Bag this!

Photo Credits: sunday page 2 lead_1

What was it that inspired you to start Tucksac?

The Goan: In October 2014, I decided to take my first few baby steps towards the world of entrepreneurship.

Sneha Suresh: I began Tucksac, an online store (Facebook) that today offers ethnic roll-up stationery pouches, handbags, laptop sleeves and slings. Back then, I was in the 1st year of Srishti Institute of Art Design and Technology, Bangalore and wanted to start off with one such product which my peers could afford and would love to use. As I wanted to avoid the use of leather and plastic I had started getting bags stitched for my personal use in cooton ethic fabric and decided to take this further. Apart from that, I also wanted to create a platform through which I could showcase skills such as weaving, dyeing and my favourite- branding and packaging, all of which I've been learning at Srishti.

TG: How did you go about getting a system in place.

It took me a couple of months . Also, I wished to get fabric from different states of India and getting the right materials and the right tailor took awhile. In fact I got my first batch of fabric during a college tour at Kutch I'm a big fan of block printed fabric and I don't think there could've been a better place than Kutch for this purpose. I still go out any get my own fabrics. It's my favorite part. And then I decide what I want to do with each of them, write it all down, sketch out shapes and write down sizes etc before going to the tailor.

TG:Tucksac is certainly an interesing name...

I used to go for art classes with Wilson D'Souza in Caranzalem and in fact he bought my first batch of bags. Well, we brainstormed on a name for the line and just couldn't come up with anything good. And I was adamant that it had sack in it! Since the first product that I came up with was rolled up pouches which involved tucking in your pens in it, my mum came up with tucksac.

TG:What are some of the challenges you faced along the way.

As I said, when I first started I was in the first year in college. Tackling college projects and responding to customers was a real challenge. While everyone was chilling out and eating during lunch breaks, I used to be hurrying to the post office to deliver orders! ( laughs). It's a little easier now and I enjoy every part of the process.

TG:Your prints are mostly ethnic. What made you choose this theme?

I really wish to encourage blockprinters and the handloom sector in my own small way. Besides that, students and facilitators in an art and design college love ethnic collection, although to be fair not just younger folk but people in general do today. In my opinion, it's probably because they understand the value of hand done work

TG:A few young entrepreneurs in this line have lamented that it's easier to run this kind of business in metropolitan cities rather than in Goa. Do you also agree?

I don't think that's true. I started off in Goa and was inspired by the raving reviews and orders in the first few days and that's why I decided to take this forward

TG:Do you feel that young girl entrepreneurs still have to struggle a little harder to be taken seriously?

I don't think that's the case anymore. But maybe it's because I have a great support system But I feel, to go forward, it is essential to be focused and believe in yourself and your work, however little it may be.

How do you make sure that you get your work out there so people know that Tucksac exists?

Word of mouth has been working really well I didn't try out anything other than Facebook because I was apprehensive about not being able to meet the demand, if I tried advertising or venturing into Flipkart and Amazon as I am working on my own.

You've been running this for almost two years now. What have been some of your learnings along the way?

I think the most important thing is to realise that there will be ups and downs at every point of time

Also, it's important to keep it going no matter how hard it gets. In the beginning, there were times when I didn't get any orders for a week And I really wondered whether it made sense to go ahead with this because it was taking up a lot of my time and energy. But it's been worth it.

What has been your most popular item?

Definitely the rolled up pouches and I have had a lot of orders for this even from art students in other states. This is because artists usually use a lot of different kind of pencils and it is hard to pick them out from a normal pouch. With this pouch, you can see what you want to pick out. However I have also had a lot orders for handbags from customers in Chennai and Mumbai.

What do you feel makes you stand out from your vast competition?

Look. My project is really small. I wouldn't even call it a start up just yet. But what makes me happy is all of this is my work and my designs and I try to make it as affordable as possible. Although youngsters are willing to spend on big brands from clothes etc, for these smaller items, they still prefer buying from peers who are doing this.

What are some of the things you would like to experiment with ?

I want to be able to do all the work myself -right from weaving fabrics and block printing, instead of buying these. In fact this was the initial idea. However, I decided it was better to create a platform first before taking the idea further.