The Indian Startup Show

Ink, Hustle & 15,000+ Tattoos. Today I’m talking with Maddy, the artist behind Delhi’s Apex Tattooz. We explore where it all started, the meaning behind the studio, and how he turned a love of drawing into a business. We get into first tattoos, partner names people wish they’d never inked, and why Maddy usually says no to face tattoos. Maddy shares how tattoo culture is changing in India, how a client’s story becomes a custom piece. On the business side, we talk about affordable pricing, using AI for design and marketing, plans for a second branch and ambitious Japanese-style tattoos. And much more so please enjoy the show.
Origin and Meaning of Apex Tattooz
Maddy built Apex Tattooz around the idea that a tattoo can give a personal story a permanent home. They share how clients’ trust gave them the confidence to move from tattooing at home to opening a studio.
Early Tattoos and Regrets
Maddy's first tattoo, around 2013, was a simple linework mandala. One request they still get all the time is a partner’s name. Some clients have returned as soon as the next day asking to change it, only to learn they’ll have to wait for it to heal.
Studio Growth and Business Philosophy
When business dried up during the pandemic, Maddy reconsidered what clients in Delhi could afford. They describe how lowering prices while maintaining the quality of the work helped the studio recover. They also share how they divide their time between painting, study, appointments, and running the business.
Tattoo Culture and Client Demographics in India
Maddy reflects on how tattooing in India has evolved from small traditional markings to detailed realism as machines and techniques have changed. They share what they see in their Delhi studio, from clients looking for a small design to those who want a larger piece that tells a story.
Personal Tattoos and Design Process
Before sketching, Maddy and their team ask why the client wants the tattoo and what it means to them. They use that conversation and visual references to develop a custom piece. Maddy also shares the words on their favourite tattoo, a tribute to his mother. “I’ll hold you in my heart until I can find you in heaven.”
Marketing and Use of Artificial Intelligence
Maddie runs the studio’s digital marketing and uses Midjourney, ChatGPT, and Claude for tasks such as preparing mockups and publishing across multiple platforms. They explain how they use search data to decide what to post and report reaching a lot of impressions over 16 months through organic Google search.
Japanese Tattoo History and Complex Cover-Ups
The conversation turns to the cultural associations of tattooing in Japan and one of Maddy’s most ambitious projects. They’re designing a Japanese-style leg sleeve to cover roughly 40 small tattoos on a client’s thigh.
Client Variety and Studio Approach
Maddy describes a client base that ranges from professors and pilots to celebrities. They talk about giving every client the same attention and respect, regardless of who walks through the door.
Unpopular Trends and Face Tattoos
Maddy explains why they steer clients away from copying popular designs and prefer to create a piece around the person wearing it. They usually turn down face tattoo requests and will only reconsider after a client has consistently wanted one for several months.
Future Expansion Plans
Maddy is considering a second studio and wants to grow at a pace that keeps custom tattoos affordable in Delhi. Looking back, they say even the setbacks taught them something they needed to learn.
Rapid-Fire Preferences and Fainting Incidents
Maddy names the ankle and neck as especially painful placements and picks Talha Anjum, Badshah, and Raftaar as dream clients. They also share what happens when a client feels faint during an appointment and why they ask clients to arrive rested, hydrated, and fed.
Advice for Founders
Maddy's advice is to start with a problem people genuinely need solved. For Apex Tattooz, that meant making high-quality custom tattooing accessible to more clients in Delhi.
Find Apex Tattooz
Search for Apex Tattooz Delhi on Google or Instagram.
Website: https://apextattooz.com
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@madyy2283

 

The Indian Startup Show is hosted and produced by Neil Patel
Connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilpatel2/
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Music by Punch Deck.
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What if saving the planet isn't just an environmental problem, but a marketing problem? In this episode of The Indian Startup Show, I sit down with Abhishek Karambelkar, founder of EcoFlyp, a sustainability platform on a mission to make it easier for people to take action for the environment. 
From struggling to figure out where to donate old books to building a platform that reached 15,000 monthly users entirely through organic growth, We explore why people want to live more sustainably but often don't know where to start, how EcoFlyp helps people discover ways to donate and recycle items, and what it really takes to build a startup from scratch.
But that's only half the story. 

(17:08) Abhishek also shows us how he's using AI to build websites, develop brand identities and generate creative assets in seconds. We even run a live demonstration of his Brand DNA tool, exploring whether AI can help startups create better branding and whether traditional branding agencies should be worried. We also get into the difficult realities of startup life: rebuilding a broken platform, finding a business model, deciding when to raise funding, and why Abhishek turned down a funding offer rather than accept terms he didn't believe were right for the business. And much more!
In this episode, we discuss:
🌍 Why sustainability is also a marketing and communication problem
🚀 How EcoFlyp reached 15,000 monthly users without spending on advertising
📚 The personal frustration that inspired Abhishek to start the company
♻️ How EcoFlyp helps people discover donation and recycling options
🤖 Building a startup with AI, and avoiding generic, soulless results
🎨 Brand DNA: the AI branding tool that generates creative assets and brand direction
💰 Why Abhishek rejected funding.
📈 Monetisation, organic SEO and scaling a sustainability platform
🏢 The opportunity around corporate sustainability and extended producer responsibility
💡 Why branding is much more than a logo
👕 Practical ways to make clothes last longer and reduce waste
🧠 The lessons Abhishek has learned about building, marketing and growing a startup
About EcoFlyp
EcoFlyp aims to make sustainable action easier by improving how people discover donation, reuse and recycling options. Its broader mission is to use better marketing, branding and communication to help sustainability initiatives reach the people who need them.
Search for EcoFlyp to explore the platform and its sustainability discovery pages.
Links 
https://ecoflyp.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhishekkarambelkar/
 

The Indian Startup Show is hosted and produced by Neil Patel
Connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilpatel2/
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it.
Listen and Subscribe to More Episodes
https://www.indianstartupshow.com/
Youtube https://www.youtube.com/@indianstartupshow
Music by Punch Deck.
https://open.spotify.com/artist/7kdduxAVaFnbHJyNxl7FWV

How do you turn your passion into a business while working a demanding corporate job? In this episode of The Indian Startup Show, I speak with Karan Kumar, a former corporate professional who built a fitness coaching business from scratch. Karan shares how he landed his first customer through Instagram, grew his business to help over 200 clients, and navigated the challenges of entrepreneurship in India. They also discuss the growth of online fitness coaching, nutrition myths, weight-loss drugs, lack of protein in indian's diet, social media pressure, and the importance of accountability and sustainable habits for long-term health.
In this episode we talk about:
From corporate to entrepreneurship: How Karan went from an engineering and MBA background to building a fitness coaching business.
Finding the first customer: How Instagram helped him land his first paying client in 2022.
Building a business on the side: Why starting as a side hustle can reduce financial pressure and help founders find product-market fit.
The reality of entrepreneurship: Managing imposter syndrome, time constraints, uncertainty and the administrative challenges of running a business in India.
Building a coaching business: Why accountability, personalised support and challenging clients' limiting beliefs can make a difference.
Client transformation stories: Lessons from clients who made significant progress through consistency and the right guidance.
The future of online fitness in India: Why demand for personalised coaching is growing among busy professionals.
Weight-loss drugs and fitness trends: Karan's perspective on emerging medications, medical supervision and the importance of nutrition and exercise.
Nutrition fundamentals: Protein, fibre, calorie awareness and the problem with chasing every new diet trend.
Fitness technology and social media: Why wearable data and online comparisons shouldn't override how you feel.
Getting started with fitness: Why focusing on one sustainable habit at a time can be more effective than trying to change everything overnight
Links
https://www.linkedin.com/in/karankumar15/
Disclaimer: The nutrition and weight-loss medication discussion is for general information and is not a substitute for personalised medical advice. Speak to a qualified healthcare professional before starting or changing medication or making significant changes to your diet or exercise routine.
 

The Indian Startup Show is hosted and produced by Neil Patel
Connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilpatel2/
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it.
Listen and Subscribe to More Episodes
https://www.indianstartupshow.com/
Youtube https://www.youtube.com/@indianstartupshow
Music by Punch Deck.
https://open.spotify.com/artist/7kdduxAVaFnbHJyNxl7FWV

What happens when you turn one of the most common dopamine loops—ordering food out of boredom—into a website?
I sit down with Purvansh Parmar, a 26-year-old software engineer and entrepreneur from Udaipur, to unpack the story behind Food Never Comes, a website designed to make people more aware of the habits and dopamine loops surrounding online food ordering. 
Built by two 26-year-old software developers - Purvansh Parmar and Anshul Sharma - from Udaipur in India's northern state of Rajasthan, FoodNeverComes says it has attracted more than 2.7m visitors since its launch in June. 
It now offers 22 kitchens, 327 dishes and 319 real recipes, complete with fake prices, a simulated checkout and a fictional delivery experience. Purvansh explains how personal experiences, self-help books, and an idea discovered through social media led to a project that grew to millions of visits and around 200,000 active users. Lesson from launching products. Good dopamine V bad Dopamine. Vibe Coding (good v bad) & Building in Public!  And much more!
In this episode we talk about:
🧠 The idea behind Food Never Comes — how boredom, food ordering, and dopamine loops can turn everyday behavior into repetitive habits.
💡 From personal experience to product — how living alone, unnecessary online purchases, and curiosity about habit formation inspired the project.
🌍 Millions of visits and global reach — the website has reportedly received 2.7–6 million visits, with fake kitchens adapted for different countries, cuisines, and currencies.
🎮 What's coming next — a new interactive game planned for the second week of October, plus new products including Extinction and Trip Never Leaves.
🔐 Privacy and analytics — how the team approaches user data and why they don't sell personal data or track individual food selections.
🤖 The reality of vibe coding — how AI-assisted development is making it dramatically faster to go from an idea to a working product, while also creating new security risks.
 🚀 Lessons for aspiring founders — why solving a real problem, saving people time or money, and paying attention to overlooked ideas can be more valuable than simply chasing trends
📱 Managing digital consumption — Purvansh shares how he limits his own Instagram usage and why balancing digital habits with physical activity matters
Products & Projects Mentioned
Extinction  - An upcoming application intended to block access to shopping websites and redirect users toward alternative activities. 
Trip Never Leaves. - A companion concept that lets users create fake travel itineraries inspired by feedback from communbities on Reddit and X
Key Takeaway
Can you use technology to make people aware of the habits technology itself creates?
Links
https://www.linkedin.com/in/purvanshparmar/
 

The Indian Startup Show is hosted and produced by Neil Patel
Connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilpatel2/
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it.
Listen and Subscribe to More Episodes
https://www.indianstartupshow.com/
Youtube https://www.youtube.com/@indianstartupshow
Music by Punch Deck.
https://open.spotify.com/artist/7kdduxAVaFnbHJyNxl7FWV

Make healthy snacking fun again! What happens when a former management consultant decides to leave the corporate world and build a snack brand from scratch? You get Must Be Nuts. 
Today I speak to Rajesh Ivaturi, the founder of Must Be Nuts. A brand born from a simple observation: healthy food doesn't have to feel boring, serious or joyless.  In this episode, Rajesh takes us behind the scenes of building Must Be Nuts, from the original idea and naming process to the realities of launching, raising capital, making expensive mistakes and figuring out what today's consumers actually want. 
We talk about what it really takes to go from a senior corporate career to entrepreneurship — including the anxiety, uncertainty and financial pressure that come with betting on yourself after you've already experienced failure.
Rajesh also shares how he used his consulting background, consumer research and AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude to understand the market and uncover an important insight: most people aren't looking for extreme “perfect” health. They want a sustainable balance between eating well and enjoying life. 
And then there's the messy reality of building a consumer brand. From getting the packaging wrong and, to struggling to understand Gen Z social media, putting another startup idea on hold. We talk about the four ingredients Rajesh believes create a powerful brand: customer insight, product quality, packaging and messaging and even dressing up as a crocodile mascot called Zag for a zero-budget guerrilla marketing stunt and much more!
In this episode, we explore:
Why Rajesh believed healthy snacking had become too serious and commoditised
How Must Be Nuts went from an idea to launch
The story behind the brand name
Getting investors interested after only one week of launching. 
Trying to build a men only platform in the early days of entrepreneurship. 
What leaving a senior corporate career really feels like
The lessons from Rajesh's first failed entrepreneurial venture
How AI and consulting-style research helped shape the business
The consumer insight that challenged the “perfect health” mindset
Expensive mistakes founders make when moving too quickly
Why copying someone else's startup playbook can be dangerous
The realities of outsourcing versus building an in-house team
Why startups fail — and why founders need an almost irrational belief in their idea
How Rajesh and his spouse divide responsibilities without letting business disagreements take over their personal life
The long-term ambition for Must Be Nuts, including international expansion
Links
https://www.mustbenuts.in/

The Indian Startup Show is hosted and produced by Neil Patel
Connect with me: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilpatel2/
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it.
Listen and Subscribe to More Episodes
https://www.indianstartupshow.com/
Youtube https://www.youtube.com/@indianstartupshow
Music by Punch Deck.
https://open.spotify.com/artist/7kdduxAVaFnbHJyNxl7FWV