Drums Food International Pvt Ltd, the company which sells Hokey Pokey ice creams and yoghurt under the brand Epigamia, has raised Rs 4.2 crore ($635,000) in an internal round of funding from its existing investors.
Shripad Nadkarni, Fireside Ventures, a private investment firm floated by former Helion Venture Partners' senior managing director Kanwaljit Singh and Apurva Salarpuria of Salarpuria Group participated in this round, taking the total funding of the company to around Rs 20 crore.
The company will use the money for the expanding the distribution network of Epigamia, which was launched in Mumbai in April this year. The company is planning to touch over 200 retail touch points, including kirana and modern trade stores in Pune and Bangalore.
"Consumers are now looking for healthy and nutritious alternatives to snacks including low fat and high protein products. Epigamia has seen an overwhelming response in the short eight weeks that it has been in the market," said Rohan Mirchandani, co-founder and CEO of Drums Food.
The development was first reported by The Economic Times.
The company had raised Rs 5 crore in angel funding round in April this year. In that round, TPG Growth partner Vishal Narain also infused personal money into the company. The capital was meant mainly for augmenting its distribution presence in cities across the country. It also helped the Mumbai-based firm to launch the yoghurt brand besides boosting production capacity.
The other brand, Hokey Pokey has presence in six cities, including Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. It sells its ice-creams at modern trade outlets like Godrej Nature's Basket, Foodhall, Big Bazaar, Reliance Fresh, Hypercity and e-commerce platforms such as BigBasket and Local Banya.
Founded by Mirchandani, chef Ganesh Krishnamoorthy, Milap Shah and Uday Thakker in 2008, Drums Food International brought in the concept of mixing ice creams on a cold stone slab which gave the customers the freedom to create their own ice cream.
Few months back it had roped in co-founder of organic milk brand Dr Moo, Rahul Jain, as a director to take overall operational responsibilities of Hokey Pokey.
Drums Food had received around $1 million in August 2013 in an angel round from a group of investors led by Peter Rajsingh (partner at New York-based Castellar Partners and professor at New York University), Nadkarni (former marketing head at Coca Cola India and also an investor in Hector Beverages) and Salarpuria (who is also an existing investor in the Mast Kalandar restaurant chain).
