Worth $1.64 billion in 2025, India’s chocolate industry is expanding at an expected annual rate of 6.04% through 2030. Direct-to-consumer India companies are taking the chance to disturb conventional players as consumers’ choices towards premium, artisan goods evolve. One of the fastest-growing D2C food and beverage companies, Manam Chocolate is leading the craft chocolate movement and changing the way cacao is grown, processed, and eaten in the country.
Founded in 2021 by Chaitanya Muppala, a Stanford graduate and scion of Hyderabad’s Almond House, Manam Chocolate is a legitimate beantobar D2C company. Distinct Origins, the company’s own agribusiness vertical, gets cacao straight from contract farmers in Andhra Pradesh’s West Godavari district. Manam has created a farmer-centric supply chain that solves major deficiencies in India’s cacao sector by removing middlemen and guaranteeing immediate digital payments. Its own fermentery and postharvest technology powered by sensors provide continuous quality and taste—a rarity in Indian cacao cultivation.
Listed among Time’s Best Places in 2024, Manam Chocolate’s Hyderabad Karkhana acts as a production hub as well as an experiential retail area. Consumers can experience the whole bean-to-bar process, sample new chocolate creations, and enter the brand narrative. Manam started its ambitious D2C growth strategy by first opening its North India experience store at Delhi’s Eldeco Centre, thereby extending its retail presence.
With 55–60% of its revenue coming from premium chocolate gifting, Manam presents itself as a retail-forward gift-led brand combining luxury with narrative. Its gift boxes have impressionist-style paintings of farms and farmers, therefore the item is as much about experience as it is about pleasure. While getting ready to grow its direct-to-consumer e-commerce approach, the company also serves the HORECA sector with premium fineflavor craft chocolate to hotels, restaurants, and chefs.
A solid retail plan including QSR-style beverage bars at airports and metro centers helps to support the D2C business model India of the brand. With plans to grow throughout high-traffic city areas, Manam’s Delhi and Hyderabad outlets are just the start. This multi-pronged retail and e-commerce strategy shows the brand’s conviction in an omnichannel D2C approach versus ecommerce.
On the finance side, Manam has raised $4 million in pre-Series A D2C funding rounds from well-known investors and family offices on top of its own $4 million in investments. This places the business among the most funded premium confectionery D2C brands in India.
In Indian D2C upgrades, Manam stands out by its emphasis on complexity—both in flavor and business strategy. The company is creating significant entrance obstacles by means of innovation, from exporting West Godavari chocolate to Switzerland to creating 300+ chocolate sensations under chef Ruby Islam. Manam’s strategic approach might help India’s premium food sector’s craft chocolate market grow into one of the fastest D2C businesses by 2025 even if it is still small.
Driven by premiumization, gifting culture, and consumer awareness, the D2C ecosystem India is changing India’s cacao story one bean at a time. Manam Chocolate is not only developing a brand.