Hourly India ops support,
when you need a hand on the ground.
Sometimes you don’t need a full sourcing engagement. You need someone in India who can pick up the phone, visit a workshop, chase a quote, verify a vendor, or handle the operational tasks that keep getting pushed to the bottom of your list.
That’s what this service is for. Hourly, flexible, no minimum commitment.
A trusted person in India, on demand.
Most buyers find us when a VA isn’t enough but a full hire is too much. Hourly ops support fits the gap.
Anchored by Shibu
Co-founder Shibu Gupta runs this service personally for engagements anchored in Jaipur or nearby clusters. For trips further afield, Shibu either travels with you or coordinates with verified local partners on the ground.
Brands already sourcing from India who need overflow operational capacity.
Founders who don’t want to hire a full-time India ops person yet.
Teams handling a specific one-off — vendor verification, factory visit, supplier audit.
US / EU companies needing a trusted person to walk into a factory and report back honestly.
Buyers who tried hiring a VA and realised they need someone who actually knows Indian manufacturing.
Buyers flying into India for factory visits who want someone on the ground to make the trip count.
$15 – 25
/ hour
Exact rate within this band depends on the type of work and project scope. Quoted before each engagement.
✔️ Time tracked transparently in 15-min increments
✔️ Billed weekly or per project, depending on size
✔️ No retainer required. No minimum commitment.
✔️ NDA signed before any work begins
Anything that benefits from someone in India with manufacturing knowledge and on-ground access.
Supplier research & verification
Find and vet manufacturers, not traders with a website.
• Find and shortlist manufacturers in a specific Indian cluster (Jaipur, Jodhpur, Delhi-NCR, Mumbai-Pune, Kerala/Karnataka)
• Verify legitimacy — physical address, GST, IEC, capability claims
• Distinguish real manufacturers from middlemen with a website
• Collect quotes, MOQs, and lead times across multiple suppliers
• Build comparison spreadsheets for your sourcing decision
Factory & workshop visits
Physical visits with photos, video, and an honest read.
• On-site visits in Jaipur and nearby clusters (Sanganer, Bagru, Jodhpur, Sikar)
• Photos and short videos of production floor, machinery, sample work
• Informal capability audits — capacity, quality standards, ethical practices
• Travel possible to Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Jodhpur, Kerala coffee belt (actuals extra)
Quality & inspection coordination
Hands-on pre-shipment work — not paper certifications.
• Pre-shipment inspections (AQL-based or buyer-specified)
• Sample-vs-bulk comparisons against your approved sample
• Defect documentation with photo evidence
• Coordinate rework with the workshop before dispatch
The first-time-buyer pricing gap
Export paperwork that actually clears customs.
• Commercial invoice, packing list, certificate of origin, BIS hallmarking docs
• HS code guidance for your destination country
• Indian export compliance — FEMA, GST LUT, IEC, payment routing
• Coordination with freight forwarders, couriers, and customs brokers
• Category-specific (phytosanitary for coffee, Coffee Board permits, BIS for silver)
Vendor management & follow-up
Chase outcomes, not emails.
• Chase pending samples, quotes, or production updates a supplier has gone quiet on
• Negotiate pricing, MOQs, or payment terms in Hindi or regional languages
• Translate tech packs or specs for karigars who don’t read English
• Mediate disputes between you and your Indian supplier
Category-specific ops work
Where deep India knowledge actually matters.
• Jewellery (Jaipur): silver verification, plating micron testing, stone authenticity, hallmarking
• Furniture (Jodhpur/Jaipur): joinery, wood seasoning verification, export packaging
• Textiles (Sanganer/Bagru): block-print quality, color-fastness, fabric grade
• Apparel: stitch density, seam strength, sizing consistency
• Coffee (Kerala/Karnataka): cupping, traceability, export permit coordination
Note · we coordinate inspections, but don’t hold formal third-party certifications (SGS, Bureau Veritas). For those, we can recommend partners.
You land, we drive, you go home with decisions made.
Flying in to meet factories and see production first-hand? Most buyers come for 3–4 days and want to visit as many vetted suppliers as possible without wasting time on logistics, navigation, or factories that turn out not to fit. That’s the whole job.
Logistics handled — billed at cost
◉ Private car and driver for the duration
◉ Hotel bookings at properties that work for business travellers
◉ Inter-city travel — flights or trains between clusters
◉ Restaurant recommendations and reservations where useful
◉ SIM card, local payments, currency exchange guidance on arrival
No markup on logistics. We share an estimate upfront based on your itinerary.
WHAT’S INCLUDED
✔️ Pre-trip factory shortlisting based on your sourcing brief
✔️ Meeting scheduling — confirming availability, briefing factories, sample sets ready
✔️ Daily itinerary — 3–5 visits per day in dense clusters, 2–3 with travel time
✔️ Personal accompaniment through every meeting (Shibu, or verified local partner)
✔️ Translation at factory visits — Hindi, Marwari, regional languages
✔️ Real-time negotiation support — pricing, MOQs, payment terms in the room
✔️ Post-meeting debrief notes — capability fit, red flags, our honest read
✔️ End-of-trip summary with shortlist and recommended next steps
$500 – $800 for our hours, plus actuals on logistics.
Tour days run 8–10 active hours. A 3-day trip is usually 24–30 billable hours. Inter-city travel time on the trip is billed hourly; personal travel before/after is not.
| Pre-trip planning call | 1–2 hrs |
| Factory shortlisting & outreach | 3–5 hrs |
| On-the-ground days · 3 days | 24–30 hrs |
| Post-trip summary | 1–2 hrs |
| Our hours | $500 – $800 |
| + logistics at actuals | $300 – $600 |
A VA can chase emails. We can chase outcomes.
Email coordination
– Email coordination and inbox triage
– Calendar and scheduling support
– Light research over Google + LinkedIn
– Can’t physically visit anything
– No Indian manufacturing context
– Doesn’t know what a fair Jaipur quote looks like
On-ground operations
✔️ Walks into a factory and looks at production
✔️ Speaks Hindi, Marwari, Kannada with karigars
✔️ Knows when a quote is fair vs new-buyer premium
✔️ Spots the difference between real 925 silver and 800-grade with a fake stamp
✔️ Navigates FEMA, GST LUT, IEC, BIS, export compliance
✔️ Can chase outcomes — not just chase emails
Three ways to engage.
Project-based
One-off work — a single factory visit, supplier audit, or quote-collection project. We scope hours upfront, agree on deliverables, bill at the end.
Best for ad-hoc
Hourly bank
Pre-purchase a block of hours (10 / 25 / 50) at a slightly reduced rate. Use across multiple small tasks over 3–6 months.
Most flexible
Embedded retainer
Reserve a fixed number of hours per week (typically 10–20). Best when you need consistent India ops support without hiring full-time.
Best for ongoing
Anchored by a co-founder, not a faceless ops desk.
Shibu Gupta
Co-founder · Jaipur operations lead
Shibu runs Indibuying’s on-ground operations across India’s main manufacturing clusters — Jaipur, Jodhpur, Delhi-NCR, Mumbai-Pune, and the Kerala/Karnataka coffee belt — with direct karigar and factory access in each.
For categories or geographies that need specialist knowledge (e.g. Kerala coffee, Jodhpur furniture), Shibu coordinates with verified partners on the ground who report into the same engagement — never a third party you have to manage.
Before you book a call.
No formal minimum. Single-task engagements as small as 2–3 hours are fine. Most projects fall in the 5–20 hour range.
Local travel within Jaipur city is included in the hourly rate. Outside-city travel (Jodhpur, Delhi, Mumbai, Kerala, etc.) is billed at actuals — train/flight + accommodation + ground transport. We share an estimate before any outside-city engagement.
Tracked in 15-minute increments with a brief work log per session. Shared with you weekly or at project completion. No padding, no minimum block billing.
Yes — standard for buyer engagements. We sign before any work begins. Specific vendor names, designs, or sourcing strategies stay confidential.
If it’s India ops work that benefits from a person on the ground — yes, in many cases. Examples: market research visits, partner due diligence, exhibition coverage, vendor onboarding for non-manufacturing services. Ask on the fit call.
Ideally 3–4 weeks. That gives us time to shortlist factories, confirm meetings, and plan logistics properly. We’ve handled trips at 7–10 days’ notice when needed, but the factory line-up is tighter and some preferred suppliers may not have availability that quickly.
Sourcing services are packaged engagements with fixed deliverables (vendor search, QC, retainer). Operations support is hourly, flexible, and unbundled — you direct the work as needed. Many buyers use both, depending on the situation.
Tell us what you need help with.
A 20-minute call to scope the work, agree on hours, and start. NDA signed before any work begins.