notable how it started out as a brand selling personalised t-shirts and pivoted to later on become a fashion and lifestyle company. 
 
And it was a hot afternoon in a Pune mall that gave Bansal the idea to pivot and build Myntra into what it is today.
 
In a podcast with social media influencer Raj Shamani released a few days ago the entrepreneur recalled his years in the Silicon Valley and how he quit his job in the US in 2007 to come back to India and start his own company. Talking about making the shift from the Valley to India, Bansal said, “I wanted to create everything personalised. So apart from the online space I was also exploring options in the offline market. I used to visit malls every Wednesday and Thursday.”
 
Bansal had a ‘Eureka’ moment while loitering alone in an empty mall in Pune one day. “Almost all the shops were of clothes, footwear and accessories. I thought that it was such a waste as people were sitting with tons of inventory but it was not getting used at all as the buyers were either sitting at home or in the office,” he said.
 
Bansal said that he was of the belief that it would have been so much better had all these things been available online. That’s how he pivoted Myntra and built a company that sold clothes, footwear, accessories, and more. 
 
Myntra scaled up, got acquired by Walmart-owned Flipkart in 2014 and became one of the top online shopping brands in the country. In FY22, it clocked revenues over Rs 3,000 crore.
 
Bansal also highlighted that he learnt failure very early-on in his life. He revealed that he worked in several early-stage start-ups between 1997-2007. “Most of the start-ups don't work. I saw failure upfront multiple times. I realised that if you start something, it will probably not work.”

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