Hasan Minhaj didn’t essentially plan so as to add investor to his already burgeoning resume. As a substitute, the chance offered itself in a cup of clean, spicy chai.
9 months after his first sip of the Kolkata Chai Co.’s signature mix, the Day by day Present alumni has gone from a faithful buyer to the model’s second-largest stakeholder and enterprise companion, with an undisclosed however vital funding.
Sitting down with ADWEEK, he was crystal clear this wasn’t one other perfunctory movie star ambassadorship however fairly a chance to carry South Asian tradition into the mainstream and lean on his storytelling chops to offer chai its “matcha second.”
“There’s a groundswell of affection for the corporate, the model, the neighborhood that they’ve constructed that spoke to me,” he stated. “Not solely do I wish to be part of this… I consider within the founders, I wish to put pores and skin within the recreation and be a part of it,” he stated.
The brainwave of brothers Ayan and Ani Sanyal, Kolkata Chai began life as a café in New York’s East Village in 2019. The hotspot had a single mission: to serve up genuine Indian masala chai to People in all its steaming, fragrant glory. It provided an antithesis to what it described because the “bastardized” model bought by company espresso chains.
By 2022 the startup had secured $1 million in funding. Advertising rooted in neighborhood and innovation — delicate serve chai ice cream giveaways, a collaboration with buzzy New York eatery seventh Avenue Burger, having Hasan serve drinks at its Williamsburg opening in Might — has pushed progress rapidly.
It now counts three areas throughout New York and operates a flourishing on-line enterprise, the place patrons can purchase its signature combine, present packing containers, and recipes.
The latter accounts for the majority of its revenues, and because it plots its it’s eyeing a broader product vary and a deeper transfer into the CPG house.
Mates really useful Minhaj take a look at the model’s eponymous hangout for years. Nevertheless, between writing and filming two Netflix specials (the third is pending), securing a job within the movie It Ends With Us alongside Blake Full of life, and co-founding manufacturing firm 186K Movies, he by no means fairly made it.
When his spouse walked into their Manhattan condo in January with a Kolkata Chai Co. starter equipment Minhaj had a mug, “fell in love with it,” instantly discovered Ani’s quantity on-line and rapidly organized a “meet-cute.”
