Breaking Biases | Arundhati Kumar

Arundhati Kumar

Founder & Chief Visualiser at Beej

Having spent a major part of her career as an HR professional, working in the hospitality, banking, insurance, media and consulting sector, Arundhati Kumar has always been a leader. In 2019, her steps towards being a more planet conscious citizen led to the birth of Beej, a lifestyle and accessories startup, with the co-existence of lifestyle sustainability as the core to work with various plant-based materials creating designs that combine the best of new-age materials and Indian craftsmanship.

A Beej Sown

Starting out entrepreneurship is a roller coaster ride, there are days that ask questions and days that answer. With Beej the challenge is that it is a totally new concept, there are no precedents for it. I go around explaining to people why our materials are different, why they are so expensive and I am always greeted with statements like “No one in India cares about sustainability.” “You guys are too expensive”. I receive these statements not just from critiques but well-wishers too! What matters is to stay the course, keep going and believe in yourself. I consider myself fortunate to have customers, people from the industry, and friends who endorsed the idea, it motivated me and built my confidence.

My business started from a google search, after working for 18 years in HR I got bored, I wanted to do something different. My father owns a leather export company, he invited me to work for him when I told him that I wanted to start my own business. I recall the exact day when it came to me, I was sitting in my workspace and googling ‘Alternatives to leather’ and suddenly a whole new world opened up to me of materials I did not know about even though I grew up with the leather business. And I thought “Wow this is cool.”

So, Beej truly sprung up from my curiosity and excitement of doing something new, I did not consider how hard it could be, I said “It’s new, nobody’s doing it, sounds exciting, Let’s do it.” That is about as much thought as I put in when I started my business, then began the process of presenting our business idea and incubation. We finally launched in January 2020 and the pandemic hit in March. All I had was the confidence that Beej was a good idea.

Look to break the bias, be it in silhouettes, materials, colours, fabrics, or explorations, everything can have its bias broken, do not let anyone tell you what you can or cannot do “You can do anything”.

Branches to Blossoms

Anything that is created to be sustainable is more expensive like recycled fabric is more expensive than virgin fabric.

Beej is trying to bridge the gap between sustainability and cost-effectiveness every day. Most material research is occurring outside India as it requires a lot of investment of time and money, a lot of vegan and sustainable materials have been testing the market for 4-5 years unfortunately, those materials remain outside the country. However, I am conscious of the fact that Beej needs to work with more Indian materials for two reasons, cost-saving and the carbon footprint, importing materials creates a large carbon footprint, reducing our sustainability. This year we have been experimenting with various materials like burlap and hemp, we look forward to sharing our studio’s creations with the world, the idea is to combine different materials to create cost-effective alternatives.

Thoughts Put into Practice

At Beej sustainability is not one part of our brand, it is like a business filter, I cannot say that I am working with ethically sourced materials while I am manufacturing it in a dingy place, treating my employees unfairly, similarly, I cannot create sustainable bags while packaging it in excessive plastic. The philosophy that we have adopted is “Start if you want to be a conscious brand, start viewing sustainability in all aspects, treating it like a filter.” At Beej, we use this filter in every aspect of our business from material sourcing itself! We try to go with designs, patterns, and silhouettes that minimize waste, we do not throw away any of our waste, we collect it and re-purpose it, recently we launched a beautiful jewellery collection made from the waste we had been collecting for 2 years.

When it comes to packaging, Beej’s packaging is entirely plastic-free and zero-waste, we tell our customers that “You do not have to throw away anything, you should be able to use everything that comes with it”.

At Beej sustainability is not one part of our brand, it is like a business filter.

Ethics and Aesthetics combined.

The truth of the matter is that even today the number of Indian consumers who are willing to buy a product because it is sustainable is minuscule, people first come to the product because it looks stylish and they like it. Then once they read more about the product it is an added bonus if it is sustainable, most people are unwilling to sacrifice their fashion quotient to support sustainability.

Beej keeps an eye out for trends, we try to give people what they want, one of our values is that we are ‘trend agnostic’ we are not overly bothered by seasonal trends because we know that after 2 or 3 months it will go out of fashion, we do not want to promote that as it is wasteful and as such, we try to create more classical designs, which are more trend agnostic and can be used for a long time.

The Next Step

Gen Z is an audience that brands cannot ignore, they deeply care about their surroundings, they like to purchase from brands whose values resonate with them, they are concerned about the climate, environment, and the world, they feel that they are going to inherit the worst of the world. I believe that if as brands we can work with them, design with them, and for them, at prices they can afford a best-case scenario can be created because the idea is to get people to adopt these ideas early on. What is the point in being a brand that preaches sustainability if it cannot reach out to the audience that cares about it the most because they cannot afford to buy it? This is a problem at Beej as well and every day we get a little closer to solving it.

Unearthing Potential

These are very exciting times for Indian fashion. Fashion is a rapidly changing industry now, what you learn in college is never enough. Keep your eyes and ears to the ground, watch out for research and new developments. As everything is eventually to be commercialized, I advise creatives to work on their maths as well.

Starting out entrepreneurship is a roller coaster ride, there are days that ask questions and days that answer.

As designers try and see things from different angles, what are customers saying about a product, what researchers are saying about it, and what are critiques saying about the same product? We need honest designers, ready to change the world. Look to break the bias, be it in silhouettes, materials, colours, fabrics, or explorations, everything can have its bias broken, do not let anyone tell you what you can or cannot do “You can do anything.”

Written by : Suchira Biswas and Jineet Shah