Kajol Bheda: Scribbling one campaign at a time
Bheda’s agency Scribbld has marked its spot in a crowded industry in India, set foot in the UAE and is looking to expand further
By Samidha Jain
Last Updated: Jan 07, 2026, 13:20 IST3 min
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Kajol Bheda (29)
Founder, Scribbld
Kajol Bheda always had a zeal for entrepreneurship; the pull towards marketing came much later. Growing up, she wasn’t the brightest student, but she says she was the most hardworking. “I wanted to do something creative. As I skilled myself with learnings and internships in marketing, I knew it was my calling,” says Bheda.
It was the Covid-19 pandemic that kickstarted the whole thing. Bheda saw the rise of video content with the coming of reels, Dubsmash, TikTok and the likes, and thought it had the potential of becoming big if leveraged well for brands. She had studied media production in the UK, and thought she could put her knowledge in marketing and production to good use. Thus was launched Scribbld in 2020.
“I started realising through my work with Indian and global brands that there was a large gap between what brands wanted to say versus what agencies were delivering,” says Bheda. Scribbld was an attempt to bridge that gap. Headquartered in Mumbai, Scribbld is a marketing and advertising agency that has clients such as Haldiram’s, Johnnie Walker and HDFC Bank. It has also collaborated on individual projects with Nykaa, Adani Airports, Stayfree, Prime Video and others.
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The idea for Scribbld was clear in Bheda’s head: It would not be the loudest agency, but one that will last. “The need to understand my audience a little more intimately is where the idea was born,” she adds. The past six years, Bheda says, have been a bumpy yet very educational journey. Among all her learnings, a significant one has been the need to say ‘no’. “You have to be selective about the work you choose to do. There’s also a lot of merit in doing things the right way. So, saying no to all the wrong things is extremely important.” Bheda started out with close to zero connections in the industry and building a network has been another important learning, followed by the value for discipline.
Marketing and advertising is a competitive industry in India, with global giants such as Leo Burnett and Ogilvy still going strong, and a whole lot of new agencies, like Scribbld, joining the force. “The industry is saturated. I had to fight for everything, by showing good work because the people I was competing with were already very big,” she adds. “Since I started the agency when I was in my early 20s, many people assumed it couldn’t possibly be mine. There was the assumption that a young woman couldn’t build something of this scale independently.”
As an agency with 50-odd employees, Scribbld is bootstrapped, profitable, and growing; it has recently expanded to the UAE. It works with brands on a retainer or project basis, and has worked on interesting campaigns such as Ospree Duty Free, an Indian airport retailer vertical of the Adani Group. The assignment included brand identity and visual storytelling to unify multiple duty-free outlets across Indian airports under a cohesive global brand. Scribbld worked with Ospree on the logo design, brand book, and identity creation to ensure the duty-free experience resonated with global travellers. They’ve also worked with Amazon Prime to market a bunch of shows to a GenZ audience.
Amit Bhutani, head of strategic partnerships and key projects, customer service and marketing, Adani Airports, collaborated with Bheda on the Ospree campaign, and was impressed by her ability to translate a conceptual idea into a visually strong, emotionally resonant brand identity. Bhutani says Scribbld didn’t just provide designs, but a strong narrative. “Looking at her work I thought Kajol’s biggest strength is her ability to listen deeply, understand the brand’s core, and translate it into meaningful design,” says Bhutani.
Bheda’s long-term vision for Scribbld is to make it India’s largest independent agency. With the UAE expansion, she is looking to expand to other countries as well. “I often say that our secret, and what we want to do, is hidden in our name. ‘Scribbld’ is a promise. Through every idea, brand and person that we’ve shaped, the world is going to know that we’ve scribbled our mark on it,” she says.
First Published: Jan 07, 2026, 13:26
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