We wanted to do purposeful work,” says Bhumika Marwaha, a 43-year-old engineer from Mumbai, on how she and her colleague Bipin Joshi started their enterprise Jhappi, which translates to ‘a hug of hope’. The duo bonded over their zeal to step away from the confines of the corporate world.
So, leaving their jobs just before the pandemic struck in 2020, they decided to test entrepreneurial waters. These last few years of hard work coupled with strong intentions have resulted in Jhappi being a ray of hope to numerous NGOs and their beneficiaries, helping them earn a stable livelihood.
‘It all started with a campaign.’
In 2021, Bhumika and Bipin decided to spearhead a campaign to facilitate the sales of Nethra Umbrellas, a 40-year-old NGO that worked with people with visual disabilities to manufacture premium quality umbrellas. Bhumika and Bipin’s campaign was aimed at integrating digital tech into the process, visibility on social media, and more in order to increase sales.
Our campaign was a success and we were able to sell a whole lot of stock. Our learnings were that a lot of the time, these NGOs would use compassion as a tool to get sales, while the quality of the product should have been the real tool. We helped them get their story right,” says Bhumika.
It was following the success of this campaign that the duo quit their jobs to set up retail stores in Mumbai in 2022, as platforms through which the NGO products could be sold.
“In a world that saw e-commerce as a way to sell, we wanted to set up physical stores that would attach stories to our range of products. Today, I can say there is warmth in every story we tell. It is an important aspect in changing the perspective of people.”
She adds that people with disabilities are often viewed by society as consumers of resources. “Our aim is to show society that they can be producers too.”
Post Credit- The Better India
