Karishma Gupta, Founder @ Satatland Fashion

Karishma, welcome to the podcast. If you could start off by telling us a little bit about yourself and what you do.

Hi, hi Pete, hi Nellie. Uh, thank you so much for having me. I am Karishma, I'm a fashion technologist and a found— and the founder of Satatlan Circular Fashion based in London. Um, what we do is we create fashion that restores the planet for you without the hassle of owning it. So we make clothes which are designed in a way that they are recyclable, using positively impacting materials. And then you as a customer decide if you want to buy them or rent them. And then once the product reaches the end of life, we take them back for responsible recycling and give you very good incentives to do that.

Yeah, I mean, a great business and obviously at the forefront of sort of sustainability in fashion, which is a huge hot topic. But maybe if we step back a little bit in your journey to that, this new adventure you're going on. How did you get there?

It has been a very nice, long journey with its own ups and downs. So I started off very early, maybe at 15 or 16, I had decided that I want to be in fashion. I like the feeling of empowerment that comes through it. You wear something nice and you look good and someone compliments you and I was like, oh, I want to do this, which brings a smile to everyone's face. Initially, I thought I wanted to go to like journalism and fashion, go to Vogue, and it's like standard dreams that you have in the beginning. And I was, I'm from a very small city, Agra, in India. And back in, back in early 2000s, we didn't have big brands. I was like, oh cool, so fashion is a good option, I'll do this. So I didn't get into the fashion communications course, and then I was also accepted in the fashion technology course. Which was looking over the manufacturing and the supply chain textile technology. How do you optimize your manufacturing unit and what kind of setup you need to have? So that was like, oh cool, I'll do it for a year, maybe drop off, go back to communications, fashion communication. Like, I don't want to miss out on a year, year worth of study. So I did that in 6 months' time or something that Nerd side of me kicked in, was like, oh, I'm in between machines. Oh, I'm looking at different chemistry things. Oh, I am looking at completely new world which I'll not have the access to. So I dropped that dream of, uh, journalism and I thought, oh, I'll pursue fashion technology and see how that goes. And then, um, I started working in industries, in big manufacturers. I worked in India, I worked in Bangladesh, I worked in Middle East. Quite a few different countries. Within India, I worked from— for a small designer to big factories which have like 50 units within themselves. Learned the back end of fashion, how things work. Not— maybe it won't be called fashion, it would be more called, um, garment manufacturing in not so sexy term. And, uh, so yeah, and then I kind of realized at one point— I also knew that I wanted to have something of my own, wanted to have a business. I come from a family of entrepreneurs myself. My dad had a recycling business back in India, and I thought, oh, maybe if I could do textile recycling or something. That was like always on the back of the mind. Then I thought, okay, cool, so I want to do my master's, get over with it, and then do, do my— then get start the business. So I moved to London London College of Fashion was on top. They were the only one offering fashion entrepreneurship course. So it's like, oh, naturally I would move towards that. I did that. I was having a very interesting conversation with someone telling them what our family business was. And they told me, oh, so it's in circular economy. I was like, what's that?

It's my fault.

I was like, what? I was like, oh, that's recycling. So I kind of like, oh, okay. So I went back home, opened up circular economy. I saw that there's a system of doing things better which does good for the planet. And I was also seeing the impact of fashion which was on— in London we are very lucky, in the Western part of the world we are very lucky, we don't see that devastating effects of pollution that is created by this industry. It is the second most polluting industry, 10% of global carbon emissions, about 1.2 billion tons of carbon. And along with it, a lot of environmental damage, water, air, everything. So I've seen that by living in the eastern side of the world, which we don't see over here. I said, oh, let's challenge it. Let's do it differently. So that's how I came up with this idea of doing Sadatland. Very long story.

No, I mean, it's very comprehensive. I guess we'll start from the beginning back in India. I mean, in terms of, you say you developed this early sort of route of going into fashion. I guess for a lot of people like us, we're not too sure about, we've got many different interests and I'm sure you did too, but how did you know to sort of refine yourself so early? And do you feel like that was a good decision in hindsight?

So I think that was a lot of influence from my friends. In my school. Plus, we are also sort of a rebellion generation within India. So, um, our parents are like, oh, you're going to be a doctor or engineer? And we are like, nope, we'll do our own thing. And how do you annoy your parents in the best possible way? I'm going to study fashion. But I remember the fight I had with my dad for like, I think it went on for solid 1 month that I am going to do fashion, I'm going to study for it. So you know, when you work hard to do that. When you are fighting for something that you want, you kind of become more attached to it. So that's how I defined it. Sort of rebellion, sort of what it made me feel, how I felt about it. Nobody would talk about different topics. I used to read magazines and stuff. So I was like, yeah, that's how. And then I had a friend group in which all 3 of us were very interested in fashion, and we thought, oh, we're all going to apply for FIT New York together, and we're just going to go out after our school. What happened was the friend group fell out, but one of them did London College of— oh, sorry, Central Saint Martin's, one of India's top designer. Another one also did, uh, the same undergrad university as me, did not pursue master's. She's also India's top lingerie designer as well, one of the biggest entrepreneurs coming up. Then this is third one is me. I hope it works out.

Yeah, wow, wow.

Yeah, and What I'm fascinated about, you did fashion and you went to university to do it in India, and while you were completing your studies, it seemed like you did a lot of work experience as well, you know, 2 summer internships, you know, project research. Why did you think at such an early age it was really important to work along your studies and develop that passion for it?

To be honest, the education system of India is very different from education system over here. These internships were very crucial for us. If we did not do them, we would have been kicked out of our courses as well. So they were mandatory, compulsory. And, um, so also it gave us— gave me or other students within that cohort to go around India as well. So my first— so I am from Agra. I did my— which is the central part of India. Then I did my bachelor's in Calcutta, which is eastern part of India. I did one internship in Vapi, which is a village in India. Then I did another internship in Delhi, which is next to Agra but a very different lifestyle. So you kind of absorb things very differently. You see industries which are run by— India is like a mix of different cultures, very diverse. So you see how different cultures work together as well. So that built multiple soft skills within myself and other students as well, not just myself. Became very dynamic in how we approached problems, how we approached people, understanding, more understanding. So I think it should be part of the curriculum as well. Overall, I don't know the education system over here very well because I only did my master's and it didn't have any internship attached with it, but I was working a lot along with my master's, that kind of kicked in. Yeah, as well.

I think it's something that a lot of people in the UK, they try and— a lot of people try and get an internship during the summer and stuff. So yeah, I guess it's not maybe mandatory, but it's more like a cultural thing. And yeah, but it does vary like between people, to be fair.

No, our university— so in India, our universities help us a lot. Not just universities, our seniors. So if I'm in first year, I'll go to my second year senior to help me get that internship in first year as well. So there's like a community effect as well, which kind of helps everyone. So if you're looking for jobs, it's much easier. I'll just ask everyone, third year, fourth year, second year, like, hey, can I get internship in this company? I would love to work in this. So we kind of prepared to work from year one, and it just makes the entire route very easy.

Yeah, that's really good having like a community that's very self-supporting as well.

Yeah, you need to build a community around yourself, and universities should be helping you do this as well.

Yeah.

And when you moved over to London, it was for an MBA with the, the prospect of starting a business. You, you said it earlier in the podcast that you always felt you wanted to be an entrepreneur, but I'm, I'm interested in— those are two big, big steps at the same time, moving country from two completely different cultures and also just maybe not going down the traditional career route starting your own business. What was it that compelled you to do those both at the same time at such a young age, and how's it been for you?

So also, there's a big part that I come from a family of entrepreneurs as well. I'm the third generation entrepreneur within the family. So my grandfather, my father, my brother is now managing the family business, and I'm like, okay, I'm exploring different routes within the avenue. So I knew that I wanted to do a business And a big role of it is about being a woman as well, where you're like, oh, if I work for someone else, if I get pregnant, I'm gonna get kicked out. No matter which part of the world you're in, this is how we are treated as a women. So I was like, okay, cool, if I am the owner of the business, I am kind of securing my life. So I was like, okay, cool. So if I have to do this, if I have to progress in my life, I want to explore more of the world before I do anything else, like job or marriage or whatever, that life progression. Because obviously your life and career progresses parallelly. Cool. So London, I came because I was like, I— that was the only one that did offer the course. I did not know anything about London. Only thing I knew about London was the telephone booths.

They don't even hear anymore. I think they've taken them all off.

Yeah, I was like, oh, there are nice fancy red telephone booths. That's all I knew.

Yeah, not that fancy. A lot of them are broken.

When I came down and I saw Shard, I was like, what the— where is this building? What is this? I've never seen this before. So I had zero clues. So I was about 24, 23 when I came down to do my entrepreneurship course. I did not think that I will be an entrepreneur very soon. I thought, oh, I might join someone else's business as a co-founder, might take a leadership role somewhere, eventually move back to India, do something else, or blah blah blah. I was keeping all the routes open. And then obviously on this journey you realize, oh, what's important for you right now? And then I kind of got very obsessed with the problem of waste. The environmental impact that is happening. It kind of grew on me. I, I worked in different sectors as well. I tried working for skincare, I didn't like it. Fashion clothes were my favorite, realized that after doing it. Did try a business, try to start a business with my best friend. My first demand was, if it's not sustainable, I'm not putting my foot in it, because that's something that I want to do. So I think it was more of a journey progression or like life progression that I took it. And there are multiple, multiple factors to it. And yeah, didn't know that I'll do it this early, but here I am. No, be prepared for an unexpected.

Yeah. Well, it seems like you have a genuine passion for like, for waste, which kind of seems weird to say. Yeah. So yeah, where did that develop like, and what is sort of the motivation behind? That passion?

I think I have a positive association with waste because my dad did a recycling business. So grew up looking at waste all the time. It was like it converting into cash. I was like, oh, that's good. It can do something. So I have a very positive association with the waste. I do have a negative association with the pollution and the environmental impact around it. So if we start managing the waste, which it is creating, the pollution it is creating. I worked with certified factories and I saw how good their practices were and you're still making the same product. Why don't you do it better? So I had the skills.

Yeah.

And I had the passion for it, had the vision for it as well.

You had obviously the passion and the willingness and then you even came up with the idea. So now you've got this business you've started. I want to ask a bit more about the actual experience of being an entrepreneur. So as a woman in entrepreneurship, how have you found maybe competing for investment or just generally like getting your name out there? And also, it seems that you've competed in some competitions. I saw a DreamTech UK contest by Dell. How have you found competing and how has that developed you as an entrepreneur?

So first, as a woman entrepreneur or being in this field and my gender my ethnicity, me being an outsider, everything. It plays a very interesting role because there's a thing that how people perceive you as well, and then there's a thing of biases that people have. With time, I have— I have learned a lot more about people and myself than running a business, because that's a very important part of it. Um, In terms of competing with— competing in this space or getting into competitions or anything, I think we have to be very open-minded. There are loads of opportunities out there. You have to grab them irrespective of your gender. Yes, there are places where, if you see, women are underfunded, right? Underfunded and over-mentored. Everyone will come down to give advice and et cetera, et cetera. If you look at the stats, it's like, uh, only 1% of the VC funding goes to female entrepreneurs, whereas you have 33% female founders, female entrepreneurs in the UK. So like, how is it even possible? Like, how is it even possible if 33% of the gender difference, like the split between entrepreneurship, is women and they're only getting 1% of the funding. So, you know, it's very difficult to crack into that circle as well. So I'd say, um, it is difficult. It is very difficult. And there are opportunities out there, and you have to kind of keep trying, keep trying. Yeah.

Yeah. And I guess on the competition as well.

On the competitions as well. These are great places, right? You know, you— why I participate in the competitions is because they give you visibility, right? You get more opportunity to network and break into that circle with people you wouldn't necessarily get to connect with because that's also a very important part for your business. That visibility is the most expensive thing. As a business that you're running, uh, you can buy the visibility through Instagram ads, Snapchat ads, or whatever, TikTok ads. But if you get organic visibility and someone is vouching for you, say UK, Dell UK, or Virgin Startup, that, that vouches for us a lot. So if they are vouching for you, they add an extra layer of trust and credibility in front of people who could be your customers or investors or your advisors or your teammate. So I'd say, yeah, they have brought a lot in. And I'd recommend anyone who is listening to this to apply for as many as you can. You might get some foot— some of the doors open for you.

Yeah, yeah, it's great advice. I mean, if we sort of go back a little bit into what you just said about other people's biases of various of your characteristics, I mean, and how your view of yourself has changed in entrepreneurship. And this journey that you're going on. How do you just like let or not let other people's biases affect how this like views yourself? Because obviously that's a bit of a challenge, or at least it seems as such.

So if you go look at the studies of biases that people have, uh, female entrepreneurs are looked upon as risks and threat to their capital. To investors, and male entrepreneurs are looked as opportunity. So how investors or how people frame question— normal people as well. I've seen in LinkedIn comments of different people how if a female entrepreneur is presenting her business, even in a comment, how other people react to them. And if a male entrepreneur is, um, pitching their business in a comment, in LinkedIn comments, and people react to them, right? Uh, an example of this would be, how will you acquire customers, right? If this is a good question, and how will you hold on to them, right? They're asking about go-to-market and etc. The investors are asking. So this is a question for female entrepreneurs, whereas a female— a male entrepreneur is going to be asked question like So what's your go-to-market strategy and where are the opportunities? The first question is, how do you plan to acquire customer and how will you hold on to them? Is kind of obviously looking at you as a threat, as a risk, right? That it's going to be difficult for this person to acquire customers and it's going to be more expensive for them to hold on to their customers as well.

So it's critical.

It's critical. It's a prevention question. It's, it's a very preventive question to female founders. And these are like you'll see them everywhere. And then if you ask that male founder the same question in a different position, like, what's your go-to-market strategy and what are the opportunities, right now you're going to be like, oh, I'm going to have hired 10 people, I'm going to pay them this much, I'm going to put our name in front of these, these, these partnerships, and this is what we're expecting, and this is how we're going to grow this business. So, you know, the questions that are put forward to you as well will also change the answer. Yeah, even if you want to know the same thing. So those are the things that I have learned that happens. And yeah, we are very far, we are very far from training the investors or training people to see how do you get rid of that unconscious bias of looking at women as a risk to actually like look at them equally.

I want to ask about maybe your team within your business. I mean, who's part of it? What do you look for in your team? And why is it important for you to build a team?

So team is the— so I'll start with the code first, right? This is the most important thing, right? You can start anything on your own. And if you feel you're self-sufficient, you can do everything on your own, you're going to get a burnout. You are— going to be very biased in your approach as well. How do you approach the business? And you're better off in a cave than you can survive in a cave as well. You don't belong in a human civil society, right? So there's a really nice book which I read on that. Whereas if you have a team, you get variety of opportunities, variety of opinions that fa— that gives you like more opportunities to grow. Increases your working hours as well. So these are very tactical answers for that. Um, you do need 3 people in your team when you start off. One is the hustler, one is the innovator, and one is the doer, right? So you need 3— these 3 people, you need a balance of team. How our team is divided is, um, so I'm the founder. I started off on this on my own. Then I had the first teammate who joined us was Steph. She's the creative director. She was also the head of Ted Baker at Kurt Kaiger previously. She came in, she came in, gave me a different perspective. She has over 25 years of experience in her own career. So with her, I think we boosted in terms of our product development strategy. Then the second person who came in was through Steph. We hired Mikela for designing the products. As well because I'm not a designer, I'm more on technology side of it. So that was the product that she's doing. Then third person came in was when I realized, oh, this business needs financial support and we need to go after the investor. We need to change our strategy from going to customers because there's only so much I can put from my own pocket in this business. Then we had a CFO, we hired a CFO, Dennis. He has over 25 years again. Within corporate finance. He used to be head of natural oil and natural resources companies. So his knowledge was to move drills around and we're like, oh, we can use this in circular fashion as well, your knowledge. So that's how we built our financial strategy. Oil and gas to fashion. Yeah. Good. Big transition. Yeah. Then our latest one has been Grant. He is our marketing director and he was head of Jamie Oliver, Kenwood, and many other kitchenware brands. How I went about taking this team building was I am young, so I would balance myself out with someone, with people who are more experienced than me. If they like the business, yeah, come join us. Right now we are not paid. Nobody's paid. It's all sweat equity. And And I was looking for gaps to fill at a time when they were needed. First, when I was talking to customers, I realized I need to improve the product, so I need a product team itself for the clothing itself. Second was, okay, cool, now I need cash, I need capital. I went about going hiring a CFO. Then once we got the investment commitments, I was like, oh cool, now I need to build up the pipeline for marketing. And so I hired a marketing person. And then there'll be another person to execute these as well because obviously we can't afford these people even after the capital raise until our seed round. So we have planned that out.

It appears like everybody you've brought into the team is, you know, very established careers and very good at what they do. How did you meet these people? I assume it was through networking. And if it was networking, what networking avenues do you recommend to people? What were best for you?

Yeah, so Stephanie and I met organically. So I had a pop-up shop, she walked in, she liked the stuff, and we got chatting. I was obviously there to get customer feedback, so I was just right next to the rack all the time. I was the sales girl. So yeah, and then she told me what she did, and I was like, oh cool. And we were kind of like vibing, chatting. She was like, oh yeah, this and that. So that's how I met Steph. Oh, that was pure luck. Then Dennis, I, I put a request out on a startup community which was for hiring non-exec directors and advisors. So I put it out and quite a few people applied and Dennis was— Dennis and I got along very well. So that's how I went about with him.

For people interested, what was that website called?

Connected. Connected. It's a fundraising platform connected with without an E. And, um, so that's a really good platform in terms of hiring people. Um, I obviously get loads of recommendations for people if I go out, because obviously when you have been through so many accelerators, you have been through so many competitions, you go to networking events, you meet people, and they will recommend you to someone. And investors also try to help you hire people as well. So if I go to investors who have not invested, not committed, but still they're interested in helping us grow because they like the mission or the vision, or they just I just want to see how this business is developing. So they also connect you with people. So one of the investors recommended me this platform which was for advisors, mostly advisors, or people who are looking for direct— direction roles, director roles or something. So that's how I met Grant. So I put the request out, met a lot of people, and I've met so many marketing people. Like, marketing people are like the easiest ones you get, but it's very difficult to find the right one with you, who you get along with, who completes a gap that you have in the business, who are fit for the culture, who really align with your vision. And yeah, they see themselves growing in the company as well. Those life stages also matter. So obviously all these, all three of these are much older and their life stages, they are much more progressed. So the business gets that experience from them, plus we get the calmness of their strategy as well.

Yeah, wow, that's—

it's almost like an incremental approach you're taking, so it's kind of building one block at a time, right?

Yeah.

And so I guess in future, what blocks are left for you to then be successful, do you think, as a Tatlan?

A lot. I feel there's like a really nice picture. So you have to imagine you are on a, on a rail, railway cabin thing. You're like on a, on a track.

Yeah.

You are on that pushy thing. Push thing that goes on the track.

Okay.

And you're building, putting the track out and you're pushing it another centimeter, then you're putting another track out and then you're pushing, going forward with it. That's how startups work.

Mm-hmm.

So you have to incrementally build it. I've seen quite a few people who build it very instantly. They're like 4 dorm room guys and they're like, oh, we are gonna build the business together. I've done that before as well. Mm-hmm. Right. With my besties and everything. And they're like, oh, we're going to do this together. And then you realize, oh, one has got a girlfriend, another one's parents want them back home, someone has got this, and these teams fall apart as well. You kind of have to find what your mission or the vision is of your company, what you really want to do. Two co-founders would be happy to do it, like three as well, but be prepared that teams do fall apart. And I've seen that happen quite a lot. I've seen divorces, I've seen founder divorces. Everything happens. So be prepared. This is life.

Yeah.

I'm sort of interested by your split equity approach as opposed to maybe trying to build a bit more by yourself. I know you said the importance of team, and I guess that's why if you didn't have the funding, you thought, OK, team comes first before actually owning the whole company yourself. So what would you recommend to people? Nellif and I are currently starting off with our own startup, trying to see where we can get that. At a young age, but maybe you're still completing your studies or, you know, you've just graduated, there's a lack of funding. How do you go about like meeting those team members? How do you go about like approaching, you know, building the right team?

So there'll never be the right team. I think it all— you realize one thing at a time, like this is— these are the things that you want. It's like a shopping list that you start developing in people like, oh, I want them at this stage, or I want them to have this much financial risk appetite. I want to— I want them to have this or that in experience plus characteristics. It becomes like a shopping list for people that you're looking for. Um, if you are starting from scratch, completely scratch, obviously there'll be an equity— equal equity split. If you are 3, 4, 2, 3, 4, 5, whatever, there'll be— you'll have bigger chunks of share going away within the team. Like, obviously, whatever is right for you guys, who, how much, who is putting in money, or who's putting in more time, who's bringing in previous contacts, or who's doing innovation. You, you'll have to like sit down and write down all the responsibilities of the people that you're bringing in, and then you decide your equity split after that. When I went about hiring the team We were much more advanced, we were much more developed as a company, and I really knew what I wanted from these people. I went about finding a CTO as well with a higher equity split thing as well, but realized that I don't need a CTO right now. I might need it later. And the later you find a teammate, the lower the equity you'll have to give away. So I guess everyone is on their own journey. There'll not be like a right or wrong equity split. There are people who have— who I've heard of who are founders, they started with 50-50 business initially. They were doing 50-50 work responsibilities, and then one day, one fine day, the co-founder decided, I'm out. And then investors come in, but they were like, oh, so you don't take the business or anything, and then the investors come in and they're like, oh, there's a 50% owner of your business who's doing nothing. And initially the split was divided emotionally, like, oh, these are best friends who divided emotionally— emotional, uh, equity based on their emotions. And now it's like, oh, now we're talking about money. So that goes through a very challenging process. So be very, be very mindful of how you divide your business, who you divide your business with. There are great books you can read, um, Founder's Dilemma. Forgot the name of the author. Uh, Founder's Dilemma, which is a really good book that you guys should read. There's a podcast as well, The Startup Podcast, which is also very good. They talk about equity split in a very nice level, but The Founder's Dilemma goes through at each stages and how to divide your equity on based on that stage as well.

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In your company, you've achieved great success, and one of those is having successful pop-ups in Bond Street, Oxford Circus, Covent Garden, and King's Cross. How did you find that experience? Did you find that a useful activity? And, you know, for someone who's maybe wants to build a fashion brand, why would you recommend people to do it?

Yeah, I would definitely recommend anyone who is starting from nothing. They have a product, any product, it could be any consumer product. And the best thing you as a founder can do is to talk to actual customers. They want to buy it, right? And if you do it online, I tried to do it online first with Instagram ads and Google ads. It was lacking the customer touchpoint in this early phase. Like, who are they? And plus, I didn't have that much budget. You really need a lot of budget to do Instagram ads properly and you have to test them out. So it's like, I really want to talk to women. Like, I want to get their opinion of what they think about the brand, what they think about the clothing. I only had samples in my hand. I didn't even have enough pieces to sell. I was like, ah, this is cheap. I'm going to go for it. It gets me, gives me an opportunity to talk to the customer. It tells me what actually the thinking mind of these people is like. How do they purchase? You can read articles from Mintel, you can read research of the most amazing research-minded, consumer-centric marketing people, but the best knowledge is actually talking to people. Like, are they getting their credit cards out? Are they giving you cash for your work? So yeah, we started getting cash for the samples. I was like, I was not willing to sell the samples. I was like, yeah, if it fits you, take it. So like, oh, thank you so much. And I will make the purchase. And then I couldn't serve a lot of customers because we had only size 8 and size 10 pieces. Prices. But people are like, oh, I'll sign up to your waiting list, please let me know when you have your next collection and I'll get my friends to do it as well. So that sort of organic conversation with the customer was very good. Also, I learned a lot from the customers who are not buying. Like, what do you think? Like, oh, looks like she was carrying a very expensive bag, she already had the money, the sustainability thing was already there in the business, in the product, they were good looking product. And then I realized the customer says I really want some more modest clothing because this is just for much younger. I love your brand and vision. Here's my waiting list. When you do modest clothing, I'll come back. So those are the things as well. So I now know that I need to do more modest clothing as well. I need these sizes that I need to prepare. The— I know this is what the customer is actually willing to pay. What I tested in different price ranges, well, like in Bond Street, I was like, oh, more expensive. And then when I was doing it in King's Cross and Covent Garden And I tried different pricing and saw different perspective of the customer. So I would definitely recommend anyone who has a product-based business, get into farmers market, get into those. If you have been to Brixton Market, there's very nice— in Brick Lane as well, there are these very cheap shops that you can get for like £40 a day. Get into them and talk to people.

No, it's great advice. And I guess being on the front line, it's quite a unique experience, right?

You'll understand staffing as well. How do you staff yourself? How do you present your company as well in front of these people? And what attracts you— what attracts customers to you and what attracts customers to your next-door shop? That's also very— like, you're just seeing and learning so much so instantly. Like, so much of your appearance matters, so much of your product range matters, so much of your conversation style matters with the customers as well. So yeah. Yeah, go do it.

And with your entrepreneurship journey, I think we've discussed a lot of your highs and also just generally how you should go about becoming an entrepreneur. But if you don't mind, I'd like to ask maybe a bit about the lows you've experienced and how you've sort of grown from them.

The lows have been definitely not being able to do it much more quickly. Like, I have a different vision. The expectation for this brand has had been very different from what I started off as well. Uh, the fundraising took forever because obviously everything happened. You have political condition that went mad, you had COVID lockdown that went mad. I started the business in COVID lockdown actually, and I was like, I've started the product development before the lockdown actually happened. And when the lockdown happened and I had nice fancy dresses and I was like people are going, where are the people going to wear it? And I've put down so much money in developing this. And I was like, cool, if I can't sell it, what else can I get out of these samples? Right? Started talking to people. So that was obviously a very low point, like very depressed, depression point that, oh my God, like I have invested all of my savings in this thing and now nobody's going out, nobody's wearing it. I am falling apart with the people I actually started working with. Then another low, obviously these all social, political, economic crisis have been very big factor in the last 2 years, I think. Um, the financial downturn, then you have cost of living crisis where people don't want to actually spend clothes. People are— if you go to any bar in London right now, you'll see the difference that it's not as filled as it used to be before. Now people are very much more cautious about going out. People are not spending money, so You have a fashion consumer business, so how do you actually navigate these situations? As I said, a skill of a founder is very different from skills of a professional. So you, you're dealing with your team, people coming and leaving, you're dealing with, uh, opportunities you applied for and it did not come off. And as a, as an early, early founder, these are new things for you, and it leaves a mark on your heart that I did so well and still I faced rejection on this point. So yeah, those have been lows. It's a lot, it's a lot of things that have happened in the last 2 years. And trust me, these things will happen again as well. There'll be problems down the line. Like, no, there has never been a very peaceful time, so you have to navigate all those problems as well.

The question we like to ask all our guests is, what do you define as success for yourself? And maybe how has that changed over time in your life?

I mean, obviously when I was young, the success was like, oh, I'm gonna have the sports car, I'm gonna buy a nice house, or something like that. Then, then life and the view changed about the world and kind of start absorbing other things, that there are more things which are more important, um, than this entire thing of, oh, I want to be successful in my career, in my job, get the best highest placement got it. Like, I was the most highest paid student from my university. I got the job in the biggest company for manufacturing trousers for the role that I was doing. I was like, oh cool. Yeah, we discuss in India, we discuss everyone's salary package, who got how much, and it's like a very open thing. We have a very transparent communication system with each other. So it's like, yeah, I was, I was one of those who was paid the highest being a woman. Like, Got. So that was a success for me back then. I was like, yeah, money and those things mattered. Then moved into the job, got promoted very quickly as well because it was all women labor and they were like, they aligned to me a lot more than other male people. So like, yeah, we need this woman as well. It's like, yeah, good. So that success was going on, start this startup. And with the first thing which I was doing with my bestie, it's like we were getting opportunities like getting into the biggest Indian Fashion Week with just the samples. So that was a success, right? Those are the milestones that you get with Sadatlan. We are like, within the first time, as a first-time, first-time founder— yeah, still I'll consider myself first-time founder— um, we got into competitions, we've got into multiple accelerators. We, as a first-time founder, we've got investment committed. So many things that we've achieved as well. But I think what the success to me looks like is the impact that I want to deliver with the clothing, the, the waste that I want to reduce just in the clothing, the regenerative side of it, the, the network, the ecosystem, the value of the ecosystem that we develop. Everyone is being paid, from the, from the workers to the customers as well, like for the incentives. So that capital impact everything that I counted as success. Now, I mean, I'm, I'm still gonna eat 2 meals a day, my breakfast smoothie, that's it. That's fine, I will survive. But everything else has to stay better.

Yeah, I want to thank you so much for coming on today, Krishna. It's been amazing, and you've literally advised throughout the podcast, and I've really taken on a lot of it, you know, someone who wants to start a business myself, you know, it's been really engaging, and I kind of want you to leave the podcast with one piece of advice, maybe that you were told or something you've, like, developed yourself. Leave with us students, us graduates, like, what would you say to someone wanting to resemble your career path or just achieve success?

I mean, yeah, as you asked me that, you know, what does success mean to you? Have a really clear definition of what does success mean to you. I had when I started Sadhguru Planet, I had like a real mission or purpose written. I want to see a positive change with this. Like, whatever I see, I want to do it. I've seen transformation throughout my life, coming from small city to going to big city, coming from nothing to see everything. I've seen all of that. So I was like, oh, now I want to see the same transformation with fashion as well, for the planet. So Haveriyo's definition of success with But you start. Don't be afraid of failing. Oh my God, that's the best thing that can happen to you. Making mistakes, the best thing that can happen to you. You learn so much so quickly. So start looking at mistakes, failures in a very positive manner because obviously as a— as you are in university or in school, you're like always succeeding, you're always progressing. You're always moving from one year to the second year or third year, getting your degree, etc. So you're kind of used to this pattern of achieving things. But in entrepreneurship, it's not— there's no pattern. It's just a full-on web of maze of going from one point to another and going forward, coming back, then going forward again, then coming back again. It's an iteration loop that you'll have. So be very open-minded to success, failure. Things will go wrong. Things will not go as you planned them to be, and that's fine. That's the part of the journey.

Well, that's a great ending to go there. Once again, thank you very much for your time.

Thank you so much for having me.

No worries. And yeah, we'll see everyone in the next episode.