Commercialization and Marketing Strategy for a Dehydrated Food Start-Up Targeting Urban Consumers

Abstract

The snack market in the Twin Cities forces consumers into a frustrating compromise. Urban professionals and university students are constantly stuck choosing between cheap, heavily fried local street food and exorbitantly expensive imported health bars. This project outlines the commercialization and marketing strategy for "Frudies," a hybrid start up built to close this exact market gap. We engineered our own manufacturing hardware the Flavour Forge dehydrator-to produce premium, clean-label banana chips locally, completely bypassing international supply chain costs. To see if Frudies actually had legs before launching, we went straight to the customers. By surveying nearly 150 people across Islamabad and Rawalpindi to understand the snacking habits and price limits. We found 30 people for real-world taste tests. The results granted good direction. The data showed that 62% of our target market was happy to pay a 20–30% premium for a convenient, preservative-free snack. But it wasn't all smooth sailing the focus groups gave us some heartlessly honest feedback on the texture of our first batch. We listened, scrapped the old prototype, and built the Flavour Forge 2.0 using brushed aluminum and better insulation to get the crunch exactly right. All of this was not an academic exercise anymore; it turned Frudies into a real CPG business. Thanks to this research and a direct-to-consumer approach, we got accepted into the Bahria University Business Incubation Centre. Now we have a solid, data-backed plan to take on our first year in a tough market.