Sustainable Fashion Entrepreneur and Co-Founder Of Tamarind Chutney, Tanvi Bikhchandani

Tanvi Bikhchandani is the co-founder of Tamarind Chutney, a social venture dedicated to enhancing artisan livelihoods and reducing textile waste. Tanvi, a Stanford alumna, oversees TC’s business development, communications, and impact. The team at Tamarind Chutney sources fabrics directly from small to medium-sized craftspeople, gives them design input, and tries to share earnings with them.

In India, there is a growing interest in sustainable and conscious fashion, with shoppers preferring to buy from brands that share their beliefs. Much of this shopping is done online, with eCommerce rising at four times the rate of traditional retail (pre-COVID). And it was there that Tamarind Chutney’s peculiarity got them noticed.
Tamarind Chutney was founded in 2019 with the goal of improving artisan livelihoods and reducing textile waste. They work directly with small to medium-sized craftspeople to source textiles, provide design input, and split earnings. They also collect ‘deadstock’ fabric from current production to avoid dumping it in landfills. They worked with 45+ artisans/tailors in the last year and saved 763m of cloth from the dump.

They started making masks, and they’ve swiftly become one of their best-selling items in recent months. They created a capsule work from home line that includes comfy items like cotton T-shirts, shorts, and patiala salwars, which is their primary product. They’ve had a lot of excellent feedback on these items, especially the T-shirts and shorts.