MSME SuperPower:
Tendrils of success: Shaping the future of rural micro-entrepreneurs
Ajay Babu
Founder, Tendrils LLP, Hyderabad, Telangana
I grew up in Challappem, a small village in the Prakasam district of Andhra Pradesh. After completing my BTech in Civil Engineering and pursuing post-graduation, I joined the Association of Lead Entrepreneurs of India (ALEI), where I worked as a faculty member at the Centre for Entrepreneurship Development.
For over two decades, I trained several aspiring entrepreneurs, including adolescent girls, in the plantation sector of Sri Lanka and the Maldives. I am still associated with ALEI as a consultant, where I guide women entrepreneurs to get access to finance as well as marketing.
A common challenge that women entrepreneurs, artisans, and Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) face is direct access to a wider market. Then there are the problems of redundant equipment and product designs. These pain points inspired me to set up Tendrils, a company that works for the benefit of rural micro-entrepreneurs and helps bridge the gap to the pan-India market.
Weaving the idea of Tendrils
Tendrils Naturals LLP was set up in July 2022 with a grant of Rs. 8 lakhs secured under the Startup India Seed Fund Scheme (SISFS) through ALEAP AIC WE HUB. I began working with farmers who cultivate medicinal and aromatic plants in the Narayanpet district, an underdeveloped district of Telangana, teaching them the nuances of ethical buyback arrangements.
I diversified into making cosmetics out of the oil extracted from aromatic and medicinal plants.
I also began sourcing food processing products from farmers and enabled local women entrepreneurs to purchase raw materials directly from them.
Tendrils offers a full circle of finished products brought from these women entrepreneurs, and we help them procure and diversify what they produce. We source turmeric and wild honey, both with 5% curcumin content (an active component that gives turmeric its yellow colour), from the Araku and Paderu districts, and pepper from the tribal areas of the Pathari forest. I reached out to local consumers—mostly middle-class people in cities—via social media and became largely dependent on the word of mouth of my existing customers.
Implementation challenges
Adulteration of natural products, which can harm the health of consumers, is a major challenge in this sector. I set out on a mission to make genuine quality organic products at an affordable cost. Tendrils conducts chemical testing on all its products and has test reports for every item we sell.
To ensure uniform quality of products, I personally visit the factories and maintain continuous interactions with the entrepreneurs, and I have enabled a foolproof testing system. When an agricultural specialist for Agriculture and Food from the World Bank visited ALEAP, she appreciated our efforts to empower women, farmers, and artisans.
Infrastructure, technology, marketing, finance, and manpower are the five essential elements of starting any business. Though I was aware of these essentials, my knowledge about the actual gap between consumer needs and wants was relatively low. Another bottleneck I faced was the appropriate labelling and packaging of products, particularly for my cosmetics collection.
Furthermore, when it comes to scaling the organic food business, the cost is 10 to 20 percent higher than that of general products, so pricing became an issue. Signing up for the Walmart Vriddhi program helped overcome these difficulties and enabled Tendrils to continue its mission to empower micro-entrepreneurs.
Walmart Vriddhi helps steer strategy
I signed up for the Walmart Vriddhi program in October 2023, and since then, Tendrils has revised its business strategies to push sales and dream big. The Digital Marketing module has been particularly beneficial for me. While securing finance for my business was not an issue, marketing my products is where the program’s personal mentoring helped me tremendously, thus improving sales. Early last year, Tendrils sales were as low as Rs 10,000 per month. After the Walmart Vriddhi training, the company has reached the Rs 5 lakh per month milestone, out of which offline sales through self-owned standalone outlets account for Rs 4.5 lakhs and Rs 50,000 online.
I considered going with two different brand names: Tendrils for food products and Vedic Chemist for cosmetics. However, my Walmart Vriddhi mentor advised me to have a single brand name and focus on diversification to improve brand recall among both offline and online customers, thereby increasing sales.
Before joining the program and onboarding my products on Flipkart, my eCommerce journey was riddled with complications. The high cost of onboarding Tendrils products online and fake buyers proved to be a burden both in terms of wasted time and money. But with Flipkart, it was a smooth sail. I am grateful to Flipkart because I have not had to deal with fake buyers or bear the inflated cost of onboarding my products. The prompt placement and delivery of orders have enhanced my customers’ experience and made me confident about eCommerce. Twenty Tendrils products are currently available on Flipkart, and I am in the process of uploading the entire range of 200 products by June 2024.
The Walmart Vriddhi program taught me how to reach customers both online and offline. Flipkart has taken care of my online logistics, and a MoU with the Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation’s (APSRTC) Logistics Division has helped me reduce my offline logistics cost by 50%.
Soaring high – future plans
Once my entire product line is uploaded on Flipkart, I am hopeful the online sales of Tendrils will soar. With my Walmart Vriddhi mentor’s guidance, I opened my first offline outlet in Anantapur district. Building on this confidence, I am planning to set up a second outlet in Vishakhapatnam. Eventually, I aim to set up around 50 to 60 outlets across Andhra and Telangana and work with people from underdeveloped districts in the two states.
With Walmart Vriddhi and Flipkart’s support, I have achieved a lot so far, and I still have a long way to go. As an entrepreneur, I believe we should never forget that a successful business is one that is sustainable and always asserts the quality of its products.