Founder Feature: Kartik Das of Doosra

0:02All right, my friends. Over the next few months, we get to feature some of the amazing brands backed by Redwood Capital Partners. They are one of the leading funds in the space. You need to know about them, and you're going to hear about one of the brands in their consumer fund. So here we go. If you believe great food starts with great ingredients or you're just a hummus fan, you need to know about Little Sesame. They are on a mission to make the world's smoothest hummus using organic and regeneratively grown chickpeas from Montana and zero shortcuts. It's chef crafted, obsessively smooth, and made fresh in their own hummus factory right outside my hometown, Washington, D.C.

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1:09I'm not solving problems. I'm just trying to make people smile. And if we can do that, and through that, they learn more about the breadth of South Asian food and flavors and how there's a culture outside this country where we have a huge snack culture. People don't really know about it, right? So like you said, if you crush a bag and now you're like, wow, there's so much more to explore. And there are so many brands in the South Asian space doing so many cool things. Hey, everybody. This is Caitlin Bricker, editor at Startup CPG. We are back with another founder feature. Today we're talking with Kartik Das, founder of Dusra, an Indian snack mix with a modern twist that combines spice with unexpected sweetness.

1:49After working in investment banking and hedge funds, Kartik went to culinary school during the pandemic before deciding to share his childhood snack culture with America. From hand packing every single bag in a queen's facility to building a community around Chai's missing sidekick. He's taking a deliberately slow approach to growth that prioritizes quality relationships over rapid expansion. I crushed an entire bag in one sitting and I have zero regrets about it. Enjoy this episode.

2:23Hey, everybody, welcome back to the Startup CPG podcast. This is Caitlin and today I'm here with Kartik Das, founder of Dooser. Kartik, welcome to the show thanks katelyn so much fun being here always a good time to chat i am so excited to have you here i feel like i was so late to the deucer party i heard so many people talking about your brand after fancy food and i was like how did i miss the boat on this one this is just like such a bad look but i'm glad we're having this conversation and shout out to literally everybody else in the universe who knew about your brand and experienced it before i did Well, yeah, it's funny you say late to the game, but you guys were doing so much for 20 brands.

3:04We're right across from Panty Food. So if you are sort of diverting your focus, you're not giving them the love you normally do. So you give them all the love. I'm happy to have this chat after. Well, thank you for being here. And for anybody who's listening and might be like me in a previous life, if they don't know who Dusra is, can you just tell us what Dusra is very simply? Sure. If you boil it down, Dusra is an Indian snack mix with a modern twist. So if you walk into any South Asian house across the continent, they will welcome you with a glass of chai, usually, or filled with coffee, and something that's crunchy and salty and a little spiced.

3:40Chai and coffee are on every pantry almost in the United States. But if chai is Batman, our snacks are Robin, and they go together. We're just trying to bring Robin to the party. But the name Dusra means different or other. And so while our snacks at the core of it are South Asian, they're Indian, they're spice, they're ingredients from India, I'm a classically French-trained chef and I avoid like the combinations of sweet and savory. So since Dusra means different, I knew when we were going to showcase our snack culture, I was going to do it my way a little differently. So we've got a little sprinkling of sweet.

4:12That's a little nod to the way I enjoy eating our snacks. I had never seen a flavor profile like you're achieving with Dusra. I was like, OK, so I get spicy like I've had Aztec chocolate before and things like that. But this is nothing like I had tasted that spice and then the chocolate together. I think you have a little bit on your website about how they're just like crushable bags. You can eat it. It's it's addicting. It's valid. I ate it in an entire sitting. I didn't feel bad about it afterwards. But I was like, wow, OK, he's on to something. I think a lot of times in this space, a lot of folks are trying to just solve problems or fitness or knee space.

4:55I always start with, I'm not solving problems. I'm just trying to make people smile. And if we can do that, and through that, they learn more about the breadth of South Asian food and flavors and how there's a culture outside this country where we have a huge snack culture. People don't really know about it, right? So like you said, if you crush a bag and now you're like, wow, there's so much more to explore. And there are so many brands in the South Asian space doing so many cool things that are, some of them are very authentic and traditional. Some of them are authentic to their lived experiences here.

5:24And then the really fun part is the consumer now gets to try like 50 more things that are delicious and you can sort of fit into your everyday life. Not to take the spotlight off of Dooser, but do you have any brands in particular that come to mind when you think about those flavors? Yeah. Oh, oh my God. Okay, so get ready for this. All right. So I think when South Asian foods first come to CPG, you had three or four folks kind of like running on their own, right? You're your Maya Kamal's been doing it forever, Brooklyn Deli, Suki's, Saffron Road, and more recently, Asha Pops. And all of them are doing it almost in silos.

5:55They were talking or trying to convince a customer who wasn't familiar with cuisine. But now there are like, I've got 50 off the top of my head that I can tell you, right? So now in Salsas and Meals, you've got Arias, you've got House of Kajana, You've got Chef Bombay, Masala Gossip, Masala Bliss, Cumin Club, Ojasui, Home Buys, Simran Cooks, Garam Goddess, Peepaw People, Paro, Ajis, Drush, Ix-Actually Co, Kahlo, and Groi. And that's just in sauces and dips, right? Then what we're known for are spices. You've got the big boys like Spicewala and Diaspora. But then you've also got Chutney Punch. You've got Potty Life, Tasting India, Sorcery, Satya Blends, Pure Spice.

6:33And then if you want to have a little fun with it, you go to the snack section, right? You've got what we do. You've got reishi snacks. You've got chaos. You've got Pulpito. You've got Neuramaya, who's doing that with pretzels. You've got Chika Chika, Babu's Kitchen, Heritage Coffee, Elements Truffles, like Confusion Snacks, Babu, Dosa Chips, Talkback, Zip Fruit. I think you guys got a chance to try. And that's without even going to beverage, right? So naturally, you've got chai. You've got your chai boxes and coconut chai, soul chai, folks like that. But then you've got Sinwise Coffee, Transcendence.

7:04You've got Bolly Good and Jungli, right? You've got Rupi Beer, who's doing in the beer space. There's so many of us, it's kind of insane. And you can sort of pick your entry point, right? And the beauty of doing all this together is we're making a market together and that helps everybody else. So I'm just so grateful to be able to do it now, but we also know that we're doing it sort of standing on the shoulders of giants, right? The late, great Floyd Cardoz. You've got Bhatmalakshmi doing stuff. If you've got Sua Desi in Chicago, there's so many small places talking about Sua Desi food culture.

7:34And now we get to do it on shelf. I have to say, I've probably interviewed maybe two dozen brands are coming up on that at this point since I've taken the mic for this series. And I have never witnessed somebody thus far who's called out so many brands. And I think it says a lot, A, about the CPG community in general. And I think it says a lot about you as a founder. So I'm really interested and curious about your perspective about how brands are winning in the space together and how that piece goes towards educating when it comes to these flavors. That's always a tough question, right? I think we're talking about, I think you spoke to Figa a few weeks ago, a few months ago, right?

8:17And I think what they're doing with Kupuasa is so cool, but you need three or four other folks who are talking about it so everybody can showcase the ingredient. And I think for South Asian food, it's about, it isn't about an ingredient at this point. It is about creating familiarity and reducing like that barrier to trial, right? Because we're a billion people. We think we've got food and flavor down, but every time you're trying something new, there's naturally like a little hesitation. Like, do I want to spend money on something where I don't know how it's going to taste? And so I think the beauty of it is if there's so many of us, I told you 50 brands, there's probably 50 I'm missing, right?

8:51And every single one of us, what we're doing together is breaking down that barrier of, oh, this might not taste good, or this could be scary, or the difference between spice and spicy, right? Common misconception when it comes to South Asian food. And so I think that's what we can do together. And at the end of the day, there will be competition. There are a few of us doing similar things in similar spaces, but we are all on a very early part of our journey where I think we're all five, six, seven years away from actually competing with each other. I don't think we're taking money out of someone else's.

9:19We're not sharing basket space yet. there will come a point but I think for now we're just building this market together and then hopefully retailers in the U.S. realize that we're not three items in an ethnic shelf but there's a possibility of a section where you can go and discover this cuisine so no we'll see but I'm hopeful. I am hopeful too. You mentioned a little bit about your background with French cuisine. Before we get too deep into this conversation I need to hear more about your background and what from your background led you to do Sura? Absolutely. So I was born in the south of India in Chennai, which is where I'm a chef from, Sima, which is like the best restaurant he's from.

9:59But I moved to Singapore when I was a kid. So I like to say I'm a third culture kid. I grew up the South Asian culture in Singapore, which is a combination of Chinese, Malay, Indian, and a whole bunch of other things. And I really found myself when I came to the States, right? So that's nice. So three cultures combining. But I always wanted to work for myself and I always wanted to work in food. But when I came here at Winter School for Hospitality, I ended up working in investment banking, believe it or not. Needed a visa, came through. Did that for a couple of years, went to a logistic shop for a couple of years, went back to a hedge fund.

10:28And then one day I woke up on my birthday and I was like, what am I doing with my life? I wanted to tell food stories and I wanted to showcase my food culture. And it was about finding that right spot. But most people who talk about food don't really understand how difficult it is to be behind the stove, right? It's a grueling lifestyle. It's difficult. So I needed to understand that. So I went to culinary school and I actually went to culinary school during the pandemic. So it was the three of us in the classroom. I couldn't taste what my teachers were showcasing and they couldn't taste my food.

10:55So a lot of times you sort of develop your own palate and you began to rely on all the other senses. So anyway, I did that and I came back. I started writing about mom and pop shops close to where I live and I kept asking them about their food stories and they would ask me about mine. For me, it was always the snacks I grew up eating, right? I used to, I was fortunate enough to visit India every year, even after we moved to Singapore. And my favorite time of the day was 4 p.m. I'd sit down with my granddad and they'd bring out chai, right? So chai in South Asia is the beverage and like some sweets, some snacks, everything together.

11:26I know this is going to sound blasphemous. I'm not huge on chai. It's okay. Like it's great, but I was there for the snacks. And so for me, it was tasting all these different textures, flavors, right? And I used to be that weird kid who used to break up like Indian sweets and put them in my salty mixtures to get that textual contrast. People looked at me funny. I was okay with it. I'm happy being different. But I got to introduce so much of South Asian food to so many of my friends who weren't South Asian growing up. And so when it came to telling my food story, I was like, that's what I'm going to do.

11:56I'm going to tell the story of our snack culture to people who don't yet know it exists, but I know that we have so much to offer. And at the end of the day, if we can bring people together over a bite that they are going to try and describe to their friends, but not really know how to do so, then great. We've done a great job. We've created a conversation and we've lot of people together. So at what point did you say, okay, I'm going to create this snack brand. And how did you choose the ingredients that you're using in your products? Because I don't know if we've covered that yet. I find the ingredient list to be obviously very nice and very tasty, but it's unlike anything that I have experienced before.

12:32Yeah, I think for me, I'd like to say, if you walk into an Indian store, you put Dale Brothers or Kalustians in the country, you will see two aisles of Indian snacks. There's so many ingredients we could have played with. But for me, boondi, which is our spiced chickpea puffs. It's something I really enjoyed as a kid. So I knew if I was going to start somewhere, that's where I was going to start. And then we could always make adjustments. So I said, I had a combination of flavors, right? I just used to mix things together as a way I like to eat them. So I thought, okay, I think there's an opportunity here, but I have a, I come from an operational background.

13:02So there's a difference between me liking something and someone paying for something. So I said, okay, let's get some Amazon craft bags. Let's put a canva label on there and let's go to a farmer's market and see people will buy it and so we did that we did that for three months there's a great market on the upper east side here in new york and i said let's do that for three months let's see and the interactions are always extremely positive when people try them and they're like what is this i no clue but it is good i'm like great that's all i need to know so that's when we said okay let's figure out a way to give us a proper shot all right and so that's when we came up with the name dusra the name dusra means three things.

13:34It means different. It means other, which is what we are. It also means second, because usually one bite's never enough. You're going to come back for a second one. And in cricket, docerize the curveball. It's the one you don't see coming. So for anyone who is of South Asian descent, that sweetness from the chocolate is, you're not expecting that. And for anyone who's not familiar with our food, that whole flavor profile, the whole journey you go on is like, what just happened? Right. And when we thought about the ingredients, our spice blend, if you talk to anyone from the North of India, they'll be familiar with a concept called chak masala.

14:01Chaat masala is usually a range of six to seven spices, and it will take you on what we call a 12 chaat patta, which is like a flavor explosion. There's a lot happening in your mouth. It almost feels like a ping pong match. So our ingredients are, you know, dried green mango powder, amchur, which is tart. It's got that citrus notes. Black salt, which gives you a bit of that pungent balance you need in there. Then we source almost all our spices from spicewala. So they've got incredible roasted cumin and roasted coriander that are incredibly aromatic. Our chili powder is in there. Not only does it give it a vibrant color, but it has a smoky heat.

14:34And it's not overwhelming in any way, but it takes you on that journey. It's almost a conduit for the rest of the spices, right? And so a lot of times it's explaining that the spice blend together is something that's quite common in terms of how you do it. This is my take on it. But for me, I never leave with ingredients. I ask for allergens and I ask people to try it. And then if there's something we need to go down and explore further, we're happy to do that. I really like that approach because it lets people go in with like a blank slate almost and just with no expectations. Like if you pick up a book or watch a movie without knowing what you're getting into, then you might not be disappointed because it's just a journey that you're going on.

15:13I have done it myself and it adds some spice to your life. But then when you're actually doing it with the snack, I really like that approach. And if you don't have to worry about allergens, then why not? Just take a chance. exactly so we we do a lot of demos we do a lot of selling events in person because and the way we sample our our snacks are we have a shot basically and i ask you to take that shot and as you're chewing i walk you through what's happening in your mouth as it changes and that's the reason we have our little fun guy in a little rickshaw because you're going to go on a journey right but i almost refuse to let people buy product if they don't try it because this is not what you're expecting it is a hundred percent not what you're expecting i just want you to go on that journey.

15:51And if it's not for you, thank you so much for giving us a chance. And so that's how we tend to engage with folks. I really like that a lot. And something else that I really like about your brand is that you are not approaching this necessarily from a functional aspect. You are certainly looking to have fun. But I feel that there are so many brands right now, of course, with the protein boom and everything needs to have no added sugar or added protein or whatever it may be, your product, yes, has some benefits, but it's not what you're leading with. And it's not the point of your product. You're making something that just tastes good.

16:27Exactly. I think, like I said earlier, there are niches, I think, for everybody. And everyone's trying to figure out whether that's fiber or protein or something along that line they're trying to include into their life. Our snacks, so this is our OG, right? It's our white chocolate and peanut. This bag is 20 grams of protein. We don't talk about that because that's not why we do what we do, right? It happens to be gluten-free. That was like a happy accident where you're like, oh yeah, this product is actually gluten-free. But if it didn't deliver on flavor, for us, the rest of it didn't matter.

16:54And then the other thing was important was Sarenia and from the end coffee supply game, she said incredible advice once. She said, when you start a company, you start a product, it's about your story and what you're trying to do. But the only way you're going to succeed is if it becomes your customer's brand, right? What it means to them. And so what we wanted to do was we've got a flavor journey and we've got a can we've got something that you can use on almost any black canvas you're a cottage cheese person this is great as a topping you're an ice cream person this is phenomenal on top of it you're gluten-free and you're looking for a crunch and a salad this is a crouton i would have never thought of those things never thought of them but that's how our customers started using them and we said okay this is who we are now make it your own and that's why we we tend not to push anything let's just we just tell you what could happen.

17:40What could happen is so ominous. I love it. We'll be right back. Are you going to crush it on Amazon this year? It's such an important channel, but it's so hard to do alone. And most agencies are a total ripoff. We can't afford$5 ,000 a month and a commission on our sales. They just don't get it. That's why I love our partners at Daybreak. They are full service, meaning they do the creative work, the listings, the logistics, and of course all the ads, all with the most reasonable retainer out there. I work with them personally. I'm so grateful we have such a good partner to recommend out to you, our community.

18:13They do evaluate your product first to see if it might be a fit. So if you want them to have a look, email them startupcpg at daybreak.agency and they'll do a free audit for you. Good luck, everyone.

18:27I actually, you probably saw my facial expression. I have cottage cheese sitting in my fridge right now. I'm almost 36 years old, not to like age myself, but I have never consciously picked up cottage cheese at the store and like ate it. It's been hidden in foods before. I've tried cottage cheese ice cream, but it's literally sitting in my fridge. I bought some before for full transparency and it went bad because I was so intimidated by it. I'm like, I know the texture is going to throw me off. The flavor might throw me off. I just don't know what to do with you. And now I'm like, OK, I have a few more weeks left on that before it expires.

19:05After we hang up, I am going to go and I'm going to order some Dusra and that's we're going to call it a day. It'll work beautifully. And if you're really craving protein, you're doubling down. Right. Like the 20 grams in the bag is impressive. That's impressive. That's what, like almost a third of what you need to get in a day. I don't know. I'm not a dietician, so don't quote me on that. so you showed us the bag for anybody who's looking or can see us on video for anybody that can see us on video you're showing us the bag tell me about your branding process because I think I've seen iterations of the bag previously where it may have just been blank kind of like orange bag not to say blank like it still looked good not to not to undersell what it looked like but it was more of just like an orange canvas maybe that's a better way to say it um so talk to me about your branding journey and how you went from, was it your first iteration to what you have now?

20:01Yeah. So the previous branding, it was done by a friend of mine, Audrey Logue. She's got a great design eye and she loved the product. She had some time and she was very kind to support us on there. And, you know, when you start in this business, if you're not coming from a CPG background, you don't know what you don't know. And we made a lot of assumptions about what good packaging was. And I think at that time, the zeitgeist was simple, minimal, stark. And we said, okay, we want our colors to be as vibrant as what's inside the back, right? Marigolds are a beautiful flower that's very common in South Asian culture.

20:31And so we said, those are the colors we're going to start with, right? The orange and the yellows, they fit our vibes. And so we said, okay, let's do that. We wanted a big photo on there. But we knew that was going to be a V1 and we knew we had to iterate. But we didn't want to iterate with three months or six months or nine months of data. I said two years, right? Because there are going to be different places in which it shows up and different folks are going to give me different things. Also, I'm not going to assume that in six months, everyone's going to know who I am and then give me feedback on the product, right?

20:58So we launched with two SKUs, one became seasonal, and then our hero mix, our hero SKU was our mixture, which was what we have now rebranded to peanut and white chocolate. So we were at Fancy Food last year in the same section, actually. And all I wanted to do was I wanted to get feedback on what they thought this was and what the initial reactions to packaging were. So distributors, press, retailers, small independent buyers, all of them said the same thing. What's inside the bag is fantastic. You don't get that sense from looking at the bag. And we're like, okay, so what would help? Right. So part of the feedback was pack size, go down to four ounces, easier for folks to try at the same time.

21:32They did not know what Boondy was. And so we took all that information and we were at Notch Live last year and we got a lot of the same feedback. And I got, I had the benefit of meeting Alicia Potter from Faven Creative. She did Bolly Good. She did Omsom. She did Fancy Pants, like the woman is a legend. and so we met a year before we were looking at redesigns and we started talking and we and she loved the product she said when you're ready we'd love to work with you and i told her alicia i love you i can't afford you so we kept talking you're down the road finally we got to a point where okay this is the investment we need to make so we went we went on another road and i told her it's very very simple for us i want people to in a flash for a second understand what we are which is now where you see the biggest font on on front of our pack is indian snack mix We are very proudly Indian and we know where a snack mix.

22:16And then the idea was we wanted to stay true to our colors. People just associate orange with us. And so we knew we were not going to deviate from that. But the other element was, this is different. This is not something you're going to immediately understand, right? So when we were creating our logo, we didn't have a caricature before. Creating our logo, I said, I want something that people are going to think it's fun to pick up the bag. And then after that, whatever they do with it is really up to them. But they need to pick up the bag first. And so our logo, he's called Ladu, it's an Indian suite.