Healthy and Sattvic Diet is Everyone's Right
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From the very beginning, I was adamant that our baby food products should be affordable for parents from all walks of life. Nutritious food is a basic right, whether someone is rich or poor. As parents, we all want the best for our children, often striving to give them what we ourselves may have lacked. This was a core principle guiding my work.
However, as I started working on the cost matrix, I realized that our product was becoming more expensive due to several factors. While profitability is essential for any business, I wasn’t overly concerned about making a significant profit. My husband’s experience in the IT industry for over 20 years meant that we could manage with minimal profit margins, focusing instead on the social impact of our work. With this mindset, I approached the challenges we faced in making our baby food affordable.
Problem 1: Cost of Natural Farming Grains
Natural farming grains are not only grown by very few farmers, but they are also more expensive. To tackle this, I personally met with farmers, either at their farms or over the phone, and explained our mission. The farmers were eager to help, but they had concerns about pricing and payment. We assured them that we would buy all their produce at market prices, with payments made in advance. This eliminated their worry about selling their crops, and they even agreed to offer discounts. In the future, we plan to set up agreements to buy entire crops at pre-determined prices to protect farmers from market fluctuations.
Problem 2: Availability of Womanpower
Since our baby food is handcrafted, it requires significant womanpower, which can be both scarce and costly. We reached out to various self-help groups and involved them in our project. Additionally, during the COVID-19 pandemic, we had provided food kits to some needy people and saved their contact numbers for verification purposes. These contacts proved valuable, as many women were willing to join our project, providing us with the necessary labor.
Problem 3: Expensive and High-Maintenance Conventional Pots
Traditional pots are not only costly but also require proper maintenance to avoid quick deterioration. I researched old methods of cleaning and preserving these pots by consulting elderly women from the village. This knowledge was documented and shared with the women responsible for maintaining the pots, ensuring they last longer and remain clean.
Problem 4: Expensive and Fluctuating Wood Fuel for Chulas
Cooking on traditional chulas requires a lot of wood, which is both costly and subject to price fluctuations. To address this, we decided to use rocket stoves, which consume 40% less wood and burn fuel more efficiently due to a fan that increases oxygen supply. We also purchased wood during the off-season, securing it at lower prices.
Problem 5: Time-Consuming Manual Grinding
Manual grinding of grains is time-consuming, which increases production costs. To optimize this, I personally ground all the grains to understand the time and challenges involved. This experience helped us train the women in our team, setting realistic soft and hard targets for grinding.
Problem 6: Sprouting Grains for Maximum Nutritional Value
Sprouted grains are highly nutritious and easier for babies to digest, but each grain takes different amounts of time to germinate, increasing production time and costs. I experimented with sprouting different grains in various seasons to understand the timing. This information was documented, allowing us to plan and prepare sprouted grains well in advance of delivery dates.
Problem 7: Addressing Affordability for All Customers
While we had created subscription plans, we knew that not everyone could afford or commit to them. To ensure accessibility, we decided to offer our products in both 250-gram packets and smaller trial packs. We also introduced a one-week trial subscription, allowing customers to test our products before committing to a full subscription. I was confident that once customers tried our products, they would return for more.
Problem 8: Marketing on a Budget
We needed to allocate funds for both online and offline marketing to reach as many parents as possible, which would also increase product costs. To address this, we brainstormed ways to reduce our marketing budget while still expanding our reach. This led to the creation of the Nutri Friend concept, which I will explain in the upcoming section. Through Nutri Friend, we aimed to involve others in spreading the word about our products, compensating them fairly for their efforts while keeping our marketing expenses low.