Nikhil Kamath, investor and co-founder of the online brokerage platform Zerodha, has shared his observations on the contrasting eating patterns in India and Singapore, where he recently visited.
He said most of the people he met there “never cook at home.” Some don’t even have kitchen facilities at their residence, Kamath, 38, said in a post on X.
“I was in Singapore this week; most I met said they never cook at home, and others don’t have a kitchen,” he wrote.
He added that if India were to follow this trend, investing in or opening up restaurants would become a great business opportunity. “But we don’t have restaurant brands that have close to the scale Southeast Asian chains do.”
“What’s different in our consumption behaviour? And will this change say when GDP per capita crosses 5k USD, and labour costs increase? To my restaurateur friends, if one thing could change to make this industry in India thrive, what would that be?” he asked in the post.
Citing data from Swiggy and Bain & Company, Kamath highlighted a stark disparity in the number of non-home cooked meals consumed by people in various countries.
While customers in China consumed an average of 33 non-home cooked meals per month in 2023, the number was much lower at 5 meals per month in India.
The figure stood at 27, 19, 14, and 11 meals for customers in the US, Singapore, South Korea, and Vietnam.
Kamath’s X post garnered much attention, drawing diverse responses from users including criticism from many.
“Comparing Singapore and Bharat, in every aspect, and then taking Singapore as some sort of abstract baseline, makes no sense,” said one X user.
“Not a restaurateur, but Indian food in restaurants is not healthy. It has way more oil, it is way more fried, and way more spicy that most home food is. It is impossible to eat Indian food out every day, but one could easily eat, say, Vietnamese food out daily,” another comment on his post read.
“Smaller homes plus a hawker culture plus hygiene. We want bigger homes, don’t focus on hygiene, and have a snack focused street food scene. We need good streets before we can have good street food!” said another user.
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