TravelKhana: Your food is here

Indian railways are known for two things- arriving late and poor quality of food. That’s the reason our moms pack those big lunch boxes for such long hour journeys. Thankfully there is someone who has stood up to address at least one of these issues. TravelKhana.com, an NCR-based start-up, is striving to ensure that train passengers get to eat the food of their liking and from restaurants of their choosing while they are travelling.

The company's sole focus is to tackle the penetrating problem of providing fresh and quality food items to travelers anytime, anywhere on all major trains’ routes. TravelKhana is a marketplace that allows railway passengers to buy meals of their choice, from a wide variety of restaurants on its platform. Passengers can order through the startup's website, mobile app or place their order over the phone. The automated platform tracks trains in real time across India and ensures that fresh food is delivered to the passenger on time.

Founded by Pushpinder Singh, an alumnus of IIT BHU and BITS Pilani, in 2012, TravelKhana was a result of his own bad experiences with Indian Railways. "Frequent travelling made me realize that once a passenger bought the train tickets, there was a very little technology used to better his experience. When it came to good food, there was a huge demand and supply gap." The experiences held the sign of a thriving business and drove Singh, who was working with an IT firm, to start TravelKhana.

TravelKhana now has 1,200 vendors on its platform. Impressed with TravelKhana's service, IRCTC recently tied up with the startup. "What we started has now become the basis of several policy level changes in Indian Railways, including the move towards e-catering," says Singh.

Currently, the company is busy channeling most of its energy into a Virtual QSR model. Pushpinder says, “On seeing how effectively big QSR chains like McDonald’s and Domino’s work, I started wondering why it can’t be replicated with the standalone eateries in India. So we thought to ourselves why not systematize the whole process across the nation. For that, we would need to bring consistency in food safety, taste, packaging, pricing, and type. For instance, a passenger travelling from Delhi to Bengaluru should get the same type of vegetarian thali—in terms of price, packaging, quality, etc—at Bhopal and Kurnool. Consequently, we started working on creating a virtual QSR space, wherein we will impart training to vendors and impose standards. We are in the process of creating guidelines and norms on how to improve the quality of food and services.”

TravelKhana plans to increase the number of stations it covers from 120 to 200 by mid-2016. It is also looking at local train and metro travelers as possible customers. "We recently ran a successful pilot in the Delhi Metro," says Singh. The company aims to roll out this service in Mumbai and Delhi by September.

Started with an initial investment of Rs 22 lakh, put in by Singh, the startup has received a funding of `8.5 crores in three rounds. The train food market is estimated to be worth about INR 2000 Crore annually. And, with more than 23 million passengers travelling every day, the Indian Railways definitely presents a huge market for the food-tech industry.

“We rely on feedbacks a lot. Acting on grievances is our first priority. He adds, “Being in the service industry, our object is very clear – satisfy the customers,” says Pushpinder.