About us
Dear friend / fellow mom (read comrade) / casual visitor,
Since you landed here, you probably want to know more about us, who we are, what we believe in, why we do what we do, how we do it and what makes this mom of 2 wake up everyday charged up for this mission. Let me start with my WHY..
Food is one of the basic necessities of life. It provides the nourishment our body needs to function. But for most of us, it goes way beyond that. It’s a way to show love, to protect and care for our loved ones, to meet strangers, make friends, to create a cultural identity, to express belief systems and so much more. From everyday questions- Aaj khane main kya hai? to every mom’s perpetual worry- kitni patli ho gayi hai, kuch khati kyon nahi! Our lives simply revolve around food.
For me, it was when I became a mom myself, that food which was once taken for granted, came into full focus. When we met our first-born earthside, all the maternal desires to protect and to care for this little human hit me strong and hard. I thought a lot about what I can give, as a parent to my child, to ensure a strong foundation for life and one theme that always came up was food. Looking back, I think that’s where the seed of the idea came from. But, I was shocked to see baby foods in the market- laden with sugar, artificial sweeteners, preservatives etc.
It didn’t make sense to introduce foods that I was avoiding as an adult as first foods to my baby. So while being a working mom in a nuclear family, starting a food business was not something I would do straight away, but the enormity of the problem hit home. What kind of world were we building if even healthy food can’t be secured for our kids?
Thankfully, my father-in-law, late Dr. P. Sudershan Reddy, came to our rescue like the super grandad that he was. He introduced us to our ancient superfoods- millets and spoke scientifically about why these should be introduced as first foods and be a part of our daily lives. After getting further convinced with google gyaan, I was ready to feed my child these magical millets but was surprised to discover how difficult it was to source all the grains, how tedious it was to process it (to actually make it bioavailable) and then finally get to the joy of making and feeding it to my child. Commercially, there were very limited options, and trust was an issue.
Along this journey, I also discovered I wasn’t alone. There were moms like me, who were also facing the same pain points. So, it made a lot of sense to do something about this problem that many of us were facing.
Thus, began the official journey to trying to solve a mother’s #1 worry- Am I feeding my baby right? This path led me to connect with food scientists working in nutrition and millets, nutritionists, other paediatricians, fellow moms and grandmoms, who together led to the birth of Hapup.
Hapup is truly a labour of love, 100% natural easy to make Nutri-mixes that are made with love and superfoods like millets (ragi, jowl, bajra, foxtail), pulses, nuts and seeds. These delicious mixes do not contain any chemical preservatives, added salts or sugars and can easily be made ready to eat in under 10 mintues.
Thanks to a little recipe booklet with every order, you can make Hapup mixes, truly your own by playing with the mixes in your daily recipes #MakeItYourOwn.
You can use Hapup to make dosa, pancake, roti, smoothies, thepla, muffins by replacing wheat with Hapup.
The name Hapup has its origin in Gujarati, a playful way to ask a child to eat up- “Hap-up kari le” a sentence I heard or used probably the most in my entire lifetime.
So there you go, that’s our little story of why I started Hapup. I am grateful to have found amazing partners in the Indian Institute of Millet Research, Hyderabad, Indian Institute of Management- Bangalore, NSRCEL, Indian Institute of Management- Visakhapatnam, FIELD, ICRISAT, Stanford Seed Spark and countless more who have helped us build Hapup brick by brick. Our mentors have been the guiding light in our journey and our families the biggest cheerleaders!
My heart is filled with gratitude towards all our customers and team members #HapupFamily who have trusted, built and loved Hapup with all their heart.
Our mission is to help build a stronger, more resilient generation of tomorrow, by helping moms today, so try us, work with us, talk to us, because we are here to make it happen!
Love & Light,
Mommy of Hapup and 2 amazing souls!
