🚜 365 Days of Stories: Day 40 - If You’re Not Deeply Committed to the Problem, You’ll Quit Midway
During my second entrepreneurial journey, my co-founder and I were talking about what kind of business we wanted to build.
“It should be meaningful,” we agreed. “Purpose-driven. Impactful.”
That’s when he brought up an interesting issue:
“Some days tomato prices are sky-high, other days farmers throw them on the road. It’s madness.”
I asked — why?
He explained:
“It’s all supply-demand mismatch. When too many farmers grow tomatoes, prices crash. When few do, prices skyrocket. And frustrated farmers dump their crop.”
That got us thinking.
Tomato demand is fairly constant — people consume it daily. So why does supply fluctuate?
The answer: No visibility. Farmers make planting decisions based on guesswork. If prices were good last season, everyone plants tomatoes. Next thing you know — oversupply, prices crash, losses.
So we asked — what if we could fix the supply side with better forecasting?
We thought we’d hit a jackpot.
We dug deeper and found that a few agritech companies were already solving this — connecting farmers with consistent buyers and forecasting demand.
But they barely scratched the surface — maybe 0.1% of India’s farmers.
Plenty of room left. We were excited.
We even attended the Organic Millets trade fair in Bangalore, where hundreds of farmers had gathered.
But there, we hit a wall.
We realised we had zero domain knowledge. We didn’t understand the context, the nuances, or even how to start building trust with farmers.
My co-founder, especially, felt strongly:
“We can’t pursue this. It’s a long, hard road. And we’re not equipped.”
And so, we dropped the idea.
Looking back, I sometimes wonder if we gave up too soon.
But one thing is clear:
👉🏽 If you’re not deeply committed to a problem, you won’t survive the journey.
💥 Lesson: If You’re Not Deeply Committed to the Problem, You’ll Quit Midway ✅ The problem should matter to you — deeply. ❌ You can’t fake purpose or passion. ✅ If the path is long (and it always is), only conviction will keep you going.
Have you ever dropped a promising idea because it didn’t pull you in enough? Would love to hear your story. 👇
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