Bringing producers and buyers together on one platform for local homemade foods, Kravve offers a win-win solution to both seller and buyer, writes Balqis Lim
NOT everyone is born with a silver spoon but one can always find a way to overcome difficult situations.
Twenty-six-year-old Teh Yong Lin’s journey of changing his lifestyle began in the kitchen.
“My mum makes this amazing homemade pumpkin jam which she gives to family and friends.
“I began to wonder if she could sell it for some income,” says Teh.
Teh helped her mum to sell the jam through e-commerce marketplaces like Lazada and Shopee but with limited success as food products are hard to sell on these platforms.
Teh realised that there were many others facing similar difficulties in selling their homemade products.
That’s when he hit upon the idea of starting Kravve.co, an online marketplace where people can buy local homemade food and snacks.
NEW MARKETPLACE
Teh and fellow co-founder Heah Wen Juin, 25, think that culinary skills are “the most available skillset in Southeast Asia”.
“There’s always someone in the family who knows how to cook. We want to empower these people and help them earn extra income from their home kitchen and increase their quality of life.
Through Kravve, Teh hopes to connect home chefs with customers, a one-stop solution for quality handmade food. He hopes to empower home chefs like single mothers and retirees to make extra income.
Two years down the road, the online marketplace now has over 1,000 merchants registered and selling food products, with unique selections from all across the nation.
Its unique products include Jem Bunga Kantan from Sabah, Nyonya Chang (rice dumpling), Chili Achar from Melaka and Asam Laksa paste from Penang.
Not forgetting artisanal cookies like pineapple tarts, kuih batang buruk, kek batik and mooncakes which play a very important part in Malaysian festive celebrations.
Kravve delivers products to customers from all across the country and has entered the Singapore market. This year, it plans to penetrate the Indonesian market.
Its popular categories include nutritional remedies, snacks and nibbles, spreads and jams like musang king Hainan kaya or coffee caramel spread, cookies, frozen deli meats and sauces which offer a variety of sambal and pesto.
NO PRESERVATIVES HERE
All the products in Kravve are handmade using quality ingredients without preservatives and additives.
“When you are buying a product supplied by a home chef, you are essentially buying the same thing they serve to their children and family so there is no need to worry about the ingredients,” says Heah.
Kravve also has Muslim chefs on its platform.
“We require all the home chefs to declare all the ingredients in the product.
We have a Muslim Kitchen tab that showcases Muslim-friendly products. This is just an extra measure for Muslim customers to buy and eat with a peace of mind,” she says.
The platform wants its home chefs or sellers to focus on doing what they know best, which is making the products.
“These home chefs are not business people, so we do not want them to spend their time on things like marketing and delivery. We will do it for them,” he says.
“They only need to do the packaging and our delivery partners will do the pickup and deliveries,” he adds.
Another benefit for the producers are the online guides — from ways of packaging different food items and doing the captions to photography and cooking classes.
“If someone wants to come onboard, we have all the resources for him or her to succeed in the business.
“If a person wants to sell cookies but has no idea how to make them, we have cookie-making classes to empower him or her,” he says.
Occasionally, Kravve works with some home chefs to produce special edition packages during festive seasons. It usually consists of types of cookies synonymous with the season.
SUPPORT SYSTEM
At Kravve, protecting both the merchants and buyers is important.
“When a customer buys from Kravve, there are guarantees so there isn’t the fear of not receiving the product. The same goes for the producers or sellers.
“One of our sellers told us that before joining Kravve, she once received orders for 50 bottles of her sambal. But after spending so much time making the paste, the buyer cancelled the order. She had to sell them at cost price to cover her losses,” says Teh.
He guarantees such an incident will not happen at Kravve as the marketplace has strict processes to ensure transactions are secure.
In terms of protecting the buyers and customers, Kravve has also removed producers who failed to meet orders.
MOVING FORWARD
“Although it’s hard to reach out to rural areas, we believe that home chefs from there have more potential to succeed.
“That is why we are also looking to partner with local government agencies on their outreach programmes, as it will be easier to reach these producers,” says Teh.
To make it easy for people to start their business, Kravve is offering loans to them.
In terms of technicalities, the online marketplace is adding more tools at every stage to simplify the selling and purchasing process, including customer service.
It is also enhancing its system to use artificial intelligence and machine learning to help producers make more sales and retain customers.