<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><root available-locales="en_US," default-locale="en_US"><static-content language-id="en_US"><![CDATA[<p>For 24-year-old Tabish Ahsan, 2009 was not the best of years. The student of business administration was hoping for a well paying job in a reputed MNC but the aftershocks of 2008 meltdown left him without a job.<br><br>After six months of struggle, Ahsan and his friend Saral Budhiraja came up with the idea of starting theshoespa.in and by July 2010 the site was up and running.<br><br>"Back then starting this business was more about necessity rather than passion," says Ahsan. "We had heard of such a service in Mumbai but no one offered it in Delhi-NCR. The investment required was not very high so we went ahead with the idea."<br><br>Ahsan always wanted to get into a restaurant or café business but that he felt was too risky and required a lot of capital. A budget constraint and an easy marketing strategy drew him towards the idea of an online services business.<br><br>Six months into the business, Budhiraja found a job and decided to quit the business. In the initial phase, both the business and the partnership found it rough going and Bhudhiraja opted out. Ahsan on the other hand was convinced that this unique business idea will click, though he too was often flooded with doubts. Ahsan held on to the business by buying off his partner's stake for about Rs 6 lakh – 50 per cent of the initial investment.<br><br>Today Ahsan's revenues fluctuate between Rs 65,000 and Rs 2 lakh a month but he is still six months away from breaking even. <br><br>Ahsan has come a long way since the early days! "There were days when I used to collect shoes on my own from customer's doorstep, repair them in my backyard," he remembers with a smile. "Then there were days when I had no orders at all," says Ahsan, who still takes all orders by himself over the phone, though for collection he has recruited three boys.<br><br>The business has fluctuating margins complaints Ahsan. Collecting shoes from the doorstep, repairing it, paying the hired staff of 13 people and then dropping it back to customer doorstep is quite a burden on company's fragile shoulders. Not to forget the marketing expenses the business has to afford.<br><br>"One round of a certain place in Delhi could sometimes fetch us two pair of shoes or sometimes 10 or more," Ahsan says. After being in business for almost one year now, theshoespa gets monthly orders between 500-700.<br><br>Though the company makes some money at the end of every month, Ahsan believes once the scale comes in, the margins will improve and that will be the time when Ahsan will start accepting a salary. Currently, he chooses to put back everything that he makes into the business.<br><br>Though Ahsan survives without a fixed monthly salary for himself, he has hired 13 people and pay them salaries anywhere between Rs 6000 and Rs 10,000 a month, depending on the work profile and experience.<br><br>Ahsan believes skilled workers, who specialize in chemicals and leathers, are hard to find and hence even in the early stage of business he had to keep the basic salary high for technicians fixing the shoes. "About 60 per cent of the job is still done by hand and thus more than a technique, the job is about skills," he says.<br><br>Learning about repairing shoes wasn't an easy job for Ahsan as well. "This is such an unorganized field. You can't find a book in the market or a set formula on how to repair a shoe, it comes with experience and so we keep experimenting."<br><br>Ahsan spent his initial few days observing and meeting experts who repair/ dry clean leather accessories in Agra, in Delhi's Karol Bagh area etc.<br><br>"Initially it was really disheartening to see our customer being disappointed even after doing everything possible we could have done on the shoe," Ahsan adds.<br><br>The business is still restricted in and around Delhi and Ahsan is going slow on scaling up. Even though the idea is unique and there are only a handful providing this service in an organized way, there is still a need for rapid expansion. <br><br>Ahsan now needs to stretch out to other areas and other markets of the country before someone replicates the idea.</p>