Country Delight, a direct-to-consumer (D2C) food essentials brand, has raised $108 million in Series D round taking its valuation to $615 million.
The round was led by new investors - Nicholas Cator-founded Venturi Partners and Singaporean private equity major Temasek, with participation from Asia-focused SWC Global and homegrown PE firm Trifecta Capital also bringing in fresh investment.
Existing investors, IIFL Asset Management, Elevation Capital, Orios Venture Partners and Matrix Partners also participated to infuse 30% of the total investment.
Avendus Capital acted as the exclusive financial adviser to Country Delight on this transaction.
“Country Delight is now looking at becoming a leading natural food essentials business where we are looking to widen our product portfolio to cover all the food essentials kitchen needs on a daily basis,” Chakradhar Gade, co-founder, Country Delight, said in an interaction with VCCircle.
“Some of the new categories that we are looking to enter are pulses, grains, spices, oils, pickles and basic snacking items, he added.
The latest fundraise is in continuation of $65 million tranche raised in March, taking the company’s total funding to $147 million so far.
The Gurugram-based firm had previously raised $25 million (Rs 185 crore) in its Series C round of funding led by Elevation Capital (formerly SAIF Partners) in November 2020. IIFL AMC had also joined the round as a new investor. Matrix Partners India and Orios Venture Partners are also some of its key backers.
Country Delight was founded in 2013 by IIM Indore batchmates Gade and Nitin Kaushal to deliver fresh food essentials offering milk and dairy products to the doorstep of consumers. It uses a tech-first approach to solve supply chain and distribution problems.
Overtime, it has expanded to fruits and vegetables. The company’s business model ensures fresh farm-to-home deliveries within 24-36 hours from sourcing, facilitated by a fully integrated just-in-time supply chain model.
With the latest fund infusion, the firm intends to launch more products within the existing category.
The company is also launching a range of fruit yogurt in small portions with a philosophy driven towards small ticket items, small portions with a focus on order fresh and consume fresh idea for consumers.
In the last 3 years including the pandemic period, Country Delight claims to have grown 10 times in scale and has served over 1.5 million customers present in 15 cities across 11 states in India.
“Country Delight is solving a very real problem at scale. Quality consciousness in India is on the rise. The brand’s focus on offering farm-to-doorstep daily pantry essentials that are fresh and of the highest quality has resulted in immensely positive customer feedback and strong loyalty,” said Rishika Chandan, executive managing director, Venturi Partners.
"We have been very impressed by their product-first approach, vertically integrated business model and ability to expand across categories," Chandan added.
Chandan added, India has about 20 million affluent households across the top 50 cities that could benefit from Country Delight’s range of products, making this a huge opportunity that has remained largely commoditized thus far.
“Currently, we are clocking a revenue of almost $120 million. We are doing about 8 million deliveries a month to 300 subscribers. We have been growing to two and a half times year-on-year. Over the last six months we've grown 50% in revenue,” Gade explained.
The firm is looking to double its subscriber base over the next one year. “Our intent is to go deeper within existing and nearby geographies,” Gade further said.
