Why Understanding Businesses Matters More Than Selling Them: A Conversation with Shreeya Shinde
What if the best investment decisions begin long before spreadsheets and valuations?
We often think venture capital and private equity are built entirely on financial models, market sizing, and balance sheets. But behind every successful investment lies a deeper understanding of people, brands, and the stories that make businesses worth believing in.
Our next guest is someone who has deliberately chosen to bridge two worlds that are often seen as separate. With a background in fashion communication, marketing, and financial markets, she has gradually shifted her focus from building brands to understanding how businesses are built, acquired, and scaled. Through experiences in content strategy, influencer marketing, client strategy, and startup ecosystems, she's now exploring venture capital and private equity with the belief that great investment decisions require both analytical thinking and a deep understanding of consumer behaviour.
Joining us today is Shreeya Shinde, a marketing professional, business enthusiast, and aspiring venture capital professional who believes that understanding a company's numbers is important—but understanding the people, positioning, and purpose behind those numbers is what creates truly meaningful investment insight.
Let's dive into a conversation about marketing, venture capital, private equity, consumer behaviour, business strategy, investing, curiosity, and the intersection where creativity meets capital.
Q1.
Your career has evolved from fashion communication and marketing toward venture capital and private equity. Was there a specific company, acquisition, or business decision that made you realise you were more interested in how businesses are built than how they're marketed?
Shreeya Shinde:
One company that truly inspired this shift for me was LVMH. Coming from a fashion communication and marketing background, I initially looked at fashion mainly through a creative and branding lens. But when I started learning more about LVMH, I realised that fashion is not only about creativity or marketing. It is also about how businesses are built, acquired and scaled. What really interested me was how LVMH has acquired and managed so many different luxury houses while still allowing each brand to maintain its own authenticity, identity and taste. That made me curious about the business decisions behind these acquisitions and how a company can create growth without taking away what makes a brand unique. This curiosity gradually pushed me towards understanding investments, acquisitions and business strategy, which is where my interest in venture capital and private equity started developing. For me, it feels less like a complete career switch and more like looking at the fashion and business world from a deeper, investment-focused perspective.
Q2.
You mention that your marketing background gives you a perspective that many people in finance may not have. Can you describe a situation where viewing a business through a brand lens changed the way you evaluated its potential?
Shreeya Shinde:
I think my marketing background helps me understand the connection between a brand and its consumers. A business may have a good product and strong numbers, but I also tend to look at how clearly the brand is communicating its value and whether consumers actually connect with it. For example, while looking at consumer brands, I naturally pay attention to their positioning, content and the way customers respond to the brand. Sometimes, a brand may be in a very competitive market, but if it has built a strong identity and understands its consumer really well, I see that as a strong growth potential. My marketing background helps me look beyond just what the brand is selling and understand why a consumer would choose that particular brand and continue coming back to it. I think that is the perspective I bring while evaluating a business.
Q3.
You're pursuing the NSE VCPE certification while actively working in marketing roles. How do you balance learning technical investment concepts with gaining practical experience, and where do you see the two intersecting most?
Shreeya Shinde:
I have been learning investment concepts through the NSE VCPE course while also gaining practical experience in marketing. I think both have helped me look at a business from two different but interconnected perspectives. The technical concepts help me understand the numbers behind a business, such as cash flows, valuation and what is financially important when evaluating a company. During my marketing experience, I also realised that marketing cannot work completely in isolation. Every campaign, growth decision or strategy is connected to finance and how a company allocates its resources. At the same time, my practical marketing experience helps me understand consumers, how a brand positions itself and how it builds a connection with its audience. I see the two intersecting most when evaluating a consumer-focused business. Finance helps me understand whether the business is financially sustainable, while marketing helps me question whether consumers actually understand, trust and want the brand.
Q4.
Across your internships, you've worked on influencer outreach, client strategy, event marketing, and content creation. Which responsibility taught you the most about business beyond marketing, and why?
Shreeya Shinde:
I think working closely with a small clothing startup taught me the most about business beyond marketing. I was primarily working on social media, but because it was a small brand, I got to see how the business operated more closely. In marketing, you can have unlimited creative ideas, but I realised that every idea comes with a cost. With a startup, you have to understand the company’s financial capacity, work within limited budgets and decide where spending can actually create the most value. I also got some exposure to the supply side of the products and understood that there are multiple costs behind bringing even one product to the customer. That experience taught me to look beyond just how a brand is marketed and think about budgeting, costs and resource allocation. It gave me a much more realistic understanding of how a business actually works.
Q5.
You often mention curiosity as one of your strengths. When you're studying a company today, what are the first three things you look at before deciding whether it's an interesting business to analyze further?
Shreeya Shinde:
The first thing I look at is the market and the industry the company operates in. I try to understand whether the market is growing, what trends are shaping it and whether there is enough potential for the company to scale. Second, I look at the product and the problem it is solving. I ask myself whether the problem is significant enough and why a consumer would choose this product over existing alternatives. I also look at the competition, not necessarily as a negative, but to understand what genuinely differentiates the company. The third thing I look at is the founding team. I am curious about why the founders chose this particular problem and whether their experience or understanding of the industry aligns with what they are building. I would then want to go deeper into the business model, revenue, growth and the financial side of the company.
Q6.
During the Metvy Business Program, you learned to pitch ideas to investors. Looking back, what aspect of your own pitch would you improve today, and what lesson did that experience leave you with?
Shreeya Shinde:
Looking back, I think I was honestly too focused on the marketing and product side of the pitch. I was thinking a lot about how we would market the idea and make it interesting to consumers. But later, I realised that I hadn’t thought deeply enough about things like the actual market need, margins and whether the idea could really scale. That experience actually helped me understand the investor’s perspective better. I think the biggest lesson for me was that you can have a really creative idea, but that alone doesn’t make it a strong business. You also need to understand the market, the numbers and whether the business has the potential to grow.
Q7.
Many students choose either a creative path or a finance path, but you've intentionally combined both. Have you ever faced skepticism because of this unconventional combination, and how do you respond to it?
Shreeya Shinde:
Yes, people have questioned my shift and even I initially wondered whether my path looked disconnected. But over time, I realised marketing taught me consumer behaviour, branding and how businesses connect with customers. Finance is helping me understand the numbers and investment decisions behind those businesses. I don’t see them as completely separate anymore. My path may not be traditional, but it is intentional.
Q8.
You describe yourself as being at an early stage of your VC and PE journey. Five years from now, what would make you feel that this transition was successful, not just in terms of job title, but in terms of the kind of professional you've become?
Shreeya Shinde:
Five years from now, I think this transition would feel successful if I am able to look at a business independently and form my own judgement about it. Right now, I am still at an early stage and there is a lot I need to learn, especially when it comes to financial analysis and understanding investments more deeply. I would definitely like to be working with a strong venture capital or private equity firm where I can learn from experienced investors and get exposure to different businesses and founders. At the same time, I want to become someone who understands both the numbers behind a business and the consumer and brand side of it. I don’t want to lose the perspective my marketing background has given me. So, more than just a job title, success for me would mean developing strong investment judgement, asking better questions and becoming a professional whose perspective can genuinely add value to a business or an investment decision.
About Conversations by Brains in You
Conversations by Brains in You is a curated interview series featuring students, professionals, entrepreneurs, creators, researchers, and changemakers whose journeys offer meaningful lessons beyond conventional achievements.
Rather than focusing solely on titles or milestones, each conversation explores the decisions, experiences, challenges, and perspectives that shaped the individual behind the profile. The aim is to create a growing repository of practical insights that help students and young professionals navigate their own careers with greater clarity, productivity, integrity, and purpose.
Every featured conversation is thoughtfully selected with the belief that authentic experiences can inspire informed decisions, lifelong learning, and better human development.
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