Since 1890, Dressed in white outfit and traditional Gandhi Cap, Mumbai Army of 5,000 Dabbawalas fulfilling the hunger of almost 200,000 Mumbaikar with home-cooked food that is lug between home and office daily. For more than a century our team have been part of this grime-ridden metropolis-of-dreams.
About 125 years back, a Parsi banker wanted to have home cooked food in office and gave this responsibility to the first ever Dabbawala. Many people liked the idea and the demand for Dabba delivery soared. It was all informal and individual effort in the beginning, but visionary Mahadeo Havaji Bachche saw the opportunity and started the lunch delivery service in its present team-delivery format with 100 Dabbawalas.
If you wish to donate food you can call on the Mumbai Roti Bank's helpline number 86555 80001 and provide the location from where the excess food has to be picked up. You can also be a part of the initiative by becoming a volunteer.
In 2005, the Indian Institute of Management (Ahmedabad) featured a case study on the Mumbai Dabbawalas from a management perspective of logistics
The New York Times reported in 2007 that the 125-year-old Dabbawala industry continues to grow at a rate of 5–10% per year.
Mr Richard Branson actually travelled with us, like a Dabbawala and delivered a huge tiffin to his own employees at Virgin, Mumbai.
In 1998, Forbes Global magazine, conducted a quality assurance study on our operations and gave it a Six Sigma efficiency rating of 99.999999
ISO 9001:2000 certified by the Joint Accreditation System of Australia and New Zealand.
Prince Charles visited us during his visit to India; he had to fit in with our schedule, since our timing was too precise to permit any flexibility. Charles also invited Dabbawalas to his wedding with Camilla Parker Bowles in London on 9 April 2005.
As technology has played vital role in making life easy for people around the global, we Dabbawala team has decided to give our customers as user friendly mobile app to connect with us and get best of our servcies without hassel.We are soon launching our Mobile Application so you can book directly from our app.
