Healthier default menus for office cafeterias, worked out with the caterer
TL;DR Platecraft works with an office campus and its contract caterer to change what lands on the plate by default - menus, portion sizes, counter layout and dish labels. Then it takes the campus through FSSAI's Eat Right Campus certification. Employers pay a fixed project fee and a yearly upkeep fee.
India's office workers carry a metabolic load that starts young. The ICMR-INDIAB study found 28.6% of adults have generalised obesity and 39.5% abdominal obesity, alongside 101 million people with diabetes and 136 million with prediabetes[1]. Desk jobs, long commutes and late evenings only make it worse.
A big share of weekday eating happens in one place, the office cafeteria, run by a caterer who's paid on cost per plate. Wellness programmes hand out diet apps while the counter downstairs keeps serving the same fried snacks and white-rice-heavy thalis. So the personal advice and the shared default point in opposite directions, and I know which one wins at 1 p.m.
What it does, in regulatory terms: menu design and food-environment consulting only. Platecraft gives no individual diet or medical advice, and makes no disease claims about dishes. The caterer stays the licensed food business operator under FSSAI.
The seed pitched hyper-personalised nutrition to fight burnout, and I reframed it. Personal plans need each person's health data and a dietitian's time, which few employers will fund for thousands of staff, and the evidence linking them to productivity is thin. Changing the default reaches everyone. A scoping review found 34 of 51 studies of choice architecture improved healthy food choices[2].
A Platecraft dietitian audits a fortnight of menus and sales, then rebuilds the cycle menu with the caterer's chef. That means more millets, pulses and vegetables, smaller fried portions, a healthy option placed first at the counter and simple traffic-light labels. Sales data shows which swaps people accept. The campus then goes through Eat Right Campus, which needs a pre-audit, FSSAI-approved hygiene training and a third-party audit[3].
The facilities or admin head of a campus with 500 or more staff buys it, often with HR's wellness budget behind them. The caterer is a partner, not a payer, and must not lose margin. I found no public price for menu consulting in India, so a project fee of ₹3–8 L per campus plus yearly upkeep is my assumption to test.
FSSAI's Eat Right Campus portal shows 3,063 certified campuses, and the certificate lapses after two years[3], so renewals bring repeat work. The OSH Code, one of the four new labour codes, lists canteens among the facilities the Centre will set rules for[4]. Employers are already asked to show what they do for staff health in ESG reports.
There's no public figure for corporate cafeteria spending or menu consulting in India. The narrowest signal is the 3,063 campuses certified so far under Eat Right Campus[3], and that includes colleges and hospitals as well as workplaces. Big contract caterers already say their menus encourage healthy eating[5], which tells you clients are asking.
Large contract caterers run most large corporate cafeterias and pitch healthy options as part of the package[5]. Their incentive is volume and cost per plate, though, and they mark their own homework. Corporate wellness apps give personal diet advice but never touch the counter. FSSAI-empanelled auditors certify hygiene and campus practice but don't redesign menus. The gap is an independent party paid to improve the default plate and prove it with sales data.
| Difficulty | Moderate (40/100) |
| Starting capital | ₹45–85 L |
| Time to launch | 4–6 months |
This is a services business with very little tech. The hard parts are people - winning chefs over, keeping food costs flat for the caterer and making healthier dishes that actually sell. Each campus needs weeks of on-site time, so growth depends on training dietitians who can hold their own in a kitchen.
Platecraft itself needs no food licence, because it never handles food. The caterer keeps that.
Building this outside India? The categories above usually have a local equivalent, so check with your own regulator.
Don't let AI write health claims for dishes or give anyone personal diet advice. This is menu design, not nutrition counselling, and a human dietitian signs off every label.
Want to work out the AI layer for Platecraft? Talk to Yash →
I see this as a sensible, modest business for a founder with food-service or clinical nutrition experience who enjoys being in kitchens. If you want a software product then this is the wrong pick. Prove first that one campus kept healthier-dish sales up for three months without raising the caterer's food cost.
The free Platecraft validation kit has the line-by-line capital breakdown, the effort scoring, the FSSAI and Eat Right Campus checklist, a 14-day validation sprint with pass/fail targets, a 90-day launch plan, 10 interview questions for facilities heads and caterers, and 5 assumptions to test. Download the kit →
Thinking about building Platecraft or something close to it? The make-or-break work is getting a caterer's chef on your side while keeping their cost per plate where it was, and I'm happy to help you work out that deal. If you need a hand, you know where to find me. Talk to Yash →
For illustration only. Names are fictional and ideas hypothetical; sourced facts are real but may be out of date. Nothing here is legal, financial or professional advice, and Yash Khatri is not personally liable for any use of it. Read the full disclaimer.