The Story of Mama Health Co.

From the Kitchen at 2AM to Changing 3000+ Lives

Five years ago, if someone told us we'd build one of Bangalore's most loved health food companies with over 3000 transformations behind us - we wouldn't have believed it.

Back then, we weren't founders. We were just two people - Poornima and I - trying to solve a very personal problem.

How It All Started

Poornima heard about Keto in a casual conversation. The idea of eating fats to lose weight felt absurd - so she did what curious minds do: researched, experimented, and finally committed.

Postpartum hadn't been easy on her - she had gained over 20+ kgs, and what many don't talk about is how tough it can be emotionally.
Not recognising yourself in the mirror, avoiding social events, feeling a loss of identity - it's something many women silently go through.

Determined to reclaim her health, Poornima took the plunge into a low-carb, high-fat lifestyle. From 77 kgs, she dropped to 55 kgs. The initial weight loss sparked a shift - she started exercising, and soon, her body and mind transformed.

From measuring every gram of food, living at her mom's place (because my home was full of irresistible snacks), and waking up before dawn to stay on track - she showed me something important:
The hardest part of any health journey isn't the workouts or the plans. It's just... eating right, every single day.

And we thought - what if we solved just that?

 

Mama Keto Was Born

That's when we started Mama Keto - the idea was simple: a mother who knows keto helping others transform through food. We didn't know then that this would become Mama Health Co., a brand rooted in food, but driven by science and empathy.

May 06, 2020 - the first lockdown lifted and we were waiting for just one person to say "yes." That one person was Poornima's friend, Mahima. She paid us Rs.17,999 and asked us to start her meals right away and May 11, 2020 is our start date.

Poornima would wake up at 2AM, cook all meals herself, and dispatch them by 7AM. We had one delivery person who also helped with groceries. Our house smelled of masalas at odd hours, waking up our family - sometimes they thought they were dreaming about food!

Obviously, this wasn't sustainable. So we cleared out our garage, set up a small kitchen, and hired 2 chefs and 3-4 delivery executives. Our first 100 customers came purely through word-of-mouth - friends who believed in us and shared our story.

By mid-2021, we had to move again. The garage couldn't hold us anymore.

 

From Keto to Health. From One Kitchen to 3000+ Lives.

We moved into a 1000 Sqft kitchen and scaled. What started as weight loss meals soon became a much bigger mission. We saw the real power of food as medicine.
We started getting customers not just for weight loss - but for PCOS, diabetes, autoimmune issues, cancer recovery, epilepsy, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, thyroid, fertility, and more.

One child - just 12 years old with epilepsy - made us realise: this isn't just about weight. This is about hope. And health. And life.

So we rebranded. Mama Keto became Mama Health Co. - a brand that is still remembered by its old name, but has grown far beyond keto.

 

The Hustle Behind the Scenes

In these five years, we've had our share of detours and failed experiments:

• We ran a 45-day white-labeled café trial across Cult Fit gyms - with cold-pressed juices, whey smoothies, and salads. Users still walked out for Rs.30 juices or pani puri. We lost money, time, and a bit of heart. But we moved on.

Trials at Cult HQ - Oh man.. they loved it!

 

• We were casually approached for an acquihire by Cure Fit - an offer (unwritten - verbal communications) that valued us at 1x revenue. We passed or they passed a little uncertain on this. We didn't build Mama Health Co. to sell early. And this outside validation gave us a push to keep going. 

 

• We launched Cheeni Kyun?, a sugar-free dessert brand, on Swiggy/Zomato. But margins on platforms don't work unless your food cost is below 25%. We couldn't sustain it. 

• We experimented with healthy snacks under the LoCarbr brand. Again, realisation hit - everything was being bankrolled by the subscription business. We were building debt. We shut it down and refocused.

We've failed fast, but we've never failed to try.

 

Back to What We Do Best

We decided to double down on what we do best - food as medicine. Today, we have meal plans aligned to unique health goals:

- LCHF / Keto for weight loss & more  

- Protein+ for strength & performance


- Balanced Plates for everyday nutrition (in partnership with Nikita Suresh)

- Anti-Inflammatory Meals (launching soon)
- And more in the pipeline...

 

Our goal is to make it easy for people to stick to what their doctors or nutritionists advise - by doing the one thing they need the most help with: sending them food that actually helps.

 

Five Years, Zero Noise

We turned 5 on May 11, 2025. No celebrations. No Instagram posts.
We're still bootstrapped, still waking up early, still solving problems hands-on.

Every meal is a chance to change someone's life.
And even when there are errors - most of our customers forgive us, because they know the heart behind the hustle.

We are Mama Health Co. today - We're here to revolutionise healthcare through food.
We're here to stay.

Thank you for being part of our story.

 

Praveen Kumar N