"I think having a mission-driven focus is the most underestimated part of running a company."
Introducing Kanika Nandurdikar, the visionary founder of NihKan Brand, who combines her expertise as a chartered accountant and wellness coach to create innovative, natural, and sustainable solutions for modern dietary needs.
Launched in 2020, NihKan Brand has flourished under Kanika’s leadership and the guidance of Dr. Suhas Nandurdikar, a renowned expert in innovative raw materials for the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries.
Kanika’s passion for sustainable, natural, and nutritious products fuels NihKan’s mission to provide convenient, tasty, and wholesome food options for those with dietary restrictions, as well as to promote eco-friendly food production practices.
In this exclusive interview with ValiantCEO Magazine, Kanika shares her journey, achievements, and vision for the future of her thriving company.
Check out more interviews with entrepreneurs here.
WOULD YOU LIKE TO GET FEATURED?
All interviews are 100% FREE OF CHARGE
Table of Contents
We are thrilled to have you join us today, welcome to ValiantCEO Magazine’s exclusive interview! Let’s start off with a little introduction. Tell our readers a bit about yourself and your company.
Kanika Nandurdikar: NihKan’s story kicked off during the covid phase, when we realised that food & nutrition was one vertical where we wanted to diversify our portfolio.
The journey started with Green Banana flour from the Jalgaon district of Maharashtra, India, which was used in daily meals of children who can’t eat wheat, as they were intolerant to Gluten.
After our research and R & D work, we developed a 100% Natural dehydration methodology to produce a premium quality, chemical & preservative-free range of products for modern food choices.
If you were in an elevator with Warren Buffet, how would you describe your company, your services or products? What makes your company different from others? What is your company’s biggest strength?
Kanika Nandurdikar: NIHKAN is on a mission to support the challenges faced by consumers who have “diet restrictions” either due to lifestyle choices or conditions such as celiac disease, gluten intolerance, gluten sensitivity, and lactose intolerance.
Nihkan offers a range of nutritious gluten-free and plant-based Superfood products, which include green banana flour, sprouted millet flours, and dehydrated ready-to-cook Mung bean and mixed grains sprout and its flours.
We also have a range of savoury & sweet snacks like cookies, millet bhakris, millet crackers for guilt-free indulgence. Our Key USPs are 100 % natural products using specialty ingredients that are ancient to India. We have curated the finest products to provide convenience, taste & wholesome foods for daily nutrition.
We follow sustainable food production practices like using solar conduction dryers, which are eco-friendly & fully recyclable packaging material for making the planet a better place to live.
What advice do you wish you received when you started your business journey and what do you intend on improving in the next quarter?
Kanika Nandurdikar: The advice on how to make the product visible in front of customers. How to communicate well with them that how our products can solve their problem.
We intend on improving our journey by spreading more knowledge and awareness of high-nutrition products & ingredients to our customers without actually telling them to buy our products.
Online business keeps on surging higher than ever, B2B, B2C, online shopping, virtual meetings, remote work, Zoom medical consultations, what are your expectations for the year to come and how are you capitalizing on the tidal wave?
Kanika Nandurdikar: Since covid the market has changed into digital marketing so our focus has been more on online e-commerce platforms, both domestic & international.
Social media awareness, recipes through Youtube, online campaigns, and Google Ads are a few activities that we do to capitalize on Online business.
Business is all about overcoming obstacles and creating opportunities for growth. What do you see as THE real challenge right now?
Kanika Nandurdikar: Innovation is key for every success; our role at RND is very strong. We do a lot of research on specialty ingredients and formulations using them.
We use Sprouted grains of millet & legumes along with Green banana flour to formulate our key recipes, which in itself is an evolution. We have our new product range coming soon, which will give consumers a solution for healthy eating along with daily convenience.
The real challenge is to reach the end consumer who needs these types of products & to make the customer aware.
In your experience, what tends to be the most underestimated part of running a company? Can you share an example?
Kanika Nandurdikar: I think having a mission-driven focus is underestimated part of running a company. As we get too occupied with the actual running of it, be it at operational levels, financial levels, or marketing levels.
What does “success” in the year to come mean to you? It could be on a personal or business level; please share your vision.
Kanika Nandurdikar: Success would mean putting my business operations in autopilot mode. At a personal level, it would mean I am enjoying the journey and am happy about my own pace & not trying to compare or compete.
Jerome Knyszewski, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Kanika Nandurdikar for taking the time to do this interview and share her knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Kanika Nandurdikar or her company, you can do it through her – Linkedin Page
Disclaimer: The ValiantCEO Community welcomes voices from many spheres on our open platform. We publish pieces as written by outside contributors with a wide range of opinions, which don’t necessarily reflect our own. Community stories are not commissioned by our editorial team and must meet our guidelines prior to being published.
