It was Eid, and while all the Muslim delivery partners were out celebrating, there was one person burning the midnight oil in a Swiggy Hub – Meet Rafiq Shaikh.
Surprised by his presence at the office on Eid, Rafiq’s fleet manager asked him why he wasn’t enjoying the festivities. He replied earnestly
“I know it’s Eid and many of my friends will not work today, which only means I will have more orders to fulfil, and you know Swiggy has orders to get delivered and I have monetary needs that have to be taken care off, so it’s a win-win situation for all”.
Like most delivery partners, Rafiq always looks for extra shifts or more work to earn a little extra. So what makes his story so different from the rest?
His ingenuity!
Rafiq was approached by an auditor at Swiggy one day, who questioned him as to why he was using a small, customized bag instead of the bag provided by the company. In true Rafiq fashion, he calmly replied “My bag has been tailored-made by me and is better than the existing bags”. Around the same time, the Mumbai team had been facing issues with the size of the delivery partner bags, as they were not in line with the RTO rules.
Impressed by Rafiq’s custom-designed bag, the auditor invited him to present his design to the operations head of Mumbai and his team. With a few rounds of tweaks, his design was successfully approved and Rafiq was rewarded with a contract for 300 delivery bags.
Today, business is flourishing for Rafiq. He now supplies close to 7000 delivery bags per month to the Swiggy hubs in Mumbai, Pune, Kolkata, Kochi and Ahmedabad.
