Purvi Tantia & Nischint SanghaviFounding team members of Wrappd.in Published On: Thursday, May 19, 2016 Views 3687

Veranta Labs, an innovative start-up announced the launch of Wrapp’d, a one of its kind online gift registry and curated shopping website in India. The user-friendly website www.wrappd.in aims to become the new-age gifting partner by helping people spend money on gifts that are most valued and cherished.

With Wrapp’d, Veranta Labs introduced to the Indian consumer a popular international concept of ‘gift registries’. Wrapp’d is an attempt to give a well-defined face and provide an easy accessible way of availing gift registries in the country. A Gift Registry is a list of products prepared by a gift recipient and shared with near and dear ones. Wrapp’d provide a one-stop platform, which allows the user to create a gift registry online through a few simple steps or just shop from the specially curated items.

All the user has to do is create their own personalized occasion page on the website,  pick and add the gifts from any e-tailer or physical store they would like to receive, select the option of sharing the registry with family and friends and wait for the D-day to be gifted!

The insight was that very often though people appreciate the thought behind a gift, they actually do not like the gift. Either they receive too many of the same gifts or the gifts are not as per their taste. Wrapp’d is a unique platform that allows you to take charge of gifting, on special occasions and pivotal moments of your life. The idea is to eliminate the irritation of gift duplication, re-gifting and boring gifts by making available complete and reliable gifting solutions.

My mantra can be simply put by my favorite quote “Be Happy with what you have but not with what you are”. I believe we should constantly strive for self-improvement but never forget to live your current life to the fullest.

Our concept is unique and each new venture comes with its own set of challenges. We have had a great time starting off the venture and have received an encouraging response from first time users. I would not say it was the most challenging part, however our prime focus was to attract users to the concept and help them have a fun and seamless experience. Hence developing a website and app that is easy to use as well as looks good and functional was a major challenge.

Also in the Indian society asking for gifts generally is not really appreciated and having people to give up the stigma of asking gifts is another pressing challengewhichwe are trying to address.

We are constantly talking to our users to get their feedback about how we could improve their experience and make it simple while trying to explain the same to our developers. We came up with a unique solution of a personalized event page and custom URL that focuses equally on the event as much as the gifts. We are also increasing focus initially on kid’s birthdays and baby showers where gift acceptability is higher.

The business is self-funded at present. We are in discussion with multiple investors for the next round.

We are trying to come up with an ESOP scheme when we start hiring senior people. We have tried to initially focus on having task oriented contracts with some vendors instead of ramping up a large team so we don’t face issues on training and attrition in the start when our business is most vulnerable. However at the same time we are constantly trying to identify talent that we can keep for the longer term.

Patience: Patience to listen to people; wait for the right opportune time.

Self-reliance: Take hard decisions and be accountable for your own actions.  To be able to step up when required and not be afraid to get your hands dirty anytime no matter how small the work is.

Positive thinking: one needs to be focused on positives especially as an entrepreneur as that is the most important factor to tide through tough times.

Few of my favorite apps are Uber, Hopscotch, Steller and Zomato

Noting down any thoughts in an organized way (no matter when they occur).

Avoid taking calls late night at home

• One tip to success

Take as much time to decide on something but once you take a decision don’t doubt yourself.

• One mistake you believe every individual must avoid

Not listening to feedback or criticism from people that matter in life as well as at work.

• One most important lesson that you have learned till now

Life is not a sprint but a marathon. It’s very important to focus on sustaining and conserving your energy to last the entire run.

Our main goal is to become one of the largest gift registry players in India and emerge as a formidable player in the competitive gifting space. We are working towards becoming a one stop shop for the best curated gifts on the online space in India. Not only this we are planning to add more features and get into deeper tie-ups with affiliates to offer customers a more enriched and deeper gifting experience. We are also planning to launch our very own products that are extremely unique on our own ecommerce platform.

I wouldn’t change much as each of my experiences has taught me a lot. The only thing different would be to start my entrepreneur journey about 2 years earlier than I actually did.

Boston, Greece, Sikkim

“Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That’s why it is called the present.” – Alice Morse Earle (also in Kung Fu Panda)