There is a lot of scope for organic industry to grow under franchise model: Manuj Terapanthi

A famous writer and contributor to modern business corporation Peter Drucker once said, “The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.”

India witnessed the historical green revolution in 1960s which not only added high yielding variety seeds (HYV seeds) to the land, but also a high amount of pesticides to protect the food from insects. Over these years pesticides have only deteriorated the ecosystem in our country. People are now trying to escape this situation by choosing organic food items which are comparatively high on price point.

We caught up with Manuj Terapanthi, CEO and founder, Organic Shop Pvt Ltd to know the importance of organic food over its other counterparts.

What is the difference between organic and non-organic food? Why is organic industry growing so fast?
In lay man’s language, the basic difference between organic and regular food is that organic food does not contain pesticides while the latter does. Further, organic food goes through several layers of quality check right from the processing to packaging. Also, there is a strict set of guidelines for organic products, may be this is the reason why organic food is expensive.

The demand for organic food is rising in the market as more and more consumers are getting aware about the benefits of organic food. In this time and age, every other person is suffering from cancer due to an over exposure of pesticides and toxins in food they consume.

How much revenue generally an organic retail store would generate? What is the current state of the market?
People nowadays are not afraid of spending money for pure and healthy food. Organic food is 1.2 to 1.3 times costlier than the conventional food and an average person in organic food industry mints around 10 to 16 lakhs a month; which may vary from place to place. Also, the industry is not compelled by the users to provide discounts or offers, for people prefer purity over price of organic products.

The growth in organic market is about 20 – 25 per cent per annum. The demand for organic products is quite high in the United States of America.

What methods do you use for supplying and storing organic products?
Organic food is all about freshness and purity, for we try to deliver food as soon as possible. Ours is a marketplace model so we do not keep the stock with us rather we let the vendors directly do the shipment from their end.

Where do you see the organic industry in the next five years?
According to a survey conducted in the USA, every household will have at least one organic food item, so it’s a good sign. Slowly but surely, people will shift to organic products.

How is organic industry going to benefit the farmers?
Government is giving a lot of incentives to the farmers. Sikkim has recently got organic certified and Uttrakhand is also participating in the industry understanding the benefits. Both Central and State government are supporting the farmers who are converting their field for organic products. So, yes, the government is giving a positive response.

What is the relevance of franchising organic products?
Franchising model gives flexibility to reach to the consumers directly. About 60-70 per cent of organic consumers are still offline. There is a lot of scope for organic industry to grow under franchise model.

What is your franchising model?
Our idea is to basically promote the local entrepreneur empowering him with orders and everything in the frontend while we would support him with technical know-how and sales at the backend.