From One WhatsApp Order to 10,000+ Deliveries: The SushiMen Story Nobody Asked For (But Everyone Needs to Hear)

How a freshwater aquarium expert accidentally built Bangalore's most obsessive sushi operation — with no restaurant, no investors, and zero clue what he was doing.

⏱️ 10-minute read | 📅 Published November 27, 2025 | ✍️ By Chef Abhijeeth Urs

This is the unfiltered story of building SushiMen — the struggles nobody talks about, the tiny victories that kept us going, and the obsessive attention to detail that turned one WhatsApp order into 10,000+ deliveries.

October 10, 2018.

I had just finished designing a filtration system for a 6-foot planted freshwater aquarium. Beautiful green carpet, crystal-clear water, perfect ecosystem. That was my life back then — building aquariums, not sushi. I was even in the process of applying for 3 aquarium filtration patents.

Then my phone buzzed.

"Hey man, can you make sushi for my wife's birthday? She's obsessed with it but can't find good stuff in Bangalore."

I stared at the message.

Here's the thing: I'd worked in hotel sushi kitchens. Not because I wanted to. Not because I dreamed of being a sushi chef. I was working in an Italian fine dining restaurant — the dream job I'd always wanted.

But they needed someone in the sushi kitchen. I had no choice. Keep the job, or leave.

I was the worst fit imaginable. No motivation. No experience. No relevance to my training. But I was chosen anyway. Against all odds.

And eventually, I realized: Sushi chose me. Not the other way around.

So when that WhatsApp message came? It wasn't me choosing sushi again.

It was sushi choosing me. Again.

I typed back: "Sure. When do you need it?"

That single order changed everything.

October 10, 2018: The message that changed everything.

The Bangalore Sushi Scene in 2018: A Wasteland

Let me paint you a picture of Bangalore's sushi scene seven years ago:

6-8 Asian restaurants. Maybe 2-3 "Japanese specialty" places. That's it. For a city of 12+ million people.

And the sushi? Let's just say... it existed. Barely.

Ingredients were scarce. In 2018, only 3 reliable sushi-grade fish suppliers existed in Bangalore. Vendors were unreliable. Brands changed every shipment. I'd order Norwegian salmon, get something from Thailand. Order nori, get sheets that crumbled like paper.

But that first order? I couldn't mess it up.

So I did what any obsessive chef would do: I controlled what I could control.

That one order turned into two. Then five. Then a WhatsApp group.

And suddenly, people were asking: "Can you do this full-time?"

The Menu That Didn't Exist

Here's the thing about running a "restaurant" via WhatsApp: people expect a menu.

But I didn't have one.

Why? Because I refused to promise something I couldn't deliver.

People thought I was crazy.

"Just put up a menu! Put everything on it! Let people order what they want!"

No.

I followed the same protocols as a fine-dining restaurant — daily fish inspection, temperature logs (fish at 1-3°C, rice at 36°C), batch-based preparation (2-hour max window), taste testing every single component.

People respected it. Slowly, they started trusting me: "Just make whatever's best this week. We trust you."

That trust? That's the foundation SushiMen was built on.

The non-negotiable standards that built our reputation.

The Website That Nobody Wanted (And Everyone Complained About)

By late 2019, the WhatsApp groups were chaos. People couldn't find past menus. Orders got lost.

"You need a website," everyone said.

So I tried to build one myself. Trying to cut corners, save money, use whatever free tools I could find. I thought I could figure it out.

I was wrong.

Version 1.0 was a disaster. 78% bounce rate. People left within 15 seconds. Confusing navigation. Unclear ordering process. Photos that looked like they were taken with a potato.

"Your website is a nuisance," one customer emailed. "I just want to order sushi, not solve a puzzle."

Fair.

That's when I realized: I couldn't do everything alone.

I reached out to Preetish Poonja — a techie friend from our biking club who runs Webtrip. He didn't just rebuild the website. He hand-held me. Encouraged me. Taught me how an e-commerce platform actually functions, how I could manage it independently going forward.

He continues to be the backbone of SushiMen's digital presence.

But we also needed photos. Professional ones. Not the potato-quality images I'd been using.

I called an old friend from hotel management college — Md. Rafi. We'd lived in the same hostel, studied in the same class, did our first industrial training together at Devi Garh Palace, Udaipur for 5 months.

We were good friends. But there was that rivalry — he specialized in F&B service, I specialized in F&B production. That combination intensified everything.

He'd pivoted from being a bartender and juggler to become a photographer. Now he's a fashion photographer whose work you've probably seen.

He did the shoot exactly how I wanted — for a fraction of what a regular food photographer would charge. Because that's what friends do.

Version 2.0 launched. Bounce rate dropped from 78% to 42%. Clean design. Clear navigation. Professional photos. Actual working checkout.

And suddenly, strangers were finding us and clicking "Order Now."

The Four Partnerships That Made SushiMen Possible

Here's what nobody tells you about starting a cloud kitchen: You can't do it alone.

Four partnerships saved SushiMen from being just another failed food dream:

Without these four? SushiMen doesn't exist.

The bottle that became our mascot. Real customers, real collections.

Summer 2019: The 20-Day Delivery Experiment

By mid-2019, orders were coming from all over Bangalore. Whitefield. Electronic City. Hebbal. Places 45-60 minutes away.

And I had no idea if the sushi would survive.

In a restaurant, sushi sits for 20-30 minutes max. But delivery? That's 4-5 hours from prep to consumption.

What if the rice dried out? What if the fish oxidized?

I didn't have answers. So I found them.

By Day 20, I had a system. Not perfect. But reliable.

20 days. 47 test deliveries. Obsessive? Absolutely.

The Phase We Don't Talk About

There was a time when we almost gave up.

A bunch of restaurants started offering sushi. It was suddenly everywhere on Swiggy and Zomato. Convenient. Cheap. Available 24/7.

We closed for a couple of months. I thought maybe the market had moved on. Maybe people wanted convenience over quality.

But our loyal customers came back. They shared their dissatisfaction. Their disappointment with what was available.

And we realized: We weren't competing on convenience. We were competing on craft.

So we came back. Weekend-only. Pre-orders only. On our terms.

And the people who cared? They stayed.

7 Years Later: What Nobody Tells You About Staying Power

October 10, 2025.

Seven years since that first WhatsApp order.

10,000+ deliveries. 4,000+ through Dunzo alone.

We've been daily (11 AM - 11 PM). We've been weekly. We've been weekend-only. We've pivoted more times than I can count.

But we've survived.

While restaurants with investors and storefronts shut down, we kept going. While cloud kitchens burned through cash, we stayed profitable. While food trends came and went, we stuck to our craft.

Why?

Because we never compromised.

We didn't grow fast. We grew right.

That's the SushiMen story.

Seven years, 10,000+ deliveries, zero compromises.

The Part Where I Ask You Something

Remember when I said, "Sushi chose me"?

That's not a metaphor. That's a story.

A story about working in an Italian restaurant when I got pulled into the sushi kitchen. About being the worst possible fit. About initially refusing to accept it. About the moment I realized how precious and rare this opportunity was.

Want to hear that story?

Drop a comment below. If enough people want it, I'll write Part 2: "How Sushi Chose Me (And Why I Was in Denial About It For Years)."

One More Thing...

If this story resonated with you, share it.

Not because I need the reach (though that helps). But because somewhere out there, someone's sitting on a dream they think is "too risky" or "too niche" or "too impossible."

Maybe they need to read this. Maybe they need to know that one WhatsApp order can change everything.

Thanks for reading. See you this weekend.

— Chef Abhijeeth Urs
Founder, SushiMen | Sushifying Bangalore, One Roll at a Time