Smita Jatia has now become a very prominent name amongst all the McDonald’s lovers for the significant contribution she has made to Hardcastle Restaurants Pvt Ltd, currently the most popular franchise of McDonald’s’ products in West and South India. Smita is currently the managing director of her company and successfully obtained a 1000 crore revenue while expanding their business across 40 cities in the whole of West and South India. Born and brought up in a conservative Marwari family, Smita got married when she was only 18 years old leaving her studies of graduation in the commerce stream from the Syndenham College of Commerce and Economics in Mumbai.
When asked, Smita proudly told to the reporter of a private news channel that it’s all because of the immense support of her husband, kids and in-laws, which has made Hardcastle Restaurants Pvt Ltd so successful, the world’s most prominent chain of fast-food hubs in West and South India. When Smita’s husband Amit Jatia started Hardcastle Restaurants Pvt Ltd in 1996, Smita joined the company 2 years after that i.e. in 1998. Within this span of 2 years, Smita got admitted at the Hamburger University in Chicago to learn effective business management techniques and how use each of them to diversify your business.
After returning from there, Smita started carrying essential responsibilities of her company including tasks like conducting trainings and operations, people resources etc. Smita says that when McDonald’s was initially introduced to the Indian market, most of the people had quite a fragile understanding about the taste of a typical western way of snacking. Mrs. Jatia took this as a challenge and made all kinds of endeavors, right from improvising the menu to that setting a pocket-friendly price range to that of creating separate menus both for veg and non-veg eaters.
Smita firmly believes that it’s just the beginning of their journey and they still have a long way to go. Hence, she is trying to keep up with the times and has made a technology based platform as well for the youngsters of the current era which allows them to order their favorite foods online while staying occupied with a number of entertaining activities.