Meet Hussain Lokhandwala; The Man Who Built A Multi-Crore Food Business By Selling Sandwiches Worth INR 29!

What’s a sandwich? Two slices of bread with a bit of filling inside. The trick: assembling the proper amount of sauces and cheese. Hussain Juzer Lokhandwala, a 33-year-old Pune-based businessman, utilized this simple trick of making sandwiches when he initiated his first outlet in Pune’s Magarpatta in 2013.

Starting a cloud kitchen with an initial investment of INR 1.5 Lakhs, the business now earns revenue worth several crores per year. How did MBA grad Hussain Juzer Lokhandwala do it? Let’s find out. 

Hussain- A Man With A Unique Mindset

Coming from a privileged background, Hussain grew up with everything he wanted. Like most businessmen, he could’ve inherited his father’s business and enjoyed a luxurious lifestyle without much effort.

What drove him was the will to do something different - to make his own name and fortune. “I did not want to be a middle-aged man who would not have made it without the support and backing of the family business. I wanted to do it on my merit,” Hussain expresses.

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Hussain also expressed about the days he spent quarreling with his father, who wanted him to inherit the family business and lead a comfortable life. Parallel to that, Hussain wanted to explore the world and struggle on his own. He wanted to know what it meant to start one’s own business.

His first hurdle towards starting his own business wasn’t money or facility, but his father, whom he had to convince about his passion, about his goal, and why it was a better choice than joining the family business.

Starting Steps Towards Success

With a suggestion from one of his professors during his MBA days, he took to advertising for his startup funds, despite his father’s strong objections.

Finally, Hussain decided to move forward with his chosen path. He took it up as a challenge, although it wasn’t just a challenge for him. He wanted to prove himself to everyone back home, especially his father. “I wasn’t afraid of failing and never gave up. Living alone, managing expenses, running the house gave me a chance to understand what I was truly capable of.”

With an amount of INR 1.5 Lakhs, Hussain had two options - spend that money on a trip to Europe, which he had been planning for a long time, or invest that money on his first outlet plan.

He was inspired and motivated for his outlet, thanks to his frequent visits to Subway in Mumbai. Hussain's first concept was to create an Indian equivalent of Subway, with good quality, taste, and a reasonable price.

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Keeping this in mind, he wanted to make sure that a sandwich can be had for as little as INR 29.

Hussain describes his first month as an entrepreneur as a chaotic experience. 

“I was juggling being an advertising consultant while running the restaurant. It was nothing short of madness. I was overworked, underfed and almost always sleep-deprived. I would take the morning train, come to Pune from Mumbai, work through the day, schedule meetings in Mumbai in the evenings and repeat the next day,” he says.

Experience Comes With Time And Hard Work

During the initial phase of ‘What a Sandwich’, Hussain had to do all of the work at the restaurant himself, which included cleaning, prepping, purchasing materials and veggies, assembling sandwiches, and managing finances.

At one point, he had to pick between paying rent and keeping his job. He chose to rent over his pay as it gave them the space needed to function, and he continued to do all of the labor at the restaurant. “This continued for close to three months, and we finally broke even. We then managed to hire one employee who was solely in charge of deliveries,” he says.

Even before the notion became famous, ‘What A Sandwich' began working as a cloud kitchen. The cloud kitchen industry flourished enormously during the pandemic year of 2020 when many eateries had to shut down.

Another breakthrough moment came in 2021, when they crossed state lines and established themselves as a nationwide player with up to 50 delivery kitchens.

Hussain believed that staying in the restaurant business was the best option.

He takes pride in being a debt-free company and says he intends to keep it that way for the foreseeable future.

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