Chennai-based digital home-cooking start up Cookd has raised ₹4.4 crore in a pre-seed funding round led by Konglo Ventures, Kerala Angel Network, and well-known angels from the food industry. Some of the other strategic investors in Cookd include Aju Jacob, director, Synthite Industries, and Geemon Korah, CEO and executive director at Kancor Ingredients Limited. Actors Keerthy Suresh and Kathir have also pumped in money into the firm, along with Vineet Kumar, CEO of Native (acquired by P&G).
The start up, founded in 2020, helps users plan recipes and meals. It now plans to gain a stronger foothold in the D2C segment and launch new-generation food products directly to consumers.
The pandemic and the home-cooking trend accelerated Cookd’s growth in a year. Today, they have an online footprint of over 1.5 million followers across all social media platforms, 31 million views and 15 million minutes of content watched month on month.
“The unorganised food sector encompasses 65% of India’s food industry, at an estimated $37 billion. The home-cooking segment has a larger share of the pie, as opposed to ordering in or eating out. Recipes are one of the most searched categories online, and we started by creating easy-to-replicate recipe videos for social media,” said Vinod Jose, lead investor, Konglo Ventures. “Cookd is operating in a niche that marries the science of data-driven food consumption patterns and the art of creating restaurant-quality recipes, right at home,” he added.
“India does not have many brands that go beyond posting recipes online to increase their following. Cookd shows a lot of promise in terms of integrating content, technology and e-commerce to build an end-to-end solution,” Ajit Anzar Moopan, lead investor, Kerala Angel Network, said.
“We are building one of the largest home-cooking brands, based on deep insights gathered from our fast-growing community of home cooks,”Aathitiyan, founder and CEO, Cookd, added. According to a report by Dineout, the demand for home-cooked food has increased four times in 2021.
