Introduction:
Deep in the cacophony of Gurugram, fast acquiring the sobriquet of being India’s Silicon Valley, is stationed the headquarters of Limeroad—a sterling epitome of what a simple idea can finally metamorphose as a business with the potential to be a game changer. Conceived in that frustrating moment when one had to turn page after page of some glossy magazine, Limeroad grew to become a platform connecting millions of Indian women with unique and affordable fashion while empowering local artisans and small-scale entrepreneurs in the process. This is the story of how Suchi Mukherjee turned a personal pain point into a thriving e-commerce ecosystem—a woman with a global perspective and a local vision.
The Spark of Inspiration
This was one ordinary day when Suchi Mukherjee turned the pages of a fashion magazine. The kaleidoscope of colors and interesting designs made the reads very interesting. Suddenly, her eyes fell on a piece of jewelry that completely took her breath away. It was beautiful, unique, and just what she was looking for. She could feel the rush of wearing it, but it turned to frustration in a second. The jewellery was designed by a local designer in Mumbai. There was no easy way for Suchi, living outside India then, to buy it.
This disappointment could so easily have faded away, filed away in the repository of modern life’s minor inconveniences. For Suchi, it was a eureka moment. She realized that there was an enormous vacuum in the market: dislocation between India’s rich tapestry of artisans and a global consumer base, hungry for unique and beautifully crafted products.
The Journey Begins
Armed with this insight and years of experience in the tech industry—not only as a developer but having spent time at other successful startups, like eBay and Skype—helped Suchi make a bold decision. She gave up her comfortable life in London and a successful career to come back to India and build something from scratch. In 2012, Limeroad was born with the mission of creating India’s first women’s social shopping website.
But Suchi was conscious of the fact that getting an e-commerce platform up and running in India wouldn’t be easy. Country-wide, the online shopping ecosystem was still at a nascent stage, riddled with problems at the logistics level, low internet penetration, and a general distrust in online transactions. Not to mention the fact that Suchi was entering a male-dominated tech industry as a woman entrepreneur, which is adding another layer of complexity to her journey.
Overcoming Obstacles
The early days at Limeroad were a hustle of hustles with many obstacles. Challenges were across multiple fronts, ranging from technology infrastructure to winning over vendors. She, along with her small team, had to not only create a robust yet user-friendly platform that could handle the intricacies of e-commerce in India but also convince several small-scale artisans and vendors who had not sold online earlier to join the platform.
Logistics: Building an effective supply chain in a country as infrastructure-challenged as India was required to ensure that products are delivered on time and for customer satisfaction.
Customer Acquisition: Having to carve out a niche and bring in users of their application in a market dominated by giants like Flipkart and Amazon necessitated creative marketing strategies.
Funding: Suchi’s impressive background meant little when she began raising capital as a woman entrepreneur in India—this was accompanied by its own set of challenges.
The vision and determination proved very powerful allies in the hands of Suchi. She gathered a formidable team, with co-founders Manish Saksena and Ankush Mehra, each coming with very diverse expertise. The team waded through these challenges together, innovating at every step.
The Limeroad Innovation
What really set Limeroad apart from any other marketplace was the very unique angle it took toward e-commerce. Instead of a marketplace, Limeroad positioned itself as a discovery platform. It figured out that women don’t necessarily shop for products alone; they often shop for looks or styles. And there came the realization for Limeroad’s signature feature: the virtual scrapbook.
It also had a scrapbook feature for users to create their own style combinations with products within the site and share them. This has managed to make shopping not only more engaging but social, too, which solves one of the major problems in online fashion retail: how a customer can envision different items together.
Moreover, Limeroad earned from these creations, hence incentivizing the customer to create such scrapbooks. This was one really large function turning customers into curators and micro-influencers for creating an entire community for this platform.
Scaling Up and Making an Impact
As Limeroad continued to gain momentum, its effects started spilling over. The platform acted as a launchpad for many small-scale vendors and artisans who earlier had little access to the broader markets. By 2015, the company had already on-boarded more than 600 vendors, with 1.5 million user-generated scrapbooks showcased.
This growth came with immense investment: Limeroad raised $5 million in Series A funding in 2012, followed by Series B funding of $15 million in 2014, and a substantial $30 million Series C funding in 2015 by reputed investors such as Tiger Global, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and Matrix Partners.
But probably the most-coveted validation came in 2016 when Limeroad collaborated with the Madhya Pradesh Government’s M.P. Laghu Udyog Nigam for the online promotion of handloom and handicraft products. Of course, more than just business, this cemented Limeroad’s role as a platform for the preservation and promotion of India’s rich artisanal heritage.
Timeline of Key Events
- 2012: Limeroad founded by Suchi Mukherjee, Manish Saksena, and Ankush Mehra
- 2012: Raised $5 million in Series A funding
- 2014: Secured $15 million in Series B funding
- 2015: Raised $30 million in Series C funding
- 2015: Achieved a milestone of 1.5 million user-generated scrapbooks
- 2016: Collaboration with the Government of Madhya Pradesh to promote handloom and handicraft products
- 2017: ET Startup Award nomination
Lessons Learnt and Future Strategy
The Limeroad journey, from just a simple idea to becoming a robust e-commerce platform, contains some key lessons for budding entrepreneurs. First, identify a real problem; the frustration of Suchi with product discovery became the seed of a great business. Second, continuous innovation—Limeroad’s scrapbook feature gave them a niche in an overcrowded marketplace. Lastly, build a community; turning users into curators helped get Limeroad a loyal and engaged user base.
Embrace challenges: Every obstacle was seen to create an opportunity for innovation and growth.
Be true to your vision: Amidst all these challenges, she did not lose her vision of empowering the consumer and small-scale vendors.
As Limeroad grows, it sticks to its mission of making fashion discovery easy, fun, and accessible. With plans afoot for reaching over 400 million mobile users, Limeroad is going to not only change how India shops online, but also redesign the entire e-commerce landscape, one scrapbook at a time.
