What are the hallmarks of powerful business leaders?
According to Sahil Sambhi, the proud Founder of India’s top F&B brand House of Yuvi, great leaders must have a vision. They know how to motivate and inspire others, building, nurturing, and coaching their team. Leadership means different people to different people, but several traits are common.
Successful leaders think logically about their businesses. They invest the time and effort to clearly understand any outstanding weaknesses, threats, strengths, and opportunities. It helps them identify how to support the team and help them overcome problems.
A great leader does not merely tell people what to do. They also serve as an example. The mark of good leadership is an individual’s ability to lead the way, guiding others with their ability rather than relying on words. A leader’s effective and successful communication skills also contribute a long way to developing a strong and healthy company culture.
Loyalty is another very important trait to inculcate. After all, employees who see that leaders are loyal to them are likelier to show loyalty in return.
The Saga of a Multi-Brand Emperor
Showcasing all these traits and much more, Sahil, age 34, is a prolific restauranteur, diligently industrious and seeking all things spunky, new and innovative. He is transforming the experiential dining landscape with every restaurant he conceptualizes.
A pioneer in this field, Sahil is famous for the out-of-the-box ‘Concepts 7’ execution of quirky crowd affairs. The journey started with a single restaurant, Molecule Gurgaon, in 2016. It has now transformed into a multi-brand empire.
House Of Yuvi is, in fact, one of the fastest-growing F&B groups emerging in the country. It has a Brand presence in 20 cities in India. The Drunken Botanist, Distillery and VietNom are a few other accolades to his name.
The journey started long back when Sahil was a teenager. The sheer fascination for food and restaurants was always there in him since he was young. He was always looking for an opportunity to learn and understand this industry and start something of his own. In 2015 he got one such opportunity to open a restaurant. That was the start of his Molecule journey, and he hasn’t looked back ever since.
The journey, like any other, has had its ups and downs. But each down has taught him something and improved his trade. “It’s been seven years. I’m very proud of what I’ve accomplished and achieved. Today we have 11 successfully operational restaurants and 15 more to launch in the next six months,” he shares. There is so much new that is planned. The times ahead are going to be very exciting.
Further sharing his inspiration behind his tremendously successful entrepreneurial story, Sahil says his family has always been foodies. They loved to eat out and experiment with different cuisines and different types of food. He was always very intrigued by the working of restaurants. Sahil would find a packed restaurant very fascinating. He wondered how the owner would be managing so many diners each day. The passion and smile with which the staff handled each customer was very heartening to see. Very early in life, he decided to venture into this industry. He was always looking for opportunities. “This industry involves a deep sense of passion, sincerity, hard work and perseverance. And I was ready to make it big here,” he reflects.
In Pursuit of Perfection
There are many precious professional qualities and values Sahil thinks are greatly admired by his clients, colleagues, and employees. He feels his out-of-the-box thinking is one quality he is proud of. He doesn’t like thinking orthodox. And always try and find a unique way out that he feels makes his concepts different from others. With so many restaurants opening daily, the thought process must be unique and different for you to stand out. Another quality he possesses is finding a solution to any problem.
“The trade we are in there is bound to be issues and problems each day, scaling from a minor to a major. I have always worked on finding solutions. I look to find a solution to every problem first that comes to me rather than looking into the reason for the problem, which I feel is one of my strongest strengths,” he states.
Sahil is also a very hard-working person. His colleagues would vouch for that, as he is a seeker of perfection and doesn’t back down till he feels he is there or closest to attaining that perfection. He has always told his team that be the most hard-working man in the room. Hard work and perseverance never fail. Success can be delayed, but these traits won’t fail you.
A Molecule Gastronomy-Driven Journey
Sharing their USPs, making them one of the best F&B brands in the country today, Sahil says that House of Yuvi is what they proudly call themselves. They started Molecule, a molecule gastronomy-driven restaurant, back in 2015 in Gurgaon. It was one of the best-launched brands of the year. It was an instant success with Molecule. It became the talk of the town in no time. Over the years, they expanded Molecule to seven other cities.
Next, they launched a very interesting concept called The Drunken Botanist (TDB) in 2018. It’s a concept inspired by Amy Stewart’s book ‘The Drunken Botanist.’ A cocktail-driven place with food from around the world makes TDB stand out. Rainforests inspire the interiors with many greens indoors. TDB is known for its cocktails. The cocktail menu is curated with fresh herbs and no artificial syrup or sweetener. One of the most famous bars of Gurgaon, TDB is the go-to place for its ambience, world cuisine menu and brewed beer.
After having launched two successful watering holes, Sahil wanted to foray into the food space. Thus, he with his team launched their most well researched Vietnamese cuisine brand called VietNom in the cyber hub Gurgaon. With Asian cuisine being the 2nd most preferred cuisine for Indians and with plenty of pan Asian brands being already successful, the love for Asian food was very well established. They tied up with the Vietnam embassy in India and went on research trips to Vietnam. And their chef got an opportunity to train extensively at local restaurants in Vietnam to learn the nuances of the cuisine. The embassy helped Sahil and his team source local Vietnamese ingredients to ensure authentic flavours, and the H.E. ambassador also participated in food-tasting sessions for them to achieve local taste and flavours. VietNom was launched in May 2019. It became popular in no time and is still one of the most acclaimed Asian restaurants in Gurgaon.
Aiming Long Term
Being an experienced leader on the technological adoption front, Sahil says that Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are very advanced technologies with the power to transform the way businesses function and humans interact. It is the way forward. The future is going to be driven by it. “We have already adopted these to help us with our customers’ database.”
It helps Sahil and his team better understand their customers who have already dined in. It also helps them reach the audience looking for their type of restaurant. Another great use of AI is to reduce the costs of the workforce. Order taking has become so much easier and has reduced costs significantly.
“Another benefit we are proud of is that it reduces errors. Our systems manage our database and customer relationships. They are more efficient and more accurate,” he reveals. The workforce is now free from ordering kitchen groceries, looking into stocks and reports, etc., The AI/ML solves all those for them and the staff is more focused on providing a great customer experience which is where they are most needed. Their new customer acquisition has become much more efficient with relevant marketing campaigns and their reach to the target audience with technology.
Surmounting Storms
With all the highs that one attains to being successful, it’s not without the challenges one faces daily. Some of the challenges that they face are licensing roadblocks. “Being a company which operates out of different states and cities, variance in licensing policies and multiple irrelevant license requirements which change in every state is a major challenge in our country.”
Another challenge is supply chain consistency which has never been maintained over a period of time. There are many other challenges they face daily. But the only thing Sahil tells his team is to overcome every obstacle they encounter. Sometimes they’ve had to go out of the way and do things unlike they are to be done. He adds, “At the end of the day, it is getting things done one way or the other matters. And I’m lucky that my team echoes this feeling and works hard to achieve our goals.”
An Ocean of Wisdom
In his advice to budding entrepreneurs aspiring to venture into his space, Sahil says the learning process is never-ending. He has learnt many things during the course of his journey of seven years so far. “One of the most important things I learnt was eliminating the fear of failure. Because I feel that impacts your thought process the most.”
It is an industry in which there will be failures on an everyday basis. For example, a very well-researched and thought-after dish might not fancy your customer at all. Accepting that and changing and evolving based on the feedback is the key. Being proactive and being experimental is another very important learning. You have to keep up with the trends and keep innovating with time. There will be successful campaigns. And you might not be successful in some, but experimenting and implementing new ideas should always be the focus.
So go out there and fulfil your dream of being a restaurateur. “Because I’m sure it’s the most exciting and satisfying thing you’ll ever do.” There will be many highs, and there will be downs. But how you come up from the downs will define you and your journey.
On the Shores of Future Success
Regarding his future prospects, Sahil says a massive expansion plan is in place for 2023-24. The Molecule as a brand has eight successfully operational outlets and has 15 new openings planned in the next six months in cities like Faridabad, Gwalior, Indore, Meerut, Allahabad, Civil Lines Delhi, 2nd outlet in Gurgaon, Dehradun, Hyderabad, Mohali, Jalandhar, etc. With these openings in place midyear, the estimated revenue for Molecule as a brand is expected to be 200 crores in 2023-24.
With a phenomenal experience and success in Gurgaon, VietNom is expanding to six cities across India with openings planned in Delhi, Noida, and 2nd outlets in Gurgaon, Goa and Mumbai in the next three months.
With six outlets planned in the next four months, the brand’s turnover is expected to be around ₹80 crores in 2023-24. “We are also launching a new hi-energy premium bar brand in June in Gurgaon, Delhi, Noida and in smaller cities like Lucknow and Indore,” he informs. Another path-breaking regional Indian restaurant brand is launching in Goa, Mumbai, and Delhi in April- May. “We are partnered with a celebrity chef.” It will be a one-of-a-kind experience of deep-rooted in regional Indian food served on a modern plate.
