Meet Gaurav Mirchandani, worked as guard, sold mobiles, now owns a Rs 200 crore company

Many of us have noticed the small toys that come free with a packet of chips or other edible items and it would not be wrong to say that kids simply love these toys.

Gaurav Mirchandani, a Indore-based businessman, is one of the biggest suppliers of such toys in India. Gaurav Mirchandani started the business by importing toys from China. He launched the business in 2015 with just Rs 10 lakh and worked really hard to build a company with a turnover of around Rs 150 crore.

The name of Gaurav’s company is Candy Toys Corporate Pvt and it manufactures several toys including Racer Pull Back Cars, DIY Toys, LED Toys, Musical Toys, Prank Toys, Dinosaur Toys, Puzzle Toys, Crazy Balls, Figurine Toys, Sticky Toys, and Candy Toys.

Gaurav Mirchandani launched Hoppin, a candy brand, three years ago and the turnover of the new company is around Rs 50 crore, which means his cumulative business turnover is Rs 200 crore.

Gaurav completed his schooling from Choithram School, Indore and then went to the US for his graduation in marketing and finance from University of Georgia, Atlanta. After completing his graduation, Gaurav Mirchandani completed MBA in international marketing and economics in 2009.

Gaurav Mirchandani struggled a lot while he was studying in the US and he did odd jobs to arrange money to pay for his hostel fee. Gaurav did some campus jobs in order to earn the money. He worked a guard at a church and also washed cars to earn the money. After completing his graduation, Gaurav Mirchandani started selling mobiles at a mall.

At that time, Gaurav came in touch with a perfume store owner who belonged to Hyderabad. Gaurav joined his perfume store as a sales executive and eventually the man sold the store to Gaurav as he was returning to India.

“Till 2013 online buying wasn’t huge in the US and I was doing great business during Valentine’s Day, Black Friday and Xmas. But as online shopping became popular, our sales began to drop,” Gaurav said in an interview to Weekend Leader.

In 2015, Gaurav closed his business in the US and returned to India. According to Gaurav, he met Deepak Brahmane, a senior executive at Yellow Diamond, and the meeting changed his life forever. “I came to know that the company needed 4-5 lakh small toys daily, which was offered with their chips packets. The toys were being imported from China,” said Gaurav.

 “Deepak felt that since I had business exposure in the US, I could explore the toy business. I visited a toy manufacturing plant in China, where they were making toys for Mc Donald’s and other global giants with just 10 injection moulding machines,” he added.

Gaurav started the toy business with Rs 10 lakh and initially traded through SM Dyes, his father’s company. He named his brand SM Toys. In the beginning, Gaurav imported the toys from China, but later he decided to buy from Indian manufacturers. “There were just 6-7 vendors who made such products in India,” says Gaurav.

Gaurav is married to Reema, a fashion designing graduate and she is also active in the business.