Dishoom's Co-Founder Shamil Thakrar, on building a soulful, poetic business

Conversations of Inspiration

Holly Tucker MBE

Education, Society & Culture, Entrepreneurship, Self-improvement, Business, Personal Journals

5.0 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 10 October 2022

⏱️ 70 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This week, Holly was lucky enough to sit down with Shamil Thakrar, over a cup of Dishoom’s freshly brewed chai tea, and learnt what’s really at the heart of his business.

At the very beginning, Shamil and his co-founders set out with the goal of bringing the beauty of the Irani cafés they so loved in Bombay to the UK. Now with nine restaurants across the country – boy did they do just that.

Coming from a business school and consultancy background, in his younger years, Shamil was far from the path of owning a restaurant. However, with passion and more than a stroke of determination to prove the naysayers wrong, he used this experience to follow his dream. In 2010, the first Dishoom restaurant was born.

However, it wasn’t always smooth sailing, and Shamil learnt that focusing solely on the numbers and profits was holding both him and the business back.

Shamil soon began pioneering a new approach – putting culture, soulfulness, kindness and authenticity centre stage, fuelled by his recognition that, “Anything, to be truly successful, has to have a bit of poetry at its heart”.

Encapsulating what it means to be in love with your business, Shamil shares how incorporating creativity with history and art has allowed him to build a truly immersive brand, loved by many.

If you enjoyed this conversation, you might also enjoy Holly’s episode with
Lord Billamoria, founder of Cobra Beer.

This Conversations of Inspiration podcast episode is brought to you with support from Adobe Express.

Enjoying listening to these unfiltered chats? Subscribe to Holly’s weekly newsletters on our website, where she shares small business inspiration of all kinds, exclusive nuggets of wisdom from her and her guests, plus offers, creative ideas and topical, 'ungoogleable' business advice.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Well, what a conversation that was. Today I spoke with Shamil Thakra, co-founder of the brilliant
0:06.4	Dishoom, and I apologise in advance if you hear me talking about their chai throughout the entire
0:12.9	podcast. I have never tasted anything like it. I was in his incredible Kensington restaurant.
0:20.3	And what took me by surprise is how soulful this conversation became very, very quickly because
0:26.9	I was just utterly, completely blown away by his creativity, his vision, and the beautiful way
0:35.6	in which he approaches business. He talks about putting poetry at the heart of your brand,
0:41.6	and I'd never heard this before. I honestly can say I haven't stopped thinking about this episode
0:48.4	since recording it, and it's literally changed my viewpoint on brand and enhanced my understanding
0:55.7	on why I'm building the brand I am today. I really hope it moves you as much as it did me.
1:10.4	I'm Holly Tucker, and welcome to Conversations of Inspiration. Back in 2006, I founded not on the
1:17.6	high street from my kitchen table, and since then I've gone on to launch Holly and co.
1:23.2	I'm the UK ambassador of Creative Small Businesses, and I believe that having a business doing
1:28.8	what you love is the key to a happy fulfilled life. My dream is to help everybody start theirs.
1:35.8	I'm here to offer advice, inspiration, wisdom and encouragement, and in my view, the best way to do
1:43.2	this is by sharing stories. So I've reached out to my favourite small businesses, entrepreneurs,
1:50.0	and those who simply inspire me and ask them to share theirs. With thanks to Adobe,
1:56.3	who've helped bring this podcast to life? Here are my Conversations of Inspiration.
2:03.7	Hi, Shameel. Lovely to be here. We are in your phenomenal restaurant,
2:09.1	Dishoom in Kensington. It's an incredible brand. I've been so looking forward to speaking to you.
2:15.5	It's been a little diary ping pong, hasn't it, but we're here in the end. It's lovely to see
2:20.3	you, Holly. Welcome to our restaurant. It's just beautiful. Now, what are my drinking here?
2:25.0	We're both drinking chai, which is today very appreciated on a slightly miserable day,
	...

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