Burger Kings

The potatoes are from Punjab, the processing is done by the specialist that works for McDonald's and Goli Vada Pav turns them into the Mumbai snack that was hot long before burgers came to India. All this at 50,000 vada pavs a day, standardised to the last gram. At the heart is the kitchen, where the potatoes are turned into par-fried patties and then frozen before being fed through a cold chain to 65 outlets in the state.

"We are perhaps the only Indian fast food chain that operates in a totally handsfree set-up," says S. Ventakesh, Co-founder and CEO of Goli Vada Pav.

But isn't Indian fast food all about being 'made by the hand'? Yuck, grimaces Shivdas Menon, the Malayali Co-founder who is the Chief Financial Officer. "Over 65 per cent of vada pav consumers today are under 40 and they are extremely hygiene-conscious. Also, imagine the problem of having 65 kitchens across the state!" says Menon.

It's not that they did not try: Goli Vada Pav began as a single store in 2004 after Venkatesh, a Tamil Brahmin, and Menon quit their regular jobs and teamed up. They were churning out a few hundred pavs the traditional way. But they faced huge wastage, pilferage and quality issues. Then they tied up with Vista, McDonald's global partners, for getting standardised raw materials.

"Today, all our vada pav varieties have a shelf life of nine months in a packaged state and can be shipped anywhere in the world," he says. At the Goli outlet, the Vada Pav is deep fried for the customer.

"We have an annual turnover of roughly Rs 10 crore now and we hope to double this in three years," says Venkatesh. Their range is priced between Rs 8 and Rs 20. Scaling up is not an issue since the machine that IIT engineers designed for them makes 100,000 pavs in less than four hours.

"As of now we see no need for outside funding, though we have had offers from both venture capitalists (VCs) as well as some very large Indian corporate houses," says Menon.

GOLI VADA PAV

• COMPANY: Goli Vada Pav
• CURRENT STORES: 65 in Maharashtra
• GROWTH PLANS: 25 new stores in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh by July; chain of 300 by 2012
• BUSINESS MODEL: A franchisee has to invest Rs 5-7 lakh and have store space
• FUNDING: Self, franchises.
• HOT ITEMS: Paalak Makai Tikki Pav, Veg Cutlet Pav, Schezwan Pav