Drape an authentic handmade saree from Very Much Indian, a Maharashtra-based brand that was recently seen on Shark Tank India

Very much Indian was seen in the recent season of Shark Tank India with its range of handwoven sarees sourced directly from weavers across India.

Indian women and their love for sarees is unmatchable. Saree is not just an attire but an emotional connection for most Indians as it symbolizes heritage and legacy. This is why it is given as a token of ritual during Hindu weddings too. Bringing such tradition to the Indian market, 'Very Much Indian' was seen in the 2nd season of Shark Tank India with their authentically woven sarees.

Slony Gambhir started VMI in the year 2016 after quitting her corporate job, which she had been doing for 10 years. Her family is into the handloom business since the India-Pakistan Partition. Slony always wanted to be an entrepreneur but had to take up a job due to certain reasons. Eventually, she realized her love for business and traditional handloom, and quit her job to revive the dying art of hand-woven Paithani sarees from her very own town Yeola in Maharashtra.

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Maharashtra is known for its Paithani sarees which are hand woven by more than 4000 weavers in the town alone. This art form is very complex and sometimes takes up to 5 to 6 months to make a single saree manually. But this form is gradually dying, and so to revive the same, Very Much Indian offers employment to the weavers and provides authentic handloom-weaved sarees to its customers.

Starting with 25 weavers and only one product, i.e., the Paithani saree, VMI now has a team of 400 weavers offering Ilkals, pure cotton, linen, Bandhani, and Khun sarees exclusively online through their website. All the products are made using traditional handloom techniques and pure threads, as said by the owner on the show. Slony also made Namita Thapar and Vinita Singh wear their saree, and they both looked pretty in the same.

The Pitch

The business made opening sales of Rs. 17 lakhs in FY 18-19, scaled up to Rs. 20 lakhs, Rs 65 lakhs, and Rs. 1.5 crores in FY 19-20, 20-21, and 21-22 respectively. It has projected a sale of Rs. 2 crores in the current year and has a net profit margin of 10-15%.

Slony Gambhir and her husband and co-founder Manish Atri pitched an offer of Rs. 50 lakhs for 3% equity initially. This was countered by Namita Thapar and Aman Gupta jointly for Rs. 50 lakhs for 10% equity, and was closed for the same amount as seen on the show.

Also Read: Swadeshi Blessings, an earthenware cookware brand from Udaipur, makes it to Shark Tank India S2!

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