An evening with Ravi Parakkat
On May 10, we had an engaging session by Ravi Parakkat, a distinguished alumnus of ICFAI.
Introduction
Takeout 25 refers to a successful grassroot movement led by Ravi Parakkat, a corporate consultant turned social entrepreneur/community leader in Oak Park, Illinois, a western suburb of Chicago. Takeout 25 was conceived in November 2020 in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. The governor's order to stop indoor dining caused a downward spiral of anxiety, hopelessness, recrimination, and arguments among restaurant owners and residents alike. There was an urgent need to save the local restaurants while maintaining Covid protocols. The core of the initiative was families placing orders for takeout food on the local restaurants. The simplicity of the request, and the assurance that it could work if all worked together — lifted an entire community. Takeout 25 kept family businesses afloat, while keeping resident families safe.
About Ravi Parakkat
Ravi Parakkat is a dedicated advocate for sustainable, digitally empowered futures. After a corporate consulting career spanning continents, he shifted to public service upon becoming a US citizen in 2016.
Recognized for his pandemic-era contributions to local economies, Ravi has been honoured as Oak Park River Forest's "Villager of the Year" in 2020 and "Community Titan" in 2022. Elected as Trustee to the Oak Park Village Board in 2021, Ravi is passionate about safety, affordability, and sustainable economic development for the 55,000 residents of Oak Park, Illinois. His civic engagement includes roles in environmental commissions and educational boards. He has earned national recognition for his initiatives.
In 2020, Ravi founded Takeout 25, aiding local restaurants during the pandemic. The venture, now a not-for-profit, addresses sustainability and food security, garnering accolades for innovation.
With a background in engineering and business, Ravi currently serves as Vice President of Digital Transformation at Junior Achievement of Chicago. His focus is on integrating digital tools to empower youth.
Earlier in his consulting career, Ravi facilitated transformation across industries, partnering with global brands like Ford, BP, and Canadian banks after the 2008 financial crisis. His achievements include pioneering work in the energy and manufacturing sectors, enhancing efficiency and resilience.
Ravi's book, "The Takeout 25 Effect," chronicles the community-driven initiative's impact, offering insights and strategies for social change. The book embodies his commitment to bettering communities worldwide.
Five key principles
Five key principles drove Takeout 25:
- Leading with purpose.
- Building community.
- Keeping things simple, fair, and positive.
- Focusing on impact.
- Innovating constantly to stay relevant.
Math to the rescue
A simple calculation proved that a small amount of $25/week in takeout meals could keep local restaurants afloat during the pandemic shut-down. If 10,000 residents spent $ 25 each per week, it would amount to $ 1 million per month. On average, each of the 100 local restaurants would receive $ 10,000 per month. This would enable them to survive by taking care of their basic expenses such as payroll and rent.
Running for Trustee
In August 2020, Ravi began his campaign to get elected as a trustee for the local Village Board. He had received an invitation in this regard from a local city council member, Simone Boutet. She was running for Village President. After consulting his family, Ravi felt it was a timely move. He felt he could more effectively contribute to society during the pandemic.
Rescuing the restaurants
As he listened to the social media groups, Ravi noticed fighting and toxic conversations. There was a spike in Covid cases. Indoor dining was banned. Some restaurants violated the rules as a desperate move to survive. The community was divided.
Ravi decided to step back from the conversation and solve the problem by balancing the competing priorities- health of the community and the survival of the local restaurants. His game plan was to connect individual action with community impact. In general, most people want to help but are not clear how to go about it. Takeout 25 brought a level of specificity and simplicity. There was a direct linkage between people’s aspirations to help and a tangible impact.
Ravi realized that with winter approaching, it would become even more difficult for the local restaurants to survive. In November 2020, Ravi invited volunteers on Facebook. People began to take a pledge to spend $ 25 on takeout food. Many local newspapers covered the initiative. On average, about 1000 people joined per week.
The focus was less on the pledge and more on food as a discussion point and a forum for feeling nostalgic and sharing experiences. Restaurants started seeing a 30% jump in revenues. Some 15,500 members of the community and more than 100 restaurants joined the initiative. The restaurants who had earlier viewed themselves as competing against each other, began to collaborate. Media attention increased and the news spread across the country. People from other parts of the US started to phone up to understand what was going on.
Looking beyond the pandemic
From November 2020 to May /June 2021, vaccines came to the market and the pandemic started to recede. The question facing Ravi was: How do we keep this movement relevant beyond the pandemic? Conversations with members of the community indicated that there was strong support for keeping the initiative going. So, a decision was taken to set up a not for profit with the same name, Takeout 25. The new entity decided to focus on three priorities: economic empowerment, food security and sustainability.
The core of Takeout 25 was economic empowerment of the local restaurants. A year later, the mandate of Takeout 25 expanded to food security. Even seemingly affluent people living in large inherited homes did not have sufficient income and were not getting enough food to eat. Ravi partnered with a not for profit to explore the possibility of giving subsidized food to people living in shelters. Restaurants signed up to provide subsidized meals that would generate revenue during the lean months and cover the costs. Food would be picked up and delivered free by a local service. Members of the community would pay the restaurants for the food on a voluntary basis. Community organizations like churches provided the space for shelters.
Sustainability often represents a cost for small business owners. So, Ravi had to find a way of enabling this in a commercially responsible way. As part of the initiative, strategies were identified that could be executed collectively to make it easier and cost effective.
The values were defined as:
- Positivity
- Community focus
- Impact
- Innovation
- Sustainability
All the decisions taken were fully aligned with these values.
Initiatives
Various initiatives were launched to keep the movement vibrant.
Holiday gift card: As part of this initiative, $ 25 gift cards were exchanged among the restaurant owners. These cards were gifted to the restaurant staff. The gift card recipients could try food from local restaurants they had not visited previously.
Boxed water: Boxed water reduced the use of plastics, supported local businesses, and helped people stay healthy. A QR code on the boxes made it easy and convenient for members of the community to access local dining offers and specials.
Green dining hub: Takeout 25 partnered with the Illinois Green Business Association (IGBA) to form Illinois’ first ever “Green Dining District” in the Oak Park area. This organization is funding the local program through grants and has ambitions to grow this first effort into a state-wide program. The focus is on building sustainability in areas such as energy consumption, water use and waste.
Payment processing: The credit card processing fee structure was quite opaque. Most small businesses just paid the fee without challenging it. Ravi came up with two options: one for new businesses needing a lower negotiated base rate and the other for more established businesses that needed to lower existing fees.
Employee appreciation: There was a growing shortage of restaurant workers in the aftermath of the pandemic. So, there was a need to keep them motivated. Local non-food small businesses donated their products or services or cash to Takeout 25. These were given as gifts to employees nominated by the restaurant owners.
Benefits for restaurant staff: Takeout 25 has started to explore group plans for 401K (retirement) and health benefits for restaurant staff. These conversations are in the early stages. But the team is optimistic that it can create an easy to execute, customized solution for Takeout 25 restaurants over the coming months.
Building credibility and trust
Takeout 25 has received several awards and testimonials.
Dec 22: Takeout 25 has been awarded the “Green Award” by the Village of Oak Park
Dec 21: Takeout 25 has been awarded “Most Innovative Pandemic Startup” by the Illinois Governor’s Conference on Tourism.
July 21: Takeout 25 has been awarded “Hometown Heroes” Visit Oak Park.
Case study: A case study on Takeout 25 has been prepared by Dr Bala Mulloth and graduate course assistant, Arielle Watt of the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public policy at the University of Virgnia. The case study was released in January 2023 and is now available to academic institutions thorough Sage Publications.
Community commerce
Takeout 25 is all about bringing the local community together and creating a micro market. The idea is to keep the local disposable income within the local economy. This is done by encouraging community members to spend locally within the community, consistent with their values and by partnering with other Not for Profit Organizations. Food fits the bill perfectly. Food is local and cannot be taken out of the community. There are memories around food. Food is also a neutral topic that appeals to everyone.
Relevance in the world of Amazon
The business model of the large eCommerce players like Amazon is generally based on extraction. These scale players extract money from the local community and put it in a central bank account. While providing convenience to customers, this kind of a business model can undermine the local community. Takeout 25 is about creating community aligned micro markets with a federated structure. It keeps local money local.
The large platforms do have a value: convenience, innovation, etc. But community commerce is aligned with the needs of the local community. It is cost effective and can drive value within the local economy.
During the Q&A, Ravi provided more colour. For Amazon, the world is the community. For a local restaurant, the immediate locality is the community. Both models have their own advantages. Most small restaurants do not have business or marketing capabilities. They find it difficult to scale up. They are also locally oriented. On paper, Amazon can help them to scale up. But these small businesses may not be interested. We must find a way to make local businesses thrive. They may scale, but they do create value through the look and feel and personal touch. Thus, both models can coexist.
Application in other contexts
It is possible to apply the core principles of Takeout 25 in other contexts. It is all about a call for action and connecting the community to a large problem. For example, India has a 1 billion workforce. About 90% are in the unorganized sector. Initiatives like Takeout 25 have the potential to generate new job opportunities and help the youth to become entrepreneurs.
Concluding remarks
It’s been three and a half years since the journey began. Takeout 25 has emerged as a not-for-profit that has saved and supported livelihoods and businesses while enabling local sustainability and addressing food insecurity. Ravi’s book “The Takeout 25 Effect” is now available as a toolkit for social change. With this toolkit, the Takeout 25 concept can be replicated in new communities and to solve different sets of problems. The Takeout 25 team with support from the communities it serves will continue to experiment, innovate, and evolve the model to create a larger impact in the world. The team stands ready to support others who may wish to adopt this model for their communities.
Q&A
In 2016 Ravi became an US citizen. Around this time, Ravi had become disillusioned with consulting. He was making a lot of money but what was the impact on people? He completed the implementation of a large project in Ontario. Using data science and various behavioural changes, the cost of electricity was reduced by 10%. It made electricity affordable to people. This was the first time Ravi saw the impact of his work on people’s lives. The experience strengthened Ravi’s resolve to move into a role aligned with his purpose. The launch of Takeout 25 and standing for elected office were both outcomes of his self-exploration for a larger purpose in life.
People knew there was a problem, but they felt hopeless and isolated. Takeout 25 gave them something specific. They could do something tangible, something fun and something that made a difference.
The key to success is breaking the problem, maximizing the benefits for all shareholders and clear articulation of the value being created.
The model can be replicated in other regions. People are the same everywhere. Whether it is economic empowerment, sustainability or food security, the underpinnings are the same.
Ravi is amazed by the optimism he sees among the younger generation each time he visits India. The key is to channelize their energy in the right direction. Similarly, during a crisis, people are charged to do something meaningful. But how do we harness the energy in a sustainable way so that social initiatives can continue even after the crisis?
People came together during the 2018 Kerala floods. During the crisis, there was a groundswell of support and people had a strong emotional connection to others in distress. But the momentum died after the crisis.
Ravi believes that suitable economic constructs are required to sustain the momentum in the long term. We must make the movement a marketplace. We must ensure that the value generated is equitably divided among the participants. A few people will sign up because of altruistic motives. But most of the others will be driven by the value they see.
Another important point to note is that the leader’s energy, drive, and commitment play a critical role. The leader must invest more time and energy than others. This is what Ravi did.
In any movement, the initial emotional connection is strong. But strong leadership is needed to sustain the movement. In the case of the Kerala floods, the energy could have been channelized better. Disasters give us the power. But we must leverage it well so that we can also move into adjacencies where similar community efforts are required.
As a student, Ravi always had the vision of improving 1 billion lives. The population of the country was 1 billion those days. But Ravi did not have the wherewithal or skill or experience. However, the thought persisted in his mind. It was when he was moving away from corporate consulting towards a more purpose driven life that he was able to create an engine to put his idea into action.
Ravi did not look at any specific model when he was putting in place Takeout 25. The initiative itself did not involve any capital investment. It was essentially sweat equity and a small group of volunteers. Things were done on the fly. What helped was that the aspiration was high. And the decision-making guidelines very clear. Moreover, there was an urgent need to act. If he did not act, Ravi sensed that the local restaurants could not be saved. The call for action was compelling.
The focus of the government and the administration was on the crisis. But there was little discussion on what would happen after the crisis. What about the liveability of the community? If businesses closed down, jobs would be lost forever.
Ravi’s focus was on the post pandemic recovery. He understood the plight of the local restaurants. One of the local restaurant owners, Jimmy Chen acknowledged that the government was giving them dole money. But there was no lasting impact. “ …what you have done with Takeout 25 is to give me new customers that will stay with me well beyond the pandemic.” Takeout 25 was generating business by getting customers excited about food. Looking back, Ravi feels that food is a neutral topic and appeals to most people.
Today most communities are divided along religion, race, caste, etc. This division is a fundamental reality. To unify the community, we must keep things simple, fair, and positive. Only if the idea is simple, people will connect to it. Once people come together, they must feel that they are getting a fair deal. The most important rule for participation is positivity. Negative comments and remarks should not be tolerated. Positivity is the condition for participating in any social initiative.