Banyan roots

Abstract

Banyan Roots was launched by Rohit Jain (Rohit) and his friend, Jayesh Mohta, in Udaipur on October 30th 2011 as a jointly run organic café cum food store for organic farm produce. The café served food made only from organic farm produce and customers could also buy organic fruits, vegetables and pulses. Later, on April 1st 2012, the two split and Rohit moved to a new upmarket location in Udaipur to run the organic food store alone. Initially, Rohit distributed pamphlets and showcased his products at a food exhibition in one of the major fairs in Udaipur. Next year, he organized a yoga camp and a health camp to create awareness among health conscious people, which was his target customer segment. He used personal funds and earned minor profits only through his stalls at various food festivals. Banyan Roots enables tribal organic farmers to connect with consumers – it trains farmers in organic farming, indigenous sustainable practices and value addition and then buys their healthy products at fair prices to sell to consumers through its own stores. Rohit’s vision is to “build a replicable model of community-based localization of organic food which could be grown and locally processed; thereby increasing biodiversity, increasing tribal farmers’ income by giving them an assured marketplace and thus implementing toxic-chemical-free farming.” To network better, Rohit joined the Organic Farming Association of India. He got Sewa Mandir – an Udaipur based voluntary organization – to sponsor farmer training for improving yield through sustainable practices. Corporates also supported different outreach activities with CSR funds. It was difficult to get urban middle- and upper-class customers in Udaipur to pay premiums for organic produce. Rohit chose not to charge a premium for organic produce in the hope that higher volumes will be transacted through him. However, it started becoming difficult for Banyan Roots to make ends meet. By the fourth year of its inception, Rohit had used all his savings from his earlier job in Ahmedabad and had also borrowed about INR1.4 million from his friends and family to invest in market operations. This case study enables a discussion on the various options for the survival and growth of Banyan Roots.