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INROur Journey
The beginning
Like many of you, most of our Festive team members have worked for corporate companies in India and around the world, some are parents to young children, and some have recently joined the parenting club, some are now living in India, and some are living abroad. Throughout our journey in pursuit of progressive careers and a better lifestyle, we all experienced the disconnect it created with our culture. We thought about it a lot and decided to do something about it with the intent to bridge the gap and celebrate our traditions and culture in a joyful way. Though most of us are new to this entire ecosystem of product design, procurement, production, packaging, marketing, sales, operations, and logistics; what motivated us is the simple thought that this will bring joy to kids and many families, fueled by our innate interest to make it happen, so here it is – Welcome to Festive.!
Now that we have decided to do this, we did talk to children and parents to understand best possible ways to make an experience joyful, we learned it generally fits in to one of these categories – illustrated stories, do it yourself projects, board games and contests. With that understanding, we brainstormed about products and experiences that we can offer to celebrate our traditions & culture for many of our festivals. We got a bunch of product ideas, and we were genuinely excited to kickstart many of our ideas. But to keep things simple, we decided to launch one product so we can make sure to stay focused on doing it right from the beginning to end.
Our first do it yourself product - Festive Ganesha
We chose Ganesha as the first project and decided to launch our product for the Ganesh Chaturthi festival in 2020. This festival celebrates the birth of Lord Ganesha. Lord Ganesha is revered as the god of beginnings. He is honored at the start of rites and ceremonies and is widely known as “remover of obstacles.” However, he is also known for many other attributes. His elephant head makes him easy to identify. He is also the patron of arts and sciences and the lord of intellect and wisdom. So, we thought it’s fitting to come up with our launch product just in time to celebrate the Ganesh Chaturthi festival. That’s how we finalized our first product. So here it is – Welcome to Festive Ganesha.!
Our "Festive Ganesha" is a set of items carefully identified and put together so that you can make your own Ganesha idol in an eco-friendly and traditional way. Your child can use their imagination to work with refined natural clay, an easy-to-use mold, and then paint it to create an idol of Lord Ganesha. Can you think of a better way to celebrate Ganesh Chaturthi? We curated this product to bring a joyful experience while making it easy enough for kids to do it independently using eco-friendly, toxic-free, water solvable, recyclable materials and finally packaged in a beautiful recyclable box.
You all knew what happened in 2020, we ran into many challenges during the pandemic in addition to usual challenges of a startup. However, we were able to meet the objectives we have set for ourselves to deliver in 2020. Once we made our Festive Ganesha available for sale on our website, we were sold out online within 3 days. We have made Festive Ganesha available in few retail stores as well to ensure our product is available before the festival date. We are humbled by the response and delighted with the feedback we received from our customers. Also, we are glad to report that we learned a lot during this entire journey.
Feedback / Response from 2020
Our response to COVID-19
When the pandemic hit all of us in 2020, we at Festive quickly adjusted our plans, and reprioritized our objectives for 2020.
We came up with a comic story to help children understand tips to fight corona. It is very well received and has been widely circulated on social media channels. The readers appreciated our effort. Also, we have donated our entire profit from 2020 sales to non-profit organizations that were helping the underprivileged during COVID-19.
Comments from readers
Our first exquisite collection of illustrated books for children
In 2020, we have also started working on creating an exquisite collection of illustrated stories for children with an intent to help modern parents introduce our Indian culture, heritage, and traditions to their children in an effortless way and help them stay true to their roots. Over a period of last couple of years, we learned that children are genuinely interested in reading or listening to these stories. However, we learned that the content that’s available in the market, for the most part, is either too in-depth or done at an outdated quality. Moreover, we think it is not appealing to a broader section of children nowadays because of the reasons mentioned above. We then talked to several children and parents to know if there will be any genuine interest in this kind of content if it is done with superior quality. Not to our surprise, there is genuine interest from most of the people we interviewed.
The problem
The problem here is that there a genuine interest, but there aren’t many quality options available in the market. So, as a next step, we started thinking about it to understand why it is that way? Also, at the same time, we started reaching out to the few best authors, artists, and publishers. We wanted their input to understand why there isn’t a significant effort to simplify this content into a suitable format for today’s children. We wanted to know why there isn’t much attention to making it with an exquisite quality that today’s children are looking to experience.
Our learnings
The books that are available in the market today are either driven by an author or an artist out of their personal interest. It quickly became difficult for them as an individual to make simplified content and get a contemporary outlook that will appeal to today’s children. Most publishers look for speed to market, price it for volume sales. This diminishes the overall quality of the product even before it gets into the market.
There is a lack of consistent focus in simplifying this kind of content as it requires a dedicated team to put a consistent effort to collaborate with authors, artists, illustrators, editors, book designers regularly to extract the quality outcome. It also requires an upfront investment with a commitment that fosters everyone to deliver superior quality.
Our differentiators
With that understanding, we decided to attempt to do this with a focus on few areas mentioned below.
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Simplified content:
We hired young authors who are passionate about Indian culture, traditions, and heritage. They are genuinely interested in storytelling and are best known for simplifying the content for young children.
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Storylines that stay the course:
We hired editors who helped us stay true to our roots, ensured our content is apt for children.
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Artwork that’s contemporary:
We hired award-winning Artists and Illustrators to get contemporary artwork that appeals to the current generation.
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Long term commitment:
We are in it for the long haul with the belief that if we stick to these focus areas, people will genuinely love us for what we are trying to accomplish, and, in the process, we may spread joy to kids and many families.
Our words/plans in action
With this focus, we have put together a lineup of authors, editors, artists,
illustrators, book designers and worked for more than two years to develop an exquisite collection of
illustrated stories for children and a monthly digital magazine. All our books and magazine issues are
now available for instant purchase and reading on our Festive mobile App.
Celebrating India Collection
Celebrating India Collection aims to introduce stories of gods, goddesses, festivals, stories of legends, and heroes of Indian history in a traditional yet contemporary way that is joyful to read. These books from this collection have rich, vibrant illustrations and entertaining stories of gods which will appeal to young children. The first six titles in the series are Ganesha, Krishna, Durga, Shiva, Hanuman, and Rama.
Tales of Wisdom Collection
Tales Of Wisdom Collection aims to introduce traditional moral and witty stories from India in a contemporary way that is joyful to read. The Panchatantra books from this collection have rich, vibrant illustrations and entertaining stories which will appeal to young children. One of India’s most influential contributions to world literature, the Panchatantra, is a collection of animal fables and moral stories. Panchatantra in Sanskrit means Five Treatises. All the interrelated animal fables in Panchatantra are arranged within a frame story. The stories are attributed to Vishnu Sharma, who wrote these books to teach statecraft to three princes who refused to get educated. For more than two and a half millennia, these stories have passed from one generation to another and have regaled children and adults alike.
Festive India Magazine
Festive India magazine is the perfect blend of action from the epics, adventures of brave warriors, tales of humor and intrigue, inspirational stories of famous Indians, insightful articles on festivals, popular tourist spots, architectural marvels, folk art, paintings, theater, martial arts, handicrafts, cuisine and much more. We conceptualized this digital magazine for children and passionately crafted it to help modern parents introduce their children to India’s glorious culture and heritage. With all the effort we put into this project, we expect Festive India Magazine to be a great companion to your children. The first issue of Festive India Magazine was released on April 10, 2022, on the auspicious occasion of Ram Navami. A new issue is released every month.
The path forward
We strongly believe that our culture is our true identity. So, we are on this journey to pass our Indian traditions and heritage to the next generation in a contemporary way that’s joyful. We are in this for a long haul with the belief that if we stick to our focus, we can make very good impact, and people will genuinely appreciate us for what we are trying to accomplish and, in the process, we may spread joy to kids and many families.
With that said, we are planning to come up with the below-mentioned products.
Books
We are partnering with renowned authors, artists to bring more titles & some of our upcoming books are not just for children !
Do it yourself products
We worked on few concepts, completed prototypes and now getting ready for production & delivery. We may launch some of our products on Kickstarter campaigns, so subscribe to our newsletter to stay informed about our next product launch.
Contests
Stay tuned to know more about upcoming contests on our social media channels & there will be giveaways and random prize draws throughout the year.
Thank you ...!
We sincerely thank you for investing your valuable time to know a little more about us and what we are trying to accomplish. Please share your thoughts, comments, and feedback with us!