Entrepreneurship Assignment - Interview

Mr. Pankaj Sharma is into organic farming business of his own called Valentia Foods. He owns an 21 acre organic farm which boasts of having 58 buffaloes, 13 cows, 84 mango trees and 16 acres of vegetation. Apart from retailing milk and milk products in Lucknow, he has recently started a contract farming stint with a leading retail chain which is sourcing seasonal vegetables from him. He has an earlier experience in Sales & Marketing profiles in Software industry and Telecom sector. An Lucknow University Alumnus, he has been one of the key resources behind the launch of Uninor in Uttar Pradesh. from Business Intelligence Division in Airtel who had a farm of his own. Curiosity took me to pay him a visit or two. We chalked out the model we would work about and soon we were good to go. (smiles)

Getting your proposition right itself takes a dollar. How did you figure that out? Even finding a land would be tough for the venture. How did it happen? I was expecting that question. It has not been that easy all through. But, when something has struck you hard then, perhaps you dont usually deter. Yes, land was a crucial investment. I was pooling into something that was costing me most of my savings. I found a piece of farm land of about 1lac sq. ft. at the outskirts of the city but the rest of the land around was on the monetarily heavier side. So, we decided to buy the land but take it slow. And the advantage of taking it slow is you can change your stance at any point in time without facing huge setbacks. So, we started out on the small piece first. It took us a while to put up the essentials in place. We built up basic infrastructure- cattle shelters, storages, pavements, fences, irrigation facilities etc. That was perhaps the first major step towards Valentia. Meanwhile, I was talking to land-owners around us to get some more land at similar rates but I must say that wasnt working out at all. Despite that, we started on a high note with 8 buffaloes and the mango trees that were already there. Two years down, today I have bought most of the land, I grow on and the rest is on a 5 year lease. So, its almost a twin model we are currently working on. We alternate on the leased land with minimal infrastructure
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So, to start off, where did you conceive the idea of an organic farm? Well! Its not an idea actually. Organic is being down everywhere. You go down to a Reliance Fresh or perhaps a Spencers and you would find an entire section devoted to a host of similar products branded as Organic and selling at a premium price. So, people have been growing them for a while now. I just fell along with those few. (laughs) See, basically, it was very need based. I come from Shimla. Ive grown up in an utterly green terrain in the government bungalows where we grew our own vegetables in a barn. Add to that the fact that we have our roots in the heartland of UP with my father being a scientist at Central Potato Research Institute and he is a bit more cynic about quality in what we eat. What more can you expect me to come up with. When I came here, as in Lucknow, I was always fuzzy about getting my veggies rite. We didnt even enough space in the lawn to grow them. Then, I encountered this guy

Entrepreneurship Assignment - Interview

while youll see a lot of that on my land. I had to bore deep for another tube-well on another nook to avoid pressure on a singular point. Its been fairly smooth ride since then. It has been a very interesting journey till now Pankaj. How do you plan to take it forward? We are growing bigger each day. We are producing 350-400 liters of milk each day. We retail to 94 homes as of now at a premium price and people understand the pricing because they understand quality and they are more than willing and capable to pay for it. Even I use the same at my home. It has been totally word-of-mouth for us. I never needed to advertise. Other than retail, we are also supplying the same to a local restaurant chain. I am getting a lot of queries but I have nothing to supply right now. So, we bought another piece of land not far from the initial establishment and a bit closer to the city and we are thinking to shift the cattle there. We have been in process of putting up a refrigeration unit also and getting the logistics sorted currently. Our contract with Reliance has too worked out fairly well. I am looking for more land on lease. The market for organic is exponentially increasing and I just cant be left behind in that. In a city like Lucknow, if people are aware, you know where the major market lies. We need to tap at the right joints. Again, this year we have had an excellent mango crop and we had been able to retail it to our milk customer base, another experiment of ours which just perfectly worked out through the season. Organic manure is another segment we are hopeful towards. We will very soon begin to package and sell it under Valentia brand itself.

You make it sound very easy. Can you relate some challenges you faced? Challenges, I suppose is a very relative term. When you are out there fighting, which Im still, you wont even remember the term Challenge. It just becomes part and parcel of the work you do and you do it every day. I am a married man. At this stage perhaps, it becomes difficult to take risks, experiment. So, the capital investment was one tough task. I was also concerned about the job and sometimes I would find myself going straight to the farm from office and staying over sometimes. My family has been a lot supportive. My father had solely managed the business in the first few months- from sourcing labour to the construction, to getting the right manure to the time-bound milk logistics. Once I resigned and joined Valentia full-time, only then he has taken a back-seat. One of the other major problems I faced was when we decided to expand and we continuously faced constraints from the manpower side. Reliable people are hard to find in this business. There were a few thefts too. I went to the extent of going back to my village near Allahabad to find one guy who I could trust. Now, we have it all fixed. We have him live on the farm itself which more than does the deal for us.

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Entrepreneurship Assignment - Interview

Being a successful contemporary entrepreneur, what would be the few pointers, you would want us, as MBA students to keep in mind? It flattered me that you branded me successful as such an early stage. Look, I am not a big hot-shot guy; rather I am just a simple man with simple needs and objectives in life. If I could create a business out of my own need and the vision to satisfy it, I suppose anybody can. So, its not about whats in you, its more of a passion you have for something which actually matters. I did my MBA a decade back and I hardly believe any lessons learnt during those two helped me other than molding my mindset and lending you a structure to think. I think thats what it should be all about. You should focus on getting a few more skills and your attitude right. The entire corporate world is full of opportunities to learn and grow. But nothing can beat the fun of starting up something of your own. My only advice would be not to wait for some self-acclaimed right time because there isnt any. Its always right now. You dont have responsibilities to bear, no stomachs to feed which allows you the luxury to play and experiment. The most important aspect of any venture is to know what you are doing. If thats not the case, stop doing it. Youll find yourself thinking about a proposition in the beginning and then you get a better way to do it but you become so attached to your idea that you dont seem to let it go. I have made that mistake and paid heavily for that. Then again, discuss with everyone, your plans, and your ideas. But just dont continue doing that perpetually. Act on them. Find a problem and solve it!
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