Entrepreneur trio triples sheep herders’ incomes by reviving desi wool market for construction industry. Eyes 1 CR revenue.

India has the second-highest population of sheep in the world. Yet, it keeps importing a ton of wool every year.

In 2022 alone, India imported $205 million worth of wool from countries like Australia, Syria, Uruguay, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.

This has made India the third-largest importer of wool in the world.

Let that sink in.

The reason for this irony? Most of the wool produced domestically goes to waste because it is either not collected and processed properly or is too coarse in texture, making it unusable for the apparel or carpet industry. 

“Imagine the kind of waste that is generated every year. We simply throw away at least 40 million kilograms of wool fibre every year. On multiple levels, it's a concerning picture. For the climate, for our local pastoralists, and our textile industry,” says Prerna Agarwal, co-founder of Samakhya, in an exclusive interview with Startup Pedia.

In 2022, Prerna joined hands with Shwetambara and Danish to set up Samakhya, a for-profit social enterprise to solve this clear problem statement in the country.

Two and a half years later, the entrepreneur trio has successfully mobilized numerous pastoralists, given them technology to shear their sheep, vaccinate them, and ultimately sell their wool directly to Samakhya. The social enterprise has also connected rural women to stable employment by hiring them at fibre processing units. 

The processed fibres then act as an alternative textile used for creating thermal and acoustic insulation material for India's construction and built industry. 

Essentially, a sustainable value chain has been created wherein everyone benefits—pastoralists, farmers, rural women, construction manufacturers, and of course, the environment.

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HOW IT ALL BEGAN

After earning her post-graduation in advertising and marketing from Saint Xavier's Institute of Communications, Prerna Agarwal entered the corporate corridors. 

She worked for almost 7 years in marketing and advertising agencies like Ogilvy and Mather,  helped numerous national and international consumer brands market their products through offline and digital media. 

“After working with Ogilvy, I realized I wanted to do more. I wanted to use my passion for communications for something that adds concrete value to society,” Prerna Agarwal shares with Startup Pedia. 

In 2016, she realized that Urmul Seemant Samiti, an NGO in Rajasthan was looking for someone to help them with their crafts value chain. This was a social initiative that Prerna had already been involved with during her college days. 

“It felt like the right opportunity at the right time. I was tasked with improving the crafts value chain in Rajasthan and training artisans in making handcrafted products. There were multiple challenges in the realms of management, training, design, and supply chain,” Prerna explains.

“I shifted my base to a small village called Bajju, 100 km from Bikaner and began addressing everything one by one,” she adds. 

Here, Prerna Agarwal was joined by Shwetambara Ujjain and Danish Choudhary. While the former is a textile designer, Danish has studied social work and has worked in Chhattisgarh.

The trio would go from village to village, speak to the women in the households, and explore the correct employment opportunities for them. 

Over four years, they created sustainable employment for over 3000 rural women by training them in handicrafts and refining a supply chain that reached the city's markets. 

During their time in numerous villages, Prerna, Danish, and Shwetambara realized one thing—farmers in arid regions struggled to have a consistent source of income. They would turn to animal husbandry, become sheep and goat herders, and try to sell wool and meat. 

The problem? Without any tech intervention, sales support, vaccination support, or tangible training, they were struggling to continue with animal husbandry and their children were migrating to cities to become labourers.  

The result? 95% of India’s wool is wasted .

In 2022, Prerna, Danish, and Shwetambara decided to branch out and start Samakhya as a for-profit social enterprise that partners with pastoralists, uplifts their standard of work and living, and changes the way desi oon is used in the country.

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THE CHALLENGES AND JOURNEY 

When entrepreneurs Prerna Agarwal, Danish, and Shwetambara started the bootstrapped Samakhya with just Rs 1 lakh pooled from their savings, they had to navigate their way through many challenges. 

1. Samakhya envisioned mobilizing pastoralists in the country. But by behaviour, sheep herders are nomadic. They keep travelling from one place to another. The team had to track down their routes, meet with them, explain their model, and then convince them to be a part of Samakhya.

“I remember a lot of time went behind just bringing pastoralists together,” startup founder Prerna Agarwal tells Startup Pedia. 

2. When the social enterprise finally managed to mobilize a significant number of herders, the next step was spreading awareness. The team had to educate them about the use of proper shearing machines, the importance of regularly getting the animals vaccinated, and how to identify quality pastures to take their sheep to. 

3. After the above was taken care of, entrepreneurs Prerna, Danish, and Shwetambara, along with their core founding team, started setting up fibre-collecting units where pastoralists could simply sell the sheep wool. They called these centers Pastoral LightHouses. The team also made adequate arrangements for herders to stay here, rest, eat food, drink water, procure green fodder for their herd to feed on, and utilize advanced shearing machines. 

4. While setting up an entire value-based ecosystem in villages, the startup founders struggled with the slowness of village life. 

“Building a business out of a village is a lot harder than building one in a city. Even things as simple as taking printouts are an operational nightmare in a village. It was a task, but we adapted to it,” entrepreneur Prerna Agarwal shares.

5. A lot of awareness-based dialogues and discussions also took place when Samakhya’s founders and team started pitching alternative fibres and thermal and acoustic materials to the construction and built industry of the country. They explained the use cases, the sustainability aspect, and how the alternatives could replace pollution-causing and carcinogenic conventional materials.

SAMAKHYA: SHEEP, FIBRE, COMMUNITY, AND EMPLOYMENT 

Samakhya has launched a brand called MAGRA. It brings 100% natural and 70% more effective thermal and acoustic insulation rolls, sheets, and baffles to help the country’s built industry reduce its carbon and energy footprint. 

Through this initiative, it directly seeks to:

1. Organise the nomadic sheep herder economy.

2. Reduce the energy footprint of the buildings.

3. Provide healthier acoustic solutions for better mental health. 

Samakhya has innovated various natural fibre-based insulation and acoustic products like Magra Honeycomb Panels, Sound Baffles, Felt Sheets, and Felt Rolls.

 These products are today used at famous infrastructure projects across the country like the ICICI head office in Mumbai, Brij Munjal Vedic Center in Delhi, World Peace Center in Gurgaon, Indian Army sites in Kargil, SRM Institute Of Science & Tech in Chennai, Sherkong School in Spiti, Jambul Cafe in Goa, and the Acumen office in Mumbai.

“Coarse sheep wool performs in surprising ways. It can provide great insulation support when used correctly to make the right kind of products. We've seen in places like Spiti and Kargil, that our insulation created a temperature difference of 10-14 degrees between internal and external temperatures,” entrepreneur Prerna shares.

“This reduced their reliance on kerosene lamps because Samakhya’s panels have offered enough warmth saving almost 14-20% on fuel and energy bills. In today’s climatic context, operational energy reduction is a massive saving for a constructed building,” she adds.

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GROWTH

As a social enterprise that is steadily carving its market identity, Samakhya has seen impressive growth in terms of revenue. 

In its first year of operations, the team achieved a revenue of a humble Rs 2.5 lakh. In FY24, they clocked an annual revenue of Rs 40 lakh. Samakhya is projected to close the current year at Rs 1 crore.

Startup founders Prerna Agarwal, Shwetambara, and Danish, along with their founding team including Rani Sable, have positively impacted 8,000+ artisans in India. 

They've helped thousands of women become primary breadwinners for their families by helping them earn a stable amount of Rs 8,000 per month. 

As for pastoralists, the MAGRA model has enabled them to triple their income in just two years.

LOOKING AHEAD

Samakhya’s team and the startup founders plan to revolutionize the thermal industry of the country.

They also want to start helping pastoralists in the regions of Kashmir and Ladakh. The ultimate plan is to go international and establish a value chain that benefits everyone in the process. 

“At Samakhya, we are literally building a market category. When we tell people to consider using natural wool instead of glass wool and rock wool, they look at us with disbelief. Then when we show them our products with technical proofs of their perrformance  being successful in many places like banks, cafes, and schools—they look at us with disbelief again. But with a positive one this time,” entrepreneur Prerna Agarwal says. 

“We will keep scaling the Magra model and helping pastoralists and artisans. Personally, I feel very fulfilled. And I know our team does too,” she signs off.

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