Founded in 2019 by Aditi and Gaurav Oberoi, Hamples is a direct to consumer, a digital discovery platform. An E-commerce of free samples and mini-trial packs for everyone to try before they buy.
The platform is designed to make targeted, at-home sampling accessible, affordable, and measurable for brands while helping them drive trial and awareness, collect first-party data, generate consumer ratings, reviews, social mentions and shares, and also unlock consumer qualitative and quantitative insights.
Gaurav Oberoi, Co-Founder of Hamples, talks the origins of the company’s name, why they chose Hamples.com as a domain, and what’s new and interesting in their future plans.
Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how Hamples got started?
Aditi and Gaurav Oberoi started their entrepreneurial journey 14 years ago from their MBA college library. After successfully launching their first online venture in 2007, they decided to impart digital marketing education to corporates and professionals from across the world. Since then they have mastered the subject and trained various businesses on Digital Marketing and Transformation, E-commerce, and Social Media.
Gaurav, an engineer and a Harvard alumnus, is a rational thinker and his logical approach is often complimented by Aditi’s creative thinking.
During Covid lockdown, they created, operated and managed 25+ eCommerce stores for Alshaya Group brands including Boots, The Body Shop, The Beauty Edits, Muji etc.
It took them a few years before they decided to transition from an established services business to launch a consumer-facing scalable venture. As they say, entrepreneurs never settle, they always challenge their perceptions and raise the bar. They both seem to be living up to this and have brought tougher all their expertise and learnings to launch Hamples.
Gaurav Bio
Gaurav, an engineer and a Harvard alumnus, is an technology entrepreneur with 15 years of hands on experience.
He started his entrepreneurial journey with his first online venture in 2007. Finding the gap in the education system, he decided to impart digital marketing education to corporates and professionals from across the world. Since then he has mastered the subject and trained various businesses on Digital Marketing and Transformation, E-commerce, and Social Media.
Gaurav has closely worked with clients from diverse industries to develop their brand marketing strategy, deliver marketing training and coach senior management, audit brand communication processes and over see millions of dollars of media budget.
He is a risk taker who believes in leaning by doing. His logical reasoning often compliments his rational thinking to support him in his decisions.
Gaurav is lately developed his interest in Neuromarketing. While he is nurturing his knowledge about the topic, he has started consulting brands on building user behavioral tracking, building brand loyalty etc.
A proud father of a 5 years old and an animal lover is spending most of his time growing his newest startup Hamples – Happy Samples.
Aditi Bio
Aditi (meaning unbounded) is a free flow, creative thinker with 14 years of experience in brand building and user experience optimization.
She started her entrepreneurial journey with a Luxury Destination Wedding planner portal in 2007. Later as a community manager for Google Business Group and Women on the web initiate, she has creatively helped startups and businesses in India to think Digital and launch their businesses. Her people centric approach compliments her creativity to optimize and simplify the processes.
She earned her master’s in business administration (MBA) in Marketing and has enriched her knowledge by working on her startups. Her core competencies include Brand Positioning, Content Strategy, Social Media Marketing.
What was the process of selecting a brand name like? When did you know this was the one?
The name Hamples is derived from Happy Samples. After rejecting many logical names, we zeroed down Hamples as it is said that happiness comes in small packages (samples).
What was the vision and purpose of your company when it first started and how has Hamples evolved as a brand since?
As a parent, we bought 10 different kinds of toothpaste for our 2 years old to try before we found the best one for her.
There were many online and offline channels for us to buy but there were none to Try before we buy. One needs to be lucky to get matched to the sample of a product she is in the market for. This gap in the pre-purchase user journey triggered an urge to launch a direct to consumer, digital discovery platform for everyone to discover new launches and try new products, reduce wastage and put an end to buyer’s regret.
A few months later, our second baby “Hamples” was born. The name Hamples is derived from Happy Samples as happiness comes in small packages (samples).
Our vision is to become a destination for users to discover and try new, unique, innovative products and services.
Anyone thinking TRY should think Hamples. In the coming months, you would see many innovative features from Hamples to compliment our vision.
How do you value your brand?
As a company we believe that the happiest people make the happiest customers. As a brand we strive to deliver happiness with innovation.
Gaurav Oberoi – Hamples
Has the pandemic affected your company in any way? What has changed since?
Many brands had reduced their marketing budget and slowed down the production during the Covid lockdown period. With the new post Covid era, we are seeing a surge in new launches from both homegrown brands and from multinational CPG companies. 2022 would be a strategic growth year for many of us, with support from our stakeholders we plan to increase our portfolio of brands, add more categories, and simultaneously increase our audience base.
What do you do to make sure your marketing is effective?
Being a startup with limited resources, we believe in action based marketing. All our campaigns and activities are linked to results and the team is always looking for innovative ways to increase the reach and onboard users / brands in bulk.
What would your advice be to entrepreneurs who are just starting out?
– Don’t over innovate: Technology changes faster than one can imagine. It is important to launch the product, test the market and continuously innovate throughout the journey. In an open market like UAE, it is relatively easier to get feedback and iterate the product offerings to match the local consumer and business needs.
– Think Big: Bigger the better. When it takes the same amount of time and effort to run any small or a big business, then why think small. UAE is the epitome of visionary leadership and they have set examples for businesses by thinking big and continuously delivering their vision.
– Collaborate: Entrepreneurs who embrace the “lone wolf” approach usually live to regret it. Collaboration, both internal with the team and external with the stakeholders, is the key to success in a fast-paced economy like UAE.
Collaboration leads to cost avoidance, cost reductions, business optimization, and faster business decisions.
What do’s and dont’s can you share when it comes to branding and naming?
We expect you to be Happy when you say Hamples 🙂
What is next for Hamples?
We have plans to grow Hamples in the UAE and scale it to other GCC.
You can follow Hamples on Linkedin, Instagram, Facebook, Tik Tok or visit their website to find out more about the platform. You can contact them at +9715859 42779 or on their email hello@hamples.com.
How does your brand name match your company vision? What new horizons can a better name open? Get in touch if you feel your brand deserves a better name, we are always happy to help.
Aditi branding domain name domains Gaurav Hamples interview naming Oberoi
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