‘Aarogyam Dhansampada!’ meaning ‘Health is the Real Wealth!’ Amidst the global coronavirus pandemic, climate crisis, global warming, modern lifestyle and healthcare emergency, the time has come that we must go back to nature, natural foods, simple, healthy, hygienic and sustainable lifestyle.
However, people are so used to artificial flavours, tastes, added chemicals, unwanted additives, synthetic elements, unnatural substances, and simulated ingredients in their instant, ready-to-eat, packaged oily, extra-spicey, salted and deep-fried foods that they find it almost impossible to adopt a healthy, nutritious, and beneficial way of foods, diets, and eatables.
Health crisis or no health crisis, people find it hard to resist their temptations for fast foods, fast life, and a fast downward slope. In today’s rapid space, even modernity sounds like traditionality. People’s psychology is again stagnating into a cesspool of stereotypes and unhealthy habits due to their constant penchant for the modern cliché that if it is contemporary, it must be good.
These stereotyping and unhealthy habits are proving to be detrimental to people’s health, leading them into a quagmire of modern lifestyle diseases like diabetes, obesity, blood pressure, tension, depression, anxieties, allergies, and so on. It went on up to the point that it seemed we had lost all our ancient, age-old, hard-earned wisdom of treating one’s health as wealth and treating one’s eating as a holy sacrifice of plant life-based natural foods into one’s own bodily fire to create the healthiest fuel of life for the lifetime.
This is when arrived Neha Vivek Dalvi, committed to the mission of bringing back that ancient wisdom of a life full of health’s wealth, durability, and longevity by convincing people to embrace Aarya Naturals.
In a candid discussion with Insights Success for its exclusive edition of ‘India’s 40 under 40 Brightest Business Leaders’, Neha, the Founder and CEO of Aarya Naturals, elaborated on her dedication and devotion to her commitment of making people see through the un-healthiness of modern artificiality and bringing them back on the path of sustainability and the way of longest and healthiest natural living.
Let us feast on it!
Please tell us about the saga of reputed Aarya Naturals since its inception.
The journey till date was amazing but filled with many ups and downs; going through all the odds, we are able to reach clients Pan India and overseas, but the struggle is not yet over. We are still growing and passing through various phases, learning new things, experiencing exploring and evolving, We believe in chemical-free products, our products are freshly made using Vedic techniques, cold-pressed, stone grounded and are made in small batches to maintain freshness. It was a task to create an acceptance for our products in the competitive market , making people aware about the benefits of our products, making them understand the USP, it was after a journey of almost 12/14 months that we were able to create some space in the market. Sincere hard work, perseverance, has helped us reach, where we are today.Â
What was your inspiration behind venturing into the business arena?
I am a cosmetic chemist and aromatherapist by profession. Getting into the food business was never planned, farming and mango cultivation was done in our native place.
We were able to enjoy the age-old traditional foods and delicacies of our native only when we visited our native place, during vacations or else it was never possible to enjoy them in our day-to-day city lives. Whatever was brought along when we returned home after vacation used to get over in a month or so.
After my postgrad when I was able to visit my native place and spend some time with the locals I was able to understand their food habits and their lifestyle. And I came to know that not only the fresh air but the healthy foods that they eat is a reason for their long life and is the reason why they are not touched by any kind of health issues or medical problems. Their day-to-day diet contained all the superfoods which are not adulterated and are fresh farm foods based on the age-old traditional recipes. There is no kind of preservation or adulteration or any other external additives or chemicals. They eat the foods which are cultivated on their very own farms.
This comprehension made me think about the ways we could bring these natural, original, and traditional foods into the daily lives of our clientele, thus bridging the divide and promoting healthy living through Aarya Naturals.
Today, we are bringing back all the age-old recipes from the rural areas to the urban areas, also making people understand the importance of these foods and their nutritive values. We are trying our level best to promote a healthy and balanced diet, natural farm-grown cold-processed stone grounded foods.
What initial challenges you have to surmount to ensure Aarya Naturals’ success rate reaches greater heights?
Initially, it was a task to make people understand the benefits of these superfoods, Â it was difficult to break the stereotypes. People in urban areas had a different food lifestyle, and it was difficult to make them believe and trust the health benefits of these chemical-free natural food products. We collaborated with many doctors and nutritionists, there are many brands in the market with the claim of organic and natural food, and we had to go through various Q&A to make our brand stand out over all of them. We had to compete with them and make our brand stand out in various parameters.
What professional values and qualities do you think your clients value in you and your company the most?
The quality of our product is valued the most by our clients; we supply freshly made products that are chemical and preservative-free. We are strictly against any non-natural flavouring, artificial colouring, and synthesized simulating of any of our products. Because we think that when you add these fake substances into the food with the intention of making them tastier, then, in reality, you not only dilute their quality and freshness but also make them unhealthier and un-nutritional for the customers.
In other words, you are playing with customers’ health, which is a strict no-no for us. Businesses might earn more money in the short term by playing with their client’s health. However, with the awareness, people can see through the all the fakeness and actually are valuing our products more and more with each passing day.
What USPs highlight Aarya Naturals’ uniqueness in the industry you are catering to?
Our products are made in small batches, they are delivered freshly, all ingredients are sourced directly from farmers, and all our recipes are traditional and have high nutritional value; all are farm-made, homemade, stone-grounded, hand pounded, and hygienically manufactured
When we say natural, we mean natural. When we say healthy, we can assure everyone that our products are healthy and fit for all age groups.
As an experienced professional, what would you like to advise the budding aspirants willing to enter the business world?
Go get your dream; there’s nothing to fear if you have your goal defined and you are loyal towards your work and goal. Do what you want but truthfully, be wise, be kind, be loyal and trust me, the whole universe will gather to make your goal successful.
Short-term profits earned with dishonesty will definitely harm you and your business in the long run. Always remember that.
How do you envision Aarya Naturals’ operations with the emerging technologies and automated tools that are revolutionizing the business world by enabling innovations?
Being in a farm-oriented business, machinery can only be used at the final stage of packing, labelling and transport.
Using machinery at the manufacturing level might spoil the taste; we believe in the cold processing of our products compared to the hot process.
Yet, as we plan to expand our product line by adding more personal care products, that might require us to bring in better machinery to save time, energy, and effort in the future.
