"New Economy" Startup Philosophy: "Growth" Is Not Everything

Startups new retail concept direct-to-consumer (DTC) can be said to be in the spotlight in the eyes of investors over the last few years because it has an attractive proposition in utilizing existing technological tools into its business processes, either in whole or in part, to boost sales.

They are efficient because it cuts the sales chain to digital channels, rather than opening its own offline outlets. As a result, the price sold is much more competitive than brand which is already large, with a number of other differentiations that are strengthened such as the materials produced are environmentally friendly and good for maintaining health.

It is interesting to highlight how they apply the concept growth exponentially by burning money like most startups do. Gorry Holdings, Greenly, and Pura are willing to share their views on this matter with DailySocial.

The three of them are startups that are growing green in the midst of this pandemic because they focus on industry wellness by consuming a healthy lifestyle.

Growth important, but not everything

Co-Founder & CEO Gorry Holdings Herry Budiman said growth is an important component for the company, but not everything. The company combines growth with a sustainability strategy so that Gorry Holdings continues to generate profits.

“We are more Libra. Growth there must be but still pay attention to aspects sustainability and profit. Maybe we compared to other companies, accept fund "There is less [funding from investors], but we can provide higher expectations for them," he explained to DailySocial.

The implications of choosing this strategy make some investors confused. Generally investors have another goal to sell their portfolio to other investors when the portfolio is raising funds. The metrics that investors usually use are growth owned by the portfolio. The more exponential the number, the more "selling" it will be.

“Gorry is always there every year growth, but indeed growth We are not exponential because our funds are limited. But this is better because we already have monetization through app and make the company permanent sustain until now."

For Gorry himself, by implementing this balanced strategy the company can retain consumers, with a retention rate that is claimed to be better than competitors. Herry explained that as many as 80% of current consumers are recurring consumers numbering hundreds of thousands of people, the majority of whom are spread across Jakarta and Tangerang. Operational costs are quite low because the company operates its own kitchen, even though it has not yet entered cloud kitchen.

The Co-Founder expressed the same opinion Greenly Edrick Joe Soetanto. Chase growth is a must, but it must be done responsibly. The funding the company receives is only invested for business development needs, such as expansion.

Edrick emphasized that Greenly's spirit is to democratize healthy food that is easy to find at affordable prices, just like the current situation where it is easy to find fast food. Healthy food should not be consumed occasionally when visiting the mall, but wherever consumers are.

To form this habit, Greenly formed operations cloud kitchen, good to cooperate with Grab Kitchen, as well as operating itself in Surabaya, Malang and Bali.

Accept offline positioned as channel sales only, because all food is processed centrally in cloud kitchen. In total, Greenly has 10 cloud kitchen and three outlets offline.

"The business model we are running now is in accordance with the initial hypothesis that we want to make this healthy food a thing of the past leisure meals, but daily food can be ordered online. For that, we run it with a concept new retail. We exist offline store but only for serving, there is no kitchen because everything is centralized in cloud kitchen. "

With this method, Edrick admitted brand exposure Greenly, both online and offline, is able to play its respective roles well. Businesses are more efficient and agile to expand to new locations and develop new menus.

This advantage was also felt during the pandemic which is still ongoing today. Even though offline sales have fallen, the company's finances are still maintained at a safe level because they are encouraged by online sales.

PURA Co-Founder and Marketing Strategist Monica Liando agree with the two previous sources. The company considers growth is something that will definitely accompany the journey if you have a solution that answers what consumers are looking for.

“We are more consumer-based let's see what this consumer needs, then what pain problems- from there we answer with a solution. We believe that when we know what we are doing [according to needs], then growth will definitely follow," said Monica.

This startup from Surabaya was founded in 2017 based on personal experience that in Indonesia it is difficult to find 100% natural cooking spice products without artificial flavors at affordable prices. Companies utilize digital channels, such as online reseller, on first operation.

Thanks to word of mouth marketing, PURA has grown to where it now has e-commerce site itself markets six spices that it produces itself. Since last year, PURA has even been available offline in supermarkets.

"From the start we saw the direction was [marketing] online because reaching more consumers is easier from there. Until now we don't have our own shop."

Take on another mission

These three companies not only focus on building businesses that can make a profit, but also carry out another mission, namely education to increase awareness of a healthy lifestyle as a habit. Forming these habits is certainly not easy in the early days of their operations.

Herry said that when Gorry Holdings was first started, the first business he was involved in was Gorry Gourmet. They conducted a mini survey of 3 thousand respondents throughout Indonesia to prove their hypothesis. The conclusion obtained is that respondents have a desire to live a healthier life, but they don't know where to start.

“Some of them answered starting from sports, but apparently Not [that's the answer], but from diet and not necessarily directly looking for healthy catering. That's why our solution is to help people define goals they. After meeting, we will give recommendations on what solutions we can provide."

Herry continued, “From our beginning Believe, what is healthy according to you may not be healthy according to other people. We help people achieve goals them and them, not just a diet. From there we just offer catering services. Our monetization goes straight from there and it works Karena barrier people to start subscribing to catering is smaller than paying for the gym.”

It could be said that Gorry Gourmet is the company's path to identifying its consumers and finding out other needs that can be developed. Four years later, the GorryWell application was initiated and confirmed Gorry's mission from the start as a company wellness.

This application contains various wellness features such as lifestyle analysis, healthy lifestyle guide, recommendations for nearby healthy foods, food recipes. The newest feature that was just released at the beginning of this month is Gorry Mart, an e-commerce platform for healthy food and beverage products.

“We do our best to keep people away so they don't get sick. This application can accommodate these needs, it has been used by corporations for their employees. They can see the extent of their employees' stress levels, what diseases they suffer most from, and from there they can make allocations budgethis to spending which is more focused. "It has also been proven that insurance claims have fallen by up to 20%."

In the near future, Gorry will complete the features in GorryWell with wellness coach. According to Herry, during this pandemic stress levels increased because he had to always be at home, which even led to divorce. His party will connect consumers with psychologists for online consultations.

“There are many solutions wellness whose solution cannot be solved with healthy food. Wellness coach Our initial plan was not to release it this year, but looking at the current conditions, we have finally accelerated it."

Gorry Holdings' seriousness is also proven by obtaining HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point) and ISO 22000:2005 certificates for food safety systems.

From Greenly's side, so that consumers are familiar with the spirit of democratization of healthy food, Greenly decided to combine global trends by localizing them to the Indonesian tongue.

"We can't do it straight away copy paste, need adjust. "What healthy food is still acceptable, in the end we chose salad because in Indonesia there is also gado-gado which is similar to that."

Menu variations continue to be developed so that consumers become more familiar with healthy food. For example, the Greenly team developed a variety of salads in shape wrap which resembles a kebab. Then the boba drink menu is made non-dairy, by taking from the healthier almond milk or oat milk.

The ingredients used by Greenly to create the entire menu are done in-house, thanks to one co-founderHe has a background as a nutritionist. The price of the products sold by Greenly ranges from IDR 30-40 thousand.

“We all do it in-house, so that cost can be kept low and marketed online. Cost overheadit's light and we can provide it savingsit goes to consumers.”

PURA is also not playing around in its seriousness in playing in the industry wellness This. Just like Gorry Holdings, Monica said that the company has obtained HACCP and ISO 22000:2005 certification, the aim is to ensure that the ingredients used are truly natural and safe for consumption. "Because many PURA consumers are mothers who buy PURA for their children."

All PURA products are developed internally and the manufacturing process has signed an exclusive contract with one of the players who are experts in their field. The company's current focus is to increase the variety of spices so that consumers have more choices.

"Our long-term target is in the next 5-8 years to enter the ASEAN market and we believe that if we use our own capabilities, this will take a long time. "Therefore, from now on we are starting to prepare for funding plans," he concluded.