Petpooja Franchise Conclave 2026: India’s First F&B Expo

Petpooja Franchise Conclave is a two-day F&B franchise expo on 20-21 June 2026 at Shree Shakti Convention Centre, Ahmedabad. Fifty-plus curated food brands, 6,000+ pre-registered investors, B2B matchmaking sessions, live tastings, and a gala dinner. Register at franchiseconclave.com.

No state in Gujarat has ever hosted a franchise event built only for food and beverage. The expos that do happen here mix F&B with education kiosks, laundry brands, and wellness clinics. An investor from Bopal who wants to open a biryani franchise spends half the day walking past coaching centre stalls before finding a single QSR brand.

We decided to fix that. Petpooja is organising this from our Ahmedabad headquarters, and we have pulled from our network of 1,00,000+ restaurant partners to curate every brand on the floor.

At a Glance:

• What: Ahmedabad’s first dedicated F&B franchise expo, organised by Petpooja
• When: 20-21 June 2026 (Saturday-Sunday)
• Where: Shree Shakti Convention Centre, Ahmedabad
• Scale: 50+ curated food brands, 6,000+ pre-registered investors
• Format: Exhibition floor, B2B matchmaking, live food demos, gala dinner
• Register: franchiseconclave.com

How Big Is India’s Franchise Market Right Now?

Source: IBEF, Sparkle Minds Franchise Statistics

35% of franchisees in India are first-time business owners, per IBEF. People who have never run a restaurant before are putting down Rs 15-40 lakh to open a franchise outlet in cities that, five years ago, barely had a branded QSR presence. Junagadh, Nadiad, Mehsana, Morbi. Not just Ahmedabad and Surat anymore. The categories expanding fastest are QSR chains, cafe and tea formats, and bakery brands.

Across our own platform, we have watched this on the billing side. A chai brand signs four franchise locations in Rajkot in January. By March, all four are live on Petpooja POSS, printing KOTs and processing Swiggy orders on Day 1. That speed of rollout was rare even in 2023.

Why Is Gujarat Ready for F&B Franchise Growth?

Gujarat has over 220 verified F&B franchise opportunities on SMERGERS and 1,300+ food business listings on Franchise India’s Gujarat page, yet no dedicated expo has ever connected these brands with investors. Ahmedabad is receiving thousands of crores in Commonwealth Games 2030 infrastructure, a bullet train corridor to Mumbai, GIFT City’s 1,034+ registered financial entities (with 71,000 finance professionals across Gujarat), and a new airport terminal doubling capacity to 2 crore passengers. Surat, Vadodara, and Rajkot are following the same growth curve. The opportunity is here. The platform was missing.

Here is what is driving that growth in detail:

Commonwealth Games 2030. Thousands of crores in infrastructure spending between now and the event, including a Rs 5,000-6,000 crore sports enclave, metro extensions, and hospitality zones.

Every one of those construction corridors and athlete villages will need food outlets. Canteens, cafes, QSRs near the venues. The demand does not disappear after the Games either.

Bullet train corridor. Mumbai to Ahmedabad in under two hours by 2028. A 508 km route that stitches together India’s financial capital and Gujarat’s commercial capital. The footfall math changes overnight when a Mumbaikar can reach SG Highway for a weekend lunch.

GIFT City. India’s first International Financial Services Centre now has 1,034+ registered entities, 38 banking units, and 194 fund management firms operating on-site. The broader Ahmedabad region hosts 71,000 finance professionals. Corporate clusters of that density create their own lunch economy. Canteens, delivery kitchens, tea chains. The demand is predictable, recurring, and growing.

New airport terminal. A new integrated terminal is under construction at Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, designed to double passenger capacity to 2 crore (20 million) annually. More flights, more travellers, more tourism-driven F&B demand at a scale Ahmedabad has not seen before.

And then there are the other cities. Surat has over 70 lakh people and disposable income from the diamond and textile trade. Vadodara has a strong middle-class spending pattern. Rajkot, with its new airport, is growing faster than anyone predicted.

Even smaller towns like Anand (dairy belt), Bharuch (high HNI density), and Morbi (the ceramic capital) are on the map for franchise expansion now.

What Happens at Petpooja Franchise Conclave

The Conclave runs across two days with exhibitions, matchmaking, and a gala dinner. Here is the indicative schedule (confirm final timings on franchiseconclave.com closer to the event):

F&B categories on the floor: QSR, cafe and tea, cloud kitchen, fine dine, desserts, and bakery.

The B2B matchmaking sessions are not casual walk-ups. They are pre-scheduled, seated, 15-minute conversations where both sides already know what the other is looking for. In our experience running 14 years of restaurant relationships, more MOUs get discussed over a sit-down dinner than across a noisy exhibition counter. The gala dinner on Day 1 evening exists for exactly that reason.

Who Should Attend the Franchise Conclave?

Someone sitting on Rs 20-50 lakh, thinking about entering food. The Conclave puts 50+ vetted brands in front of that person over two days. Compare that to three months of cold-calling franchise managers, flying to different cities for meetings, and still not being sure if the brand is genuine.

Every brand on the floor has been curated by Petpooja from a network we have worked with for years.

A restaurant owner in Maninagar who already runs one outlet and wants three more. The matchmaking sessions are built for operators who know the business and want to franchise their own brand, or pick up a second brand to operate. Multi-outlet growth brings its own challenges, from controlling food costs across locations to managing payroll for growing staff. The conversations on Day 1 evening, especially, tend to go deeper than any formal pitch deck.

An F&B brand based in Bangalore or Mumbai that has been eyeing Gujarat. Western India is hard to crack without local relationships. The Conclave brings 6,000 pre-registered, investment-ready visitors from across the state. No cold outreach needed. The room is already warm.

Why Is Petpooja Organising This Event?

We are not an event management company. We started as a restaurant POS 14 years ago, and today we process 60 lakh bills daily for restaurants like Haldirams, La Pino’z Pizza, The Rameshwaram Cafe, Chowman, and Dimsum Express.

Gujarat is where Petpooja is headquartered. We have on-ground relationships in every district. When JK Jumbokings opens a new franchise outlet in Gandhinagar, or Star Briyani expands to Surat, the first KOT prints on our system. We see the franchise pipeline before it becomes public news.

The Conclave came from a pattern we noticed across our client base. Brands kept asking us for introductions to Gujarat-based investors. Investors kept asking us which brands were worth backing.

We were doing these introductions informally over phone calls and WhatsApp. At some point, putting everyone in one room for two days made more sense than doing it piecemeal over six months.

That is also why every brand at the Conclave is handpicked. This is not a booth-rental business. If a brand is on the floor, Petpooja has vetted its operations, its franchise model, and its readiness to expand.

How Do You Register?

Registration is open for both visitors (investors) and exhibitors (F&B brands). The process takes under two minutes:

1. Go to franchiseconclave.com (linked at the top of this post)
2. Fill the interest form with your name, contact, and whether you are attending as an investor or exhibiting as a brand
3. The team follows up within a couple of days with visitor passes or exhibitor stall options and pricing

Exhibitor stalls are limited to 50+ curated brands, so slots fill up on a first-come basis. Visitor registration is pre-screened to keep the crowd focused on people with genuine investment intent.

For direct enquiries: Hardik Gandhi, +91 6358870736.

Conclusion

Gujarat’s food market is expanding at a pace the state has not seen before. Between the Commonwealth Games infrastructure, the bullet train, GIFT City’s growing professional base, and a new airport terminal, Ahmedabad alone is about to generate demand that did not exist two years ago. The smaller cities are following the same curve, just a year or two behind.

The Franchise Conclave on 20-21 June is the first event that puts all of this in one room. F&B brands ready to franchise, investors ready to sign, and a curated format that cuts out the noise of a general-purpose trade show. If the plan involves food business in Western India anytime in the next two years, this is where it starts.

Register at franchiseconclave.com (link in the Registration section above).

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