Project

Feasibility Study

Prepared by: IS Group 10

Date:

Table of Contents

Executive Summary. 2

Description of Products and Services. 3

Technology Considerations. 6

Product/Service Marketplace. 7

Marketing Strategy. 9

Schedule. 10

Financial Projections. 11

Findings and Recommendations. 13

Executive Summary

Of late, an increasing number of people have taken an initiative to become greener and
more self-reliant by plunging into small scale gardening and organic farming. Our
business idea is aimed at addressing this shifting farming/gardening trend by providing
utility-based gardening plants and solutions, and also educate the customers about garden
maintenance. The business operations would initially involve delivering plants and setting
up a provision for maintenance service. We want to make the whole process convenient
and pocket friendly for the customer, starting from buying the seeds/ saplings and
equipment, to actually taking care of it. We have segmented our customers under
different categories, and we will be using appropriate messaging and marketing channels
to target each of them.

W would be creating online content on a regular basis. We plan to market through both
online and offline avenues like Facebook Ads, College fests, city events, workshops on
gardening and plants, etc. There are a lot of categories of plants and each category has a
huge number of plants. Thus, the key is to educate people about them, and use their
needs/requirements to create a demand.

In the Indian market, there is hardly any bargaining power with the suppliers as the
product is homogeneous, so the business success solely pivots on customer experience,
which we will try to enhance by creating a culture around the gardening arena. There
have been failed and successful start-ups, and one of the most important factors has been
cost and experience differentiation. As we progress along the timeline, we aim to achieve
value creation for our customers and expand operations to metro cities.
Description of Products and Services
1. Offerings

Sapling and Seeds Garden Tools and Essentials

Ready to grow kits Hose Pipe Set

Flower Seeds Chain Long saw

Herb Seeds Pruner

Vegetable seeds Shears

Ferns Scissors

Fruits Hose Nozzle

Cactus Anvil

Branch Cutter
Orchids

Bonsai
Watering Can

Foliage Drip Kit

Succulents Neem Cake

Air purifiers Organic Fertiliser

Flowering Bulbs Castor Cake

 Fungicide

Grow Bags

Ceramic Pots

1. Service and Maintenance: This involves employing of a gardeners to take care of the
customers’ home garden maintenance needs for various challenging and laborious
tasks such as pruning, manuring, weeding and general keeping
2. Details and description of products and services: Medicinal Plants: aka the medicinal
herbs, these are discovered and used in traditional medicine practices since prehistoric
times. A lot of chemical synthesis occurs for functions including defence against
insects, fungi, diseases, etc.

Examples:

a. Tulsi

b. Aloe Vera

c. Gotu Kola

d. Calendula

2. Air purifiers: These houseplants are used for removal of toxins from the air and
improve the air quality. A lot of demand in the urban areas is witnessed

Examples:

a. Garden Mum

b. Spider Plant

c. Dracaena

3. Aesthetic Plants: These kinds of plants are used for decoration i.e. for beautifying
purposes. These plants hardly grow and are easy-to-maintain.

Examples:

a. Tillandsia
b. Silver dollar plants
c. Jade plant
d. Oxalis
4. Fragrant Plants: Primarily used to add a sense of euphoria to the surroundings, these
sweetly scented plants are one of the most desirable kinds.

Examples:

a. Azores

b. Jasmine

c. Tuberose

d. Parijat

e. Rangoon creeper

5. Vastu/Religious Plants: Vastu friendly plants are meant to promote wellness, peace and
prosperity. Some plants are said to bring good luck according to the ancient Hindu tradition.

Examples:

a. Lucky Bamboo

b. Money Plant

c. Jasmine

d. Peony

6. Organic Consumption Plants: These plants are based on basic consumption and
almost every day use.

Examples:

a. Coriander seeds

b. Spearmint

c. Carom
Technology Considerations
Various Technological considerations, aimed at proper planning, modelling and
implementation of the project and to ensure longevity and scalability of the project in the
future.

Interface:

Modern User Interface with an intuitive User Experience design, to ensure easy and efficient
workflow for the end-user. The User Interface should follow the latest material UI
specification by Google, while keeping in mind the design language and the thematic
perspective of the organisation.

The User Interface will be designed using the latest technologies such as HTML 5, CSS3,
JQuery, in conjunction with a REST API based back end.

System Modularity:

The system needs to be based on a robust architecture, which is modular and scalable for
future expansion or growth plans.

The project needs to be based on a Model-View-Controller Architecture to ensure efficient

resource allocation while development as well as to provide a scalable model for expansion;
using a modern MVC framework such as Flask or Django.

Security:

With the recent surge in Ransomware and Malware attacks on organisations, it is imminent
that a strong security framework is adopted to safeguard the user data as well as prevent any
security breach.

A robust REST API based backend should be developed, using modern technologies like
Python or Java. The REST APIs, with an OAuth2 protocol for end-user authentication will
ensure only legitimate and authorised access to the backend, while ensuring a tamper-proof
implementation of the system.
 Product/Service Marketplace
Industry Overview
This industry has moved towards online platform from being fully dependent upon
physical presence at a nursery or a store. The market generally caters to the millennials,
for they have been responsible for most sales of late.

With growing ease and awareness to own a garden with a space of any dimension, this
industry has seen a huge growth. Rapid urbanization, improving in income levels along
with changing lifestyle have resulted in increased demand for floriculture in domestic
market; reports found that outdoor plant sales were up 26.94% compared to the same
month in 2017 and sales of houseplants were close behind at 24.1% up.

Thus, it will be interesting to see how the pot plant market will make a mark in
floriculture industry and how things will unfold in the near future.

Target market
We as a company want to position ourselves as a one-stop solution provider for every
gardener’s needs. We have segmented our customers according to the different services
we are planning to provide.

1. Plant enthusiasts.
2. Individual customers
3. Homemakers
4. Young Students (youth).
5. People who want to beautify their offices.
6. Organic food, beautification and maintenance of gardens
7. Café Owners.
8. Event Managers.
9. Buildings and agencies who want to beautify/maintain their gardens.
10. Corporate giftings.
11. Farm House owners
12. Interior designer

COMPETITION OVERVIEW
There can be a lot of skews with the kind of products and services we give in future and
thus there could be a lot of competition both in organised and unorganised sector. Thus,
while moving forward to various markets with a lot more products and services,
competitor analysis is necessary for the company’s marketing plan.

Unorganised Sector

This includes all the small/medium nurseries and local vendors, serving in a specific area
for a particular amount of time.

Organised Sector
This includes all the companies already established and providing a different set of
unique products and services.

a. Nursery Live b. My Bageecha c. Urban Mali d. Green My Life e. Evergreen

Indirect competition also forms a part of the unorganised rivalry that the firm might face
in the future. There are a lot of existing companies catering to the same set of consumer
base, that we intend to serve, but don’t necessarily deal in the same products or services.

Landscaping is one of the services which can be coined as our indirect competition, and
some of the companies dealing in this kind of service provision are GreenSmile, My
Cloud Forest, Nature Nurturer, etc.

Some companies deal in exotic plants for home décor and gardening, which initially, we
would not be able to deal in. Some of our customers might be interested in such products,
if they could get their hands-on exotic plants for a cheaper price. Thus, any firm
supplying a variety of such products with a competitive price automatically becomes a
competitor.

Plants could also replace the traditional furniture in a house. We have a lot of competition
when it comes to home décor, and it’s just a niche market, that we are serving to. Only a
certain percentage of nature enthusiasts prefer to decorate their houses solely with plants
and small gardens. A lot of companies have made furniture buying experience very
innovative and convenient, which has been driving the consumer demand in their way
lately. Kitchen Gardening has been an upcoming urban trend these days and a lot of
online companies have been providing the wholesome solutions related to the same.
Portals like HomeCrop and Yard2Kitchen deal in everything related to kitchen gardening,
while we could only provide our customers with basic tools and seeds, with respect to this
skew. Thus, it makes them our indirect competitors.
 Marketing Strategy
1. Online Strategy

Encompassing SEO, social media, PPC, content marketing etc, Aangan is

primarily going to use an e-commerce platform to sell plants and services
related to it. We aim to create brand awareness and reach through the ways
mentioned below:

Customer Acquisition Cost

Orders Marketing Budget Customer Acquisition Cost

Year 1 15000 509560 33.97

Year 2 30000 929190 30.97

Year 3 45000 1319120 29.31

At our initial stage the cheapest way to make our presence felt in the market would
be through Social media platforms-
 Facebook & Instagram Advertisement

In order to boost the impressions and make it reach to the right set of target
customers, we will use Facebook adverts.

 ·Product carousel ads: The campaign will be divided into two parts:
 Product Showcase - for people who want to buy it for home purposes.
 Second Campaign: Gifting options in festive season
2. Organic Post
Making a business page and posting one post everyday related to our
product and services or it could be blogs related to plants in order to
provide knowledge to the plant enthusiast.

3. Video

Making a video related to services being offered and latest trends. One
video will be released per week. Each video will be pushed for 2 days.
Some topics for videos can be:
1. A monthly campaign on all the recent social media trends that we will be running
2. Why is it a good hobby?
4. Online Content

a. Blogs: Blogs related to plants.

For e.g. must have plants at your home, Benefits of keeping plants around you,
etc. (One blog per week)
Information Blog (interactive blog) Blog Platforms i.e. medium, blogger and
WordPress
Approximate Cost- Refer to annexure
b. Community Pages: Posting about Aangan on Community pages related to gardening,
plant enthusiasts, event planners and etc.

Approximate Cost- Free

a. Pinterest: Creating pin boards related to plants and gardening. Approximate Cost- Free

b. Social media influencers: Influencer marketing is a type of word-of-mouth marketing that

focuses on using key leaders to drive our brand’s message to the larger market

5. Offline Marketing: will involve- College festivals, capitalizing on events/days,

Flea Markets, Event Advertising, gardening workshops, Decorating public
crossways and pathways:

Schedule
December 2019: Begin Setup

Start with the website, back-end logistics, vendor management systems, marketing processes,
recruitment etc.

January 2020: Begin Operations

Start with the plants, tools and maintenance services.

March 2020: Research and Setup

Research and setup for expansion plans to cover entire Kozhikode and for vertical gardening.

June 2020: Cover entire Kozhikode

Provide all the services throughout Kozhikode

September 2020: Research and setup

Setup Kochi team and experience centre team

December 2020: Launch Kochi

We aim to cover Kochi and launch our Experience centre in Kozhikode

June 2021: Research and setup

Prepare for launch in Bangalore and setup of experience centre in Kochi.

December 2021: Provide all services

Provide all the services in Kozhikode, Kochi and Bangalore. We aim to achieve excellence
and cost efficiency for the year 2021-22

Financial Projections
Financial Plan

Project Cost:
Project Cost includes expenses
incurred in the first year for
the set-up and operations of
the firm.

Initial Capex requirements

at approximate to ₹ 10.22
Lakhs. This figure was
reached by considering all
the fixed monthly expenses
for three months and adding
the cost of all initial fixed
expenses to it.
Revenue Model:
According to the assumptions made, have taken revenue from plants and tools with an
average selling price of ₹250, and an order size of 3 plants per order which has been
obtained after extensive customer surveys. We have considered that on an average
40% of the customers would also avail our maintenance services. We are charging the
customers ₹55 for delivery charges, which was on actuals basis.
Revenue from
operations Mar-20 Mar-21 Mar-22

Plants and Tools ₹ 75,86,250.00 ₹ 1,55,28,000.00 ₹ 2,27,58,000.00

Garden Maintenance ₹ 9,94,500.00 ₹ 20,34,000.00 ₹ 29,82,000.00

Vertical Gardening ₹ 16,44,624.00 ₹ 52,44,912.00 ₹ 85,34,160.00
Experience Centre ₹ 0.00 ₹ 0.00 ₹ 0.00
Delivery ₹ 5,61,000.00 ₹ 11,48,400.00 ₹ 16,83,000.00
Total revenue ₹ 1,07,86,374.00 ₹ 2,39,55,312.00 ₹ 3,59,57,160.00

Break Even Analysis:

We have calculated BEP of three years on the basis of three scenarios, Pessimistic,
realistic and optimistic. In pessimistic scenario, revenue is 90% of the realistic revenue
and in optimistic scenario, revenue is 110% of the realistic revenue. We are achieving
the Break-even point in the second year.
Findings and Recommendations
With the growing attraction towards this industry, it can progress in multiple segments of
home gardening industry.

There are a lot of players in the market, most of which operate with the conventional
techniques as the products to be offered in our industry continue to be mostly
homogeneous and thus bringing in new innovation is quite hard. As per the customer
researches held by us, the products and services offered are very much desired, as we
concentrate on the customer’s ease of buying. Our mission is to have cost effectiveness
and ensure that each plant has a home.

According to our financial estimations, the project is expected to break even in the second
year of its operations, which quite a positive sign, missing a profit in the first year by a
margin of Rs.4 lacs. In case we do not meet the second-year profit projections, we have
planned on a provision of capital re-investments by the partners up to the amount of Rs.3
lacs per person.

We depend heavily on the kind of service and customer experience we provide as there
are a lot of suppliers in the market and the customer switching would not take a lot of
thought. We expect the industry to be on the uptrend, and thus our business plan is to
create a social culture around plant and the gardening experience.