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LETTUS KITCHENS - A short series

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Playing with Fire: Valuable lessons learnt building a Cloud Kitchens startup

A capped-series of articles covering the journey of building and closing a startup

What the series covers

  1. Why build a startup and when's the best time
  2. Discovering opportunities and shortlisting ideas
  3. Incorporating a Startup (US/Singapore/Local)
  4. Finding a co-founder
  5. Evaluating accelerators / incubators for launch
  6. Finding Product-Market-Fit
  7. Fundraising through angel investors/VCs
  8. Managing captables & employee equity ownership
  9. Burn management and Financial discipline
  10. Managing investor relations and updates
  11. Growing and managing a team of 50+
  12. Scaling operations to deliver 70,000+ orders
  13. Designing a Customer Experience across 14+ Virtual brands
  14. Technology Investments (the Good & the Bad)
  15. Pivoting a business...twice
  16. Dealing with an entrepreneur's stress/anxiety
  17. Deciding when to pull the plug and shutting down
  18. Handling layoffs and closure gracefully
  19. Capturing key lessons and paying it forward
  20. The Road ahead for a Mid-Career Entrepreneur

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Who is this for?

  • Aspiring Entrepreneurs
  • First-time Entrepreneurs going into Fundraising
  • Casual Readers curious about startup challenges and overcoming them
  • Lettus Kitchens' Followers curious to know what happened

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About Lettus Kitchens

  • Founded in Jan 2021 and shutdown in late 2023
  • Raised $450K from 12 angle investors/2 angel syndicates
  • Built 3 kitchens with 5,000+ sqft of space across 3 cities (Islamabad, Rawalpindi & Lahore - Pakistan)
  • Operated 14+ virtual restaurant brands and delivered 70,000+ orders
  • Made 2 pivots along the way (Started with Cloud Kitchens --> Grew Full Stack Dark Kitchens --> Survived through B2B Corporate Meals)

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Sign up

My team and I built Lettus Kitchens with a mission to provide access to affordable and delicious food in every neighborhood of Pakistan and empower food entrepreneurs to unlock their potential.

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Get a behind-the-scenes view of the rise and decline of Lettus Kitchens and learn about the lessons acquired as a first-time entrepreneur.

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20 Articles. Everything I've learned and resources I had gathered.

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Get one article delivered in your inbox every other week.

    Don't worry.

    You can Unsubscribe at any time.

    But unlikely you'll want to...

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    About Me

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    I'm Bilal and for the longest time, I've wanted to build something meaningful (my wife will attest to me pitching a new idea to her every other week). If only she were in VC...

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    The opportunity finally came in the form of Lettus Kitchens. After 4 years building and growing verticals at Careem, I felt I was ready.

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    It was anything but easy,

    but it proved to be one of the most meaningful experiences in my career.

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    I'm writing this series to help professionals navigate some of the early challenges of founding a company and accessing the valuable lessons/resources I acquired over time building Lettus.

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