powerhouse91| Business Connect Magazine

powerhouse91

THE NEW AGE FIRM, EMBRACING SUCCESS IN E-COMMERCE BRANDS

One of the Excellent Companies of 2022, leads the industry as a specialist with the same belief as it personifies the idea every day as they navigate through the journey. Powerhouse91 has carved its unique stance taking the acquired brands to the next stage of development.

Incepted in 2021, the idea behind Powerhouse91 was born out of the realisation that while taking an E-commerce brand from zero to one is difficult enough, scaling it to the next level comes with its own set of hurdles, and brand owners may not always have access to the right kind of resources, infrastructure, and expertise required to overcome the same. As a result, a lot of brands are unable to fulfill their real growth potential. With the aim to identify and acquire such high-potential E-commerce brands in India and accelerate their growth multifold, thereby directly contributing to the next wave of growth in Indian E-commerce, three industry professionals – Shashwat Diesh, Aqib Mohammed, and Nikhil Agrawal came together to take the foundation of this new-age firm.

POWERHOUSE91 USP
The innovative seed of Powerhouse91 was sown with a noble vision – supporting eCommerce brands to flourish as per their true potential through significant growth capital combined with deep functional expertise across Supply Chain, Marketing, and Technology.

One of the differentiating aspects of Powerhouse91 that makes it stand among the other Ecommerce roll-up companies is that it was founded by a group of people who have themselves gone through the journey of building consumer brands doing multiple crores in revenue within a year from its inception. Guided by the same operations focussed work culture, Powerhouse91 has built numerous proprietary tools, growth frameworks, and business processes to help any acquired brand grow 15-20x over the next 5 years while maintaining healthy profit margins.

Another unique factor of Powerhouse91, it is a customer-first company with a clear strategic focus on specific product categories, long-term value enhancement, and first-class customer satisfaction. Here, customer feedback is considered the driving force for all the products that come under the house of brands. This ensures the firm never compromises on quality and customer satisfaction.

INSIGHTS ON THE SIGNIFICANCE OF R&D
The key force behind a successful e-commerce business is developing a loyal customer base for your brand that will purchase from you again and again (this is how you will achieve high customer lifetime value).

It is almost impossible to achieve for a business that has one stagnant product. To become successful in winning and maintaining customers’ trust, companies need to keep working for the increment and improvement of their product line, and R&D is at the core of that effort.

There is no exception to this rule. Even if you’re product is consumable you need to be releasing new variations to maintain interest with your loyal customers. Whatever you sell, if you consistently bring better and better products to market, you’re on the path to increasing your bottom line.

MORE ABOUT THE LEADERSHIP
Powerhouse91 is the brainchild of a trio – Shashwat Diesh, Aqib Mohammed, and Nikhil Agrawal!

Shashwat and Aqib have known each other since 2015 when they worked together at Snapdeal, and have previously co-founded Azah together – now one of the leading D2C feminine hygiene brands in India. Before Azah, both Shashwat and Aqib have ventured into multiple entrepreneurial pursuits of their own across categories like FMCG, EdTech, and Hyperlocal Marketing.

Nikhil on the other hand holds over 15 years of amazing experience in corporate development and has led multiple strategic areas through expansion, financing, structuring, and divestiture deals. One of his recent accomplishments, as the Head of Strategic Finance at OYO, was the acquisition of a leading European vacation business, which was among the largest outbound deals done by any Indian start-up at the time.

The complementary skill sets of all three foundation members combined with the common zeal to create the next generation of consumer brands in India is what inspired the trio to get together and build Powerhouse91.

STRATEGIES FOR BUSINESS EXCELLENCE
Below is the list of strategies the company should follow to ensure excellence in the business operation:

Vision for the Future: A vision is much more than a statement; it’s the guiding light for the whole organization. This is true for a one-person shop as well as a large company Build a solid repeatable system and execute well: Designing an organization to deliver customer value and ultimately drive profitability should be embarked upon to create a system that can be duplicated in multiple ways. Build Sustained Improvement: Since the competition doesn’t stand still and customers always want better, stronger, faster, and cheaper, the business needs to have a continuous improvement program. Talking about the unique strategies at Powerhouse91 to ensure business excellence Shashwat further apprised,

“We are working to build in-house capabilities in all verticals. Our decisions are highly data-driven and based on customer feedback. Our integration process for any new brand that we acquire is fast and smooth. We believe in transparency within the organization which enables them to make quick decisions.”

POWERHOUSE91’S FUTURE OUTLOOK
Powerhouse91 is steadily growing and effectively operating brands across three different categories – personal care, sports & fitness, and general wellness and projects each of its acquired brands to become multi-million dollar businesses over the next year.

Now, the company is planning to continue on its course of identifying and acquiring high-potential consumer brands across the different segments. At the same time, the company intends to focus heavily on growing its existing family of brands through various levers, with the vision of establishing several of its brands as category leaders, and in many cases, category creators.

GIVING BACK TO THE COMMUNITY
The company is actively involved in social welfare. They have done different CSR activities with celebrities like Sayani Gupta. Recently, they have distributed sanitary pads within the less privileged village areas and government schools. Now, they are also looking to sponsor girls education going forward.