Entrepreneurship is like lust. It lures first timers and then enslaves them with ambition, forever. Entrepreneurship, that once was mocked, is now been presented as lavish, quirky, techy, ambitious, energetic, for and by geniuses; thanks to our techpreneurs and dot com bubble, that changed the era. All this pulled me, and I became a devotee. Acting as a catalyst was my childhood, watching my father solving problems.
I started my journey by believing in an idea, seeing potential in the product, finding and learning how to develop it, lots of trial and errors, experimenting, selling and reciprocating when it appeared succeeding. I started two businesses in Food Processing and Mushroom Cultivation after graduating as a Petroleum Engineer in 2016. Big organisations might have streamlined processes for ideating and experimenting, capital for consultants, but first timers may not. I didn’t know whether my thought process was right, or whether my next step would succeed or not. I somehow managed to take steps that solved problems.
There were many unconventional approaches that I took, as any entrepreneur does. The first and foremost was in gathering resources. We need information, to refine our products. I had a product that was new in market, a chutney familiar in Uttarakhand’s hills, transformed into a product. I had two things to offer, its taste and the idea of a pure and healthy mountain product. To arrive at as to what should be the right MRP, I took market’s help instead of imposing it through my approximations. I went to different retailers in different Tier 1 and 2 cities, presented the product, gave samples and through their feedback and recommendations, narrowed down to a number. No doubt every retailer had its own view, but their common feedback about unmatchable taste, packaging and price range helped me decide a price that was actually decided by the market. Hence, with no experience, I outsourced my pricing task, for almost free. Big organisations carry out surveys, hire agencies and consultants, and may perform various other tasks to determine right prices, which are in market lines and present the right constructed value of the product. These tasks cost a lot, however, we managed to do it for almost free. It can definitely be argued that there are a lot of parameters involved that I didn’t consider, but I managed to fix a price for which retailers were happy, customers were happy and I was happy. Problem solved, move ahead.
Another instance where I felt my approach was unconventional, was during my next business: Mushroom Cultivation. Mushroom Cultivation is a labour intensive and dependent business. Hence, margins depend highly on labor output. My business model had a process where we used to start our harvesting process at around 4 am daily, had to be done with the weighing and packing by 8, so that it reaches the market at the right time. The person in charge of this process was semi-skilled labor. With the production of approximately 60 kg per day, he demanded a working force of 4 people. An avg. of 15 kg/person production capacity was simply unacceptable to me. I knew more could be achieved as the in-charge himself was not working on full capacity. I sat down with him and calmly presented that our competitor was functioning on an average of 30-35 kg/person, and asked for his views as to how can we solve this problem. “Is there a mistake we are committing, or is our process wrong, or is our speed slow, or anything else?” I said. He realized that such efficiency would be destructive for business and immediately cut short the workforce by 50%. By throwing down a challenge for him, I managed to save myself from his outburst, which might have been unavoidable had I criticized him and demanded more output directly. I might had even lost him as an employee because he was punctual, rightly skilled and a higher demand for output would have seemed unfair to him.
These instances along with others in my journey taught me, if we attack on the core of the problem with an intent of simply solving it and nothing else, we come out with a result that makes everyone happy. I realized that it is actually problem solving that lures people in entrepreneurship. It is problem solving that got us our B-Schools. And it is problem solving, that made me an Agripreneur from a Petroleum Engineer, and eventually now an IITian.
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