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Sukhi’s Gourmet Indian Foods

The spice pastes Sukhi Singh once made in advance so that she’d be able to cook dinner for her family faster became the basis of her award-winning product line.

By Nicole Potenza Denis

Sukhi Singh never thought of food as a business. It was merely a skill she learned from her aunts and grandmother in her hometown of Dehradun, a city in northeast India that sits in a valley between the Himalayan Mountains. But while she was growing adept at cooking curries and preparing naan and meats in the tandoor, Singh became fascinated with the many herbs and spices that were in the family pantry. This early interest would turn into the basis of an award-winning Indian specialty foods business with almost 55 SKUs and retail and foodservice clients across the U.S.

The Formative Years

Singh has been cooking for people as long as she can remember. Her mother was a busy doctor and her father was a ‘foodie’ who expected traditional Indian meals, so early on, she stepped in to help prepare family dinners.

After getting a Masters degree in English Literature in India, Singh moved to London in 1972 where her husband was stationed with the Indian Air Force. With two children and a spouse who craved the flavors of traditional Indian foods, Sukhi found herself cooking elaborate meals. “I wanted to get my cooking done faster so I could explore what London had to offer,” she says.

Singh began to make her spice mixes—which she called pastes—ahead of time. She’d prepare the dry spice base (which consisted of roasted onion, ginger and garlic), the most labor-intensive and important part of any Indian curry, in the mornings. She also made a channa masala 15-ingredient spice powder for a chickpea dish. “When I would come home I would add a protein and liquids and have dinner ready in an hour,” she says.

Food remained a passion in the years to come. “I did not know what life had in store at that time, but looking back it was headed in the direction of food,” Singh notes.

A Move to the U.S.

In 1984 Singh immigrated with her family to Northern California’s Bay Area and began looking for a deli for sale where she could offer sandwiches and hot foods to the locals—mainly a white-collar crowd from nearby business such as AT&T, Kaiser and Deloitte and Touche. In 1988, after borrowing $30,000 from family and friends, and getting trained for two weeks on how to run a deli case, Singh purchased a deli for $175,000. With beginning profits of more than $1,500 a day, Singh and her family thought they were on track to a lucrative business. Then, in 1989 the massive Loma Prieta earthquake struck, creating huge destruction in the Bay area. “Our entire customer base had been destroyed or moved away,” recalls Singh.

She continued to operate the business but a year later, Singh’s deli was still losing money. “We really had no idea how to run a sandwich case from the beginning,” she says. “We walked into a business wanting what we wanted out of it, not knowing the demands of what it actually took to run it.”

It wasn’t until her sister asked her to prepare some of her pastes that Singh began to find her way again and Sukhi’s Gourmet Indian Foods was born. When her sister took one of the meals to her office, it led to a big break. A co-worker’s husband happened to be one of the buyers at the Berkeley Bowl, a 40,000-square-foot area specialty store, and he was so impressed with the meal that he was willing to sell Singh’s curry pastes immediately. “That is when it hit me,” she says. “There were a lot of people who loved Indian food, but no one had the time to make it.”

Although the deli was still losing money, Singh was able to use its facilities to prepare her curry pastes for Berkeley Bowl. Packaged in plain white plastic tubs with a computer label that read Sukhi’s Curry Paste, Singh started selling the 8- or 16-ounce containers at her own deli counter, as well. She would soon develop her original curry paste a little further, adding vinegar to get the proper pH for a shelf-stable version. She soon added tandoori marinade and her channa masala spice to the Berkeley Bowl offerings.

While the tubs were successful, they weren’t enough to revive sales in the deli and in 1992 the family sold it at a loss for $60,000. “We called it a day, and did not look back,” Singh recalls. Ready to immerse herself in retail, she began doing demos. “If our experience with the deli did not happen, I would not have thought of selling my pastes full time,” she says.

Guerrilla Marketing

With her whole family behind her, including her children who ranged in ages from 10 to 16, and her husband, Surinder, who Singh says was instrumental in building the basis for the company, Singh began her endeavor with her original curry paste, tandoori marinade and channa masala. She pounded the pavement in traditional Indian garb and landed accounts at Berkeley, Calif.’s Monterey Market as well as more than 100 other stores in the Bay area. Although she was encouraged by how quickly she would sell cases of curry paste when she did demos, she noticed that products were not moving on the retail shelves. The mainstream market wasn’t yet ready for Indian foods and she would need to be in a lot of stores before eventually turning a profit.

A Surprising Foodservice Opportunity

Singh set up shop in a small rented kitchen in San Leandro and one day received a call from a woman looking for a tandoor. The woman was the foodservice manager for Hewlett Packard, and was looking to incorporate Indian food several times a month in the cafeteria. Singh set up an entire program with foods such as tandoori chicken and chicken curry. She offered her recipes and spice pastes, and trained corporate chefs on the nuances of cooking Indian foods. After selling $1,000 worth of product in one day, she realized how lucrative the foodservice side of the business could be and began to seek out other corporate clients. Singh even flew to the east coast and set up accounts with Sodexo and Aramark, eventually landing more than 500 foodservice accounts nationwide.

Farmers’ Markets Fuel New Growth

In 1994, a friend mentioned to Singh that she should consider taking a stand at a local farmers’ market in Marin County’s Corta Madera to sell her line, which by now included pastes, spices, marinades and chutneys. (The products were inspired either by family recipes or by the regional dishes that she learned from other Indian Air Force wives.) She reluctantly paid $250 for the minimum two-year permit. To her surprise, she made her money back in the first day. “We sold $300 worth of product. This was a turning point. I knew I could sell to foodservice corporations during the week and continue to do more markets on weekends,” she says.

Singh started with her core products (curry paste, tandoori marinade, channa masala, and mango chutney,) at the farmers’ markets. But as her market presence grew, so did her product line. “Our customers gave us all the feedback we needed. We eventually created products that they were requesting, like samosas and naan.” Singh’s products even caught the attention of John Mitchell, the prepared foods coordinator for Whole Foods Market at that time. “He came to the farmers’ market and told us he wanted to put Indian prepared foods in some of the Bay area stores. We were soon creating programs for their hot bars, and others for [retailers] Bristol Farms and Harris Teeter.” Today, Singh has more than 20 ready-made cooked entrées for retail foodservice programs—a segment she says does the largest and most consistent volume.

Sukhi’s Today

In the past four years Sukhi’s Gourmet Indian Foods has more than doubled its profits, going from a $3 million company to $8 million. The business operates from a 40,000-square-foot facility in Hayward, Calif., with 75 full- and part-time employees. Singh’s family, including her two daughters, son and husband, are dedicated full time to helping run the business. Although foodservice is still an integral part of the operation (“It is simple profitable bottom line and not brand building,” says Singh), she is aggressively building the retail end of her business in specialty, natural and club stores.

In 2006, Singh hired a professional design firm to redo her packaging and branding. The packaging went from a generic gold and black label that was computer generated in-house to labeling in Indian-inspired hues of greens, blues, browns and yellows that makes a bold statement and connects all of the products and lines. Every product’s package now tells a story to educate the customer on its origins or ingredients. “Originally, our packaging had no theme flowing through it,” she explains. “Now it is connected with consistent branding.” Singh’s current packaging won the American Package Design Award.

In 2008 the company added frozen meals that now include 16 SKUs such as bestselling Chicken Tikka Masala. Singh’s brand-building steps have resulted in retail sales increasing from 10 percent of company’s profits to 20 percent in the past four years. She has hired east and west coast sales managers and brokers, and increased her trade show presence to about 15 exhibitions per year. In addition to establishing Facebook and Twitter accounts, Singh makes sure she stays in front of her customers at the farmers’ market, currently doing about 30 markets a week in the summer months. “The farmers’ markets are a way for me to connect and be in touch with my customers, who help inspire ideas, give valuable feedback and act as focus groups for new products,” she says.

Timing is Everything

In the next five years, Singh wants to continue creating items like samosas with Mediterranean flavors, sofi™ Silver Finalist Tandoori Chicken Naanwich and the Roti Wrap—products that have a format that Americans can understand, she says. Singh also plans to advertise more and expand her business in clubs such as Costco, where she currently sells refrigerated entrées and 60-day shelf life nitro flush bag meals such as Tandoori Chicken and Chicken Biryani. “Club is a big, up-and-coming area for us. When you see Indian food in Costco, you know it is gaining exposure.”Singh notes that she’s fortunate to have her family behind her while she takes her company to the next level. “We are lucky that Indian food is on a spring board now—thanks to more people craving its ethnic flavors and wanting to eat healthy,” she says. To date, there are 20 SKUs in her dry line, including more than ten chutneys and pickles and popular curry pastes, as well as 17 SKUs in Grab ‘n Go like the Channa Masala Naanwich or Chicken Curry Roti Roll. “We may be a bit mixed up with a lot going on, but we sure do okay,” she says. |SFM|

PROFESSIONAL ASSESSMENT:
WHAT YOU CAN LEARN FROM SUKHI’S

Food and beverage brand marketing expert Tammy Katz of Katz Marketing Solutions in Columbus, Ohio, examines Sukhi’s Gourmet Indian Foods’ approach and discusses ways other specialty food companies can strengthen their own brands.

Build a Profitable Channel Strategy: Singh has carefully selected retail channels to build the brand and pursued foodservice as a way to use excess plant capacity and absorb overhead. She has also wisely exited underperforming, unprofitable channels.

What You Should Do: Rigorously evaluate what are, and are not, your priority channels based on three criteria: (1) Will we make money in this channel; (2) Do heavy users of our brand/category purchase at this channel; and (3) Is the channel consistent with our brand strategy? Avoid falling prey to the allure of channels that require sales and marketing support beyond your resources or where your brand will likely have weak movement.

Educate the Trade and Consumer: Sukhi’s Gourmet Indian Foods drives volume by raising their customers’ understanding of and ability to use their products. They train chefs, provide recipes and demos, and offer clear explanations of origins and ingredients on their retail packaging. Through consumer and trade education, they build demand and eating occasions for Indian food, rather than depend upon grabbing market share from others.

What You Should Do: Use every opportunity to educate everyone in your selling process on what your brand does, what problem it solves, and how to use it properly and more often. Elevate your customers’ understanding of your brand at every touch point, including buyer conversations, marketing materials, merchandising direction, external communication and packaging. Always stress what benefits are relevant to trade customers and consumers—in their language.

Food and beverage brand marketing expert, Tammy Katz, is CEO of Katz Marketing Solutions. She has led numerous Fortune 500 and specialty food brands and launched more than 100 new products with cumulative sales of $2 billion. Katz serves on the board of directors of several food companies and is adjunct instructor of brand management at the Fisher College of Business MBA Program at The Ohio State University.

Nicole Potenza Denis is a contributing editor to Specialty Food Magazine.