Narsinghpur, my home district, is known as the sugar bowl of Madhya Pradesh, producing nearly 65 percent of the state’s sugarcane. The region’s fertile black soil has made it an agricultural hub and jaggery is a signature product, celebrated for being both natural and nutritionally superior to refined sugar.
When I returned here after a career in IT, I saw both a challenge and an opportunity. Jaggery production was widespread and could be more hygienic, and the market could use a modern brand that preserves its natural goodness while appealing to contemporary consumers. This insight inspired me to launch Future Farmers LLP and my brand Gladden.
From the outset, my goal was to transform traditional production practices. I introduced automation to ensure that Gladden jaggery is never touched by human hands before reaching consumers. Workers follow strict hygiene standards, using masks, gloves, and hair caps during production. By combining traditional knowledge with modern processes, I created a product that is safe, pure, and ready for the modern retail market.
While automating the business, I realized that scalability depends as much on mastering core business skills as on technology. Despite coming from a technical background, I needed to strengthen my understanding of retail, marketing, and operations management to drive sustainable growth.
At this stage in 2021, a conversation with a Walmart Vriddhi mentor became a turning point, revealing how online selling could transform my business growth. I received personalized mentorship under the program, and the mentor guided me through the process of enterprise registration under the MSME category and helped obtain my UDYOG Aadhaar. This helped strengthen the foundation of my business.
Through the Walmart Vriddhi learning modules, I learned valuable insights into marketing, business planning, packaging, and supply chain management. These learnings enabled me to equip my business with the right tools and utilise the acquired skillset to drive my business in the right direction.
The program also enabled my seamless onboarding on Flipkart. With its flexible delivery model, I have been able to reach pan-India consumers without logistical barriers.
The impact of the program was immediate. Before joining the program in 2021, Gladden produced about 1 ton of jaggery per day with an annual turnover of ₹60–80 lakhs. Today, production capacity has scaled up to 3 tons per day, and the turnover has reached ₹1.6 crore, driven by stronger systems, efficient scaling and informed decision making.
Gladden products are now available in 300–500 neighbourhood kirana stores in Bhopal, alongside its strong eCommerce presence. Internationally, nearly 60 percent of our jaggery is exported to Middle Eastern countries, where demand for natural sweeteners continues to grow.
With this momentum, we are now diversifying the business into new product categories and services. By converting sugarcane roughage into crockery, paper plates and organic manure, Future Farmers LLP is creating value from agricultural waste.
We are also entering the service sector by setting up new farms, developing food farms, working in soil nourishment, and assisting farmers with documentation work. The learnings from the Walmart Vriddhi program continues to prove invaluable in this phase, helping us strengthen business planning, streamline supply chains, and build effective vendor partnerships.
What began as a small experiment in hygienic jaggery production has now grown into a diversified enterprise with domestic and global reach. Armed with the learnings from the Walmart Vriddhi program, Future Farmers LLP is scaling success while contributing to a more sustainable, farmer-friendly ecosystem.
