These Women-led Startups are Ensuring Healthy Snacks Never Go Out of Style

From enjoying unique delicacies from West Bengal to munching on chips and chocolates, these startups will keep your cravings satisfied.

The main problem that stops us from switching to a healthy eating lifestyle is the fact that the alternative is very tasty whereas healthy food is not. But what if we tell you that you can enjoy your tasty food along with it being healthy? 

These four women-led startups are offering healthy alternatives at an affordable rate. The entrepreneurs behind these brands have done their research, understood the mindsets and strived hard to bring the spotlight back on healthy foods, and are all geared up for a healthy growth curve. Let’s find out who they are.

Foodio.fit  

School friends-turned co-founders Apoorva Gururaj and Suresh Reddy D are on a mission to let people snack guilt-free. 

Founded in 2020, their Bengaluru-based startup Foodio fit offers a range of Indian snacks, chocolates, beverages, speciality flours, and vegetable chips with low carb, high protein, multigrain, and keto options.  In less than a year of operation, the startup has shipped more than one lakh orders to over 5,000 customers with a 30 per cent repeat rate.

Gladful 

After learning that her 10-year-old son was protein deficient, Parul Sharma quit the corporate grind after 15 years and wound up in entrepreneurship when she couldn’t find food brands that her son liked. Along with her sibling Manu Sharma, she founded a protein-rich and healthy snacks brand Gladful in 2021.  

With a focus on children, their Jaipur-based startup uses wholewheat, and unrefined cane sugar, and avoids ammonia in its products, packing seven to eight grams of protein per serving. With a gross margin of over 60 per cent, Gladful’s products are available on Amazon, Cred, Flipkart, and smaller marketplaces like OneGreen and LBB.

India Cuisine 

India’s diversity also shows in its food. Kolkata-based husband-wife duo Umashankar Mishra and Shruti Mishra are leveraging technology to make Bengali delicacies and cuisine available across India and outside.  

Founded by the duo in January 2021, India Cuisine is a food-tech startup that sells West Bengal’s regional cuisine and food such as Bengali sweets, authentic Bengali groceries, desi ghee, dry fruits, sweets, snacks, drinks, and beverages, fryums, instant mix, and others within the price range of Rs 38 to Rs 1,220. 

Starting with just 51 products and five categories during the lockdown, it now offers more than 400 items across 10 categories and India Cuisine went on to be recognised by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT).

Timios 

When siblings Aswani Chaitanya and Hima Bindu set on an entrepreneurial journey with children’s healthy snacking brand Timios, the duo knew that the health quotient alone was not enough to penetrate the children’s market. 

Being parents themselves, they focused equally on taste so that children would enjoy it without parents’ nudging.  Now the duo’s Bengaluru-based brand Timios offers a wide range of options including mini oaty bites, teething sticks, nutty bars, berry bars and other healthy snacks for lactating and pregnant mothers.  

Priced between Rs 20 and Rs 320, they are available on its website and across e-commerce marketplaces, including Bigbasket, Blinkit, Amazon, and Flipkart. 

Credits: HerStory