The story behind Shalin and Mall-story.com started similar to that of a boat going in right direction without navigation. The idea behind this startup had the required technical expertise, but it failed on addressing a vital problem. In the highly competitive consumer oriented marketplace, one needs to garner consumer interest beforehand. This is where Mall-story.com took a change in its stance to become a fashion discovery portal.
Shalin has always been passionate about technology and has designed, developed, implemented various applications using State-of-art technology. He is a BE graduate in information technology Sankalchand Patel college of engineering. His special interests are in base lining the Architecture for the software or web concerns, creating database schema without hosting data redundancies, instantiating code framework.
Please provide a brief overview of your product/ service.
Mall-story is the only Fashion finder in India & Abroad with it’s unique sections as well as praising the best designers, fashion bloggers & stylish people around you, not necessarily Bollywood and ramp walk models. We have our unique algorithms and people-oriented ratings. People can rate/review fashion stores on the basis of it’s collection. People can post fashion deals in the city for other people to avail the offers.
What inspired you to build the above product/ service?
There was no product which was offering such detailed features in this segment of Fashion+Tech industry. I wanted to make a collaborated platform for all fashion designers, bloggers & stylish people plus normal people who could follow their icons. So I left my job at Infosys and start running after this mall-story idea.
What is your life mantra?
“Use innovation to solve issues which were never thought upon.” I have many ideas which will be in pipeline soon after Mall-story receives a decent ovation.
What was the most challenging part of your journey till now?
The most challenging part was to get an investor cum partner who could understand my vision and match my skills.
How did you overcome those challenges?
I met so many people to know their thoughts on my product and how could they help me out. Many of them had pessimistic review still I kept my calm and met new people with a working .Net web prototype during which I met Keyur who was running an IT company and wanted to come onboard Mall-story and then we have reached till now.
Share some details about the investments that you have been able to fetch for the business till now.
I have got 50% investment from Keyur’s company Concept serves Tech for the equity of 40% in return.
How do you protect yourself from the problem of Brain Drain?
I believe in giving complete freedom to my employees. They have full right to work on the given task with their creativity without my interference. I don’t mind passing on accolades to them for their great work in form of bonus & equity. What else do an employee wants apart of good HR policies and working conditions with flexibility. I have worked for 6 years before Mallstory and Infosys being 1 of my employers, I know what ecosystem they need.
According to you, what are the three qualities an individual must have to achieve success?
1) Intelligence which helps him survive the Charles darwin’s test.
2) Passion & Emotion which drives through him/her to achieve your goals dedicatedly.
3) Must know how to save time and convert your 24 hours to maximum.
Which online tools/ services/ apps do you use the most and would like to recommend as well?
I use Snappa for making marketing images for social media. Have even tried Asana and powtoons.
Share any one habit which you think makes you more productive.
My brain is storming 24 hours thinking something out of the box.
Share any one habit which you wish to change in yourself.
I am introvert and shy, would like to change this for better marketing.
Answer in less than 50 words
One tip to success:
Believe in yourself. When you stop that, you loose.
One mistake you believe every individual must avoid:
Over confidence and assuming that all your targeted numbers would be achieved 100% is a myth.
One most important lesson that you have learnt till now:
Keep patience and focus, you’ll get your rewarded for your efforts.
What are your plans for next 3 years?
I want Mall-story to reach 1 million downloads and capture Fashion market abroad.
If you get a chance to start your career again what would you do differently this time?
I would start programming at 15 this time.
What are your top three getaway destinations?
Switzerland, Greece & Spain
Share a quote that inspires you the most.
“Dont wait for God to help you, you never know God might be waiting you to help him.”