Key Takeaways
- Patel launched his Indian-American fusion model Confusion Snacks as a facet hustle in Could 2022.
- By 2023, he was centered on the enterprise full-time — right here’s how he’s saved it rising since.
This Aspect Hustle Highlight Q&A options New York Metropolis-based entrepreneur Aadit Patel, 31, founding father of Indian-American fusion snack model Confusion Snacks.
After faculty, Patel labored on Microsoft’s floor {hardware} crew, the place he noticed firsthand how bodily merchandise come to life at scale; in 2016, he moved to Seattle, the place he launched his chai-blend ardour undertaking Chaitheory. By 2019, he’d joined Scale AI and was working pilot applications buying enterprise prospects to achieve the expertise wanted to make a brand new snack model facet hustle profitable.
Responses have been edited for size and readability.
Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Confusion Snacks. Aadit Patel.
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When did you begin your facet hustle, and the place did you discover the inspiration for it?
In Could 2022, I launched Confusion Snacks to convey international flavors to on a regular basis snacking utilizing clear, guilt-free elements.
It didn’t start with the intention of beginning a enterprise. It started as a method for me to remain linked to my Indian-American identification.
Rising up, I lived on the intersection of two cultures, continually studying easy methods to carry ahead my immigrant roots whereas adapting to American life. Many instances, these identities felt like opposites. One facet of me was devouring my mother’s do-it-yourself meals and dancing to Bollywood hits; the opposite facet was crushing a bag of Scorching Cheetos whereas singing Justin Bieber within the bathe.
I beloved each side, however by no means absolutely felt “at residence.” Ultimately, I embraced the reality: I’m each Indian and American. And I needed to create one thing that celebrated that duality as an alternative of forcing a alternative between them.
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For me, essentially the most pure solution to construct that “residence” was via meals — particularly snacks. I come from a household of avid snackers, and I’ve all the time felt that meals is among the finest methods to bridge cultures. I needed a snack that felt like me: not 100% Indian, not 100% American, however someplace in that superbly complicated center.
On the similar time, I seen a cultural shift occurring within the U.S. Snackers had been changing into extra curious and health-conscious, searching for international flavors, cleaner elements and choices past the everyday salty-sweet-cheesy aisle. Eating places had introduced ethnic flavors mainstream, adopted by frozen meals and sauces — however the snacking aisle hadn’t caught up.
So, like several naive entrepreneur, I made a decision to shake issues up.
I left Scale AI in 2023 and centered on constructing the enterprise full-time.
“Physique language is essentially the most unfiltered suggestions you’ll ever get.”
What had been a number of the first steps you took to get your facet hustle off the bottom? How a lot cash/funding did it take to launch?
The very first step was a web based tender launch. We shared our selection pack hyperlink with household and pals, then watched one thing very thrilling occur — folks began sharing it with their circles. Abruptly, strangers had been shopping for our snacks, which gave us our first actual spark of confidence.
From there, we known as a few hundred of these early adopters to seize their trustworthy suggestions. We needed to know what was working, what wasn’t and what flavors really made folks mild up.
We took the subsequent few months to refine the recipe, tighten up the branding and ensure the product matched the story we needed to inform. As soon as we felt like issues had been headed in the correct course, we offered the snacks at our native LA farmers market. There’s nothing fairly like watching somebody attempt your product in entrance of you — physique language is essentially the most unfiltered suggestions you’ll ever get.
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And when that farmers market momentum saved constructing, we knew we had one thing price taking additional. So we took our first massive leap into retail. Simply 4 months later, in October 2022, we launched into Erewhon — our first main retail companion and the second the place this facet hustle began to really feel like an actual firm within the making.
To get every thing off the bottom, I invested about $3,000 of my financial savings — most of it spent on customized packaging, elements and cooking gear. Fortunately, years of tinkering with facet initiatives meant I already knew easy methods to construct web sites, design packaging and deal with social content material. And since my mother and I had been making each single batch ourselves, we saved a ton by protecting a lot in-house.
Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Confusion Snacks. The founder and his mother.
Are there any free or paid assets which have been particularly useful for you in beginning and working this enterprise?
Becoming a member of the Startup CPG neighborhood is an absolute should should you’re launching a shopper packaged items (CPG) model. It’s a free, extremely engaged neighborhood the place you possibly can join with different founders, service suppliers and subject-matter consultants who brazenly share what they’ve realized.
At first, we actually didn’t know what we didn’t know. Having the ability to drop a query into their Slack and get actual, sensible solutions from individuals who’ve been via it was priceless. Over time, we’ve additionally constructed unimaginable founder friendships and mentorships via that neighborhood — relationships which are genuinely invaluable.
Startup CPG additionally has chapters throughout many main cities and continually hosts occasions, meetups and applications. It’s an incredible solution to meet others within the area and get your product in entrance of actual shoppers early on.
Should you may return in your enterprise journey and alter one course of or method, what wouldn’t it be, and the way do you would like you’d accomplished it in another way?
At first, every thing feels electrical. Innovation naturally attracts curiosity — prospects get excited, retailers need to attempt one thing contemporary and also you begin seeing little sparks all over the place. I name this the novelty part. It’s validating, energizing and actually…sort of intoxicating. These early moments of consideration make you’re feeling such as you’ve cracked product-market match or product-channel match earlier than you actually have.
The error we made was assuming each spark was a sign. We doubled down on channels the place we noticed early pleasure as an alternative of slowing down to know which of them really had the potential to change into sustainable pillars of the enterprise. And what I imply by that’s: getting crystal clear on who your core buyer actually is, designing your product in a method that naturally invitations repeat buy (every thing from flavors to naming to pack measurement to cost) and figuring out the channels that may ship your product to that buyer profitably and constantly. With out these items, early pleasure doesn’t convert into long-term traction.
As a substitute of constructing that readability, we unfold ourselves skinny chasing fragmented pockets of demand — making an attempt to help a number of retail accounts, dabbling in numerous on-line channels and reacting to each new alternative as a result of it felt like progress. That’s how you find yourself making choices that really feel “proper within the second” however aren’t rooted in long-term technique. For us, that meant prematurely altering packaging to suit one particular channel and investing time and vitality into channels that weren’t set as much as ship the economics or repeat purchases we wanted.
Wanting again, I wouldn’t ignore these early alerts — they’re worthwhile. However I’d deal with them as information factors, not locations. I’d be extra disciplined about figuring out one successful channel, proving sturdy gross sales and repeat conduct there after which increasing outward from a spot of power.
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In relation to this particular enterprise, what’s one thing you’ve discovered notably difficult or shocking?
One of many greatest challenges has been constructing a model in a class that doesn’t actually have a playbook.
Our price proposition is bringing international flavors into on a regular basis snacking. We’ve seen these flavors shine in eating places, frozen meals and sauces that show you how to prepare dinner at residence, however not but within the snacking aisle. That’s nonetheless a reasonably new, rising class. The closest examples we may discover had been snacks imported from Asia and offered in specialty grocers or on-line marketplaces. However our aim wasn’t simply to serve that viewers; we needed to convey these flavors to everybody — the Indian child craving one thing acquainted, the American snacker searching for one thing new and everybody in between.
So we didn’t have a “have a look at what they did and replica that” roadmap. As a substitute, we turned to what each rising founder turns to in 2025: LinkedIn. CPG founders had been sharing enormous wins, new retailer bulletins, loopy sell-through stats — and we subconsciously began absorbing these tales as our playbook. In the event that they had been successful these dream accounts, then absolutely touchdown those self same accounts meant we had been heading in the right direction too…proper?
Not all the time.
What we finally realized is that chasing the accounts everybody else is celebrating isn’t the identical as constructing a profitable enterprise. These massive retailer wins look shiny (and actually, they really feel validating), however they’re not all the time aligned along with your economics, your operations, your buyer or your long-term imaginative and prescient. What works for another person is probably not the trail that works for you.
The actual problem is staying anchored in your model of success, not the trade’s spotlight reel. It means protecting your head down, understanding your shopper higher than anybody else, determining the place they really store and constructing your enterprise round that — even when it’s not the buzzy path everyone seems to be cheering for on-line.
It takes self-discipline to place your horse blinders on, particularly when the web retains telling you to run in each course without delay. However on this trade, readability beats FOMO each single time.
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Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Confusion Snacks
“When one thing falls aside, it’d clear the trail for one thing sturdier.”
Are you able to recall a selected occasion when one thing went very mistaken — how did you repair it?
I awakened one morning to an e-mail from our manufacturing companion saying that they not may produce for us as a result of an inner technique shift the place they centered on working with bigger shoppers.
I instructed them that we revered their enterprise resolution and hoped to reconnect down the street, however with out warning or a transition plan, our problem was discovering an alternate rapidly.
What made it sting much more was how a lot we had poured into that partnership. We had spent a full yr getting ready them for our upcoming Entire Meals launch — weekly calls, on-site visits, transferring tribal data, smoothing out high quality points, constructing belief. I genuinely believed we had been rising collectively.
However their decisiveness grew to become an odd kind of present. As soon as I obtained previous the preliminary shock, it compelled me to flip into problem-solving mode. As a substitute of scrambling from a spot of concern, I framed it as a chance: take every thing I realized over the previous 12 months and discover a manufacturing companion who really had the capability and need to construct with us long-term.
We needed to problem-solve asap with our Entire Meals launch on the horizon, and we couldn’t afford to overlook that launch.
That is the place our values saved us. The one factor we all the time had — even once we had been tiny, scrappy and making popcorn in a business kitchen — was the flexibility to construct real relationships. We all the time led with: “We’re right here for the lengthy haul. We’re going to work our butts off. And we’re going to be the sort of companion who reveals up — good days or unhealthy.”
I picked up the telephone and known as the proprietor of the primary producer we ever labored with. They had been those who helped us graduate from making popcorn by hand to an industrial course of. That relationship hadn’t been flawless — we had loads of scheduling and high quality battles — however beneath all of it was mutual respect. Even after we moved on, we stayed in contact, checked in and shared updates.
I instructed him what occurred and requested if he knew anybody who may be a match. By this level, he knew our product, our story and me effectively sufficient to level us in the correct course. He launched us to a father-and-son crew within the Midwest — a 40-year-old family-run producer that specialised in working with small and medium manufacturers. From the primary dialog, it felt proper. They understood the urgency with out exploiting it. They communicated transparently. They cared about constructing one thing that made sense for each side. No nickel-and-diming, no bizarre stress, no drama.
Inside three months, they had been our new producer and we had been on monitor for our Entire Meals launch.
Wanting again, I realized two massive classes:
- When one thing falls aside, it’d clear the trail for one thing sturdier.
- Lead with humanity. All the time. Actual relationships will carry you in methods luck by no means will.
How lengthy did it take you to see constant month-to-month income? What does development and income appear to be now?
It took about six months for us to begin seeing constant month-to-month income — this was once we began promoting at Erewhon, our first main retail chain. The month-to-month income was simply sufficient to cowl the working capital wanted to fund manufacturing runs, uncooked supplies and in-store demos.
Our aim is to succeed in $1 million in income by the tip of 2026.
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What’s your finest piece of particular, actionable enterprise recommendation?
Particularly for founders bootstrapping their enterprise, first concentrate on constructing channels that you would be able to management and make worthwhile, fairly than chasing each alternative that comes your method.
Within the early days, there’s a relentless tug-of-war: the accounts with the best potential in your product to win aren’t all the time able to work with you but, and those prepared to say sure won’t be the correct match long-term. Typically the correct channels take months and even years to win, and a few promising alternatives can fizzle out earlier than the end line. These lengthy, fickle gross sales cycles are robust, particularly when you should preserve the enterprise afloat.
As a substitute, determine channels the place your core prospects reside that mean you can absolutely management the expertise — gross sales, distribution and retention, and generate sufficient money circulate to fund and develop the channel itself.
Once you focus right here, you possibly can check the market quicker, design SKUs particularly for that channel and drive repeat purchases via promotions, bundles and campaigns. These self-sustaining channels change into a basis you possibly can scale from when bigger, high-potential accounts are prepared.
Constructing these worthwhile, controllable channels will preserve your enterprise rising and provide the stability to go after the larger wins when the timing is correct.