Go Green Warehouses: Taking Indian Warehouse Industry to Global Level through its Green Solutions

Go Green Warehouses

Post-pandemic, warehouses are in high demand. Institutional investors worldwide are watching the Indian warehousing business. This industry is growing rapidly. After the COVID-19 pandemic, e-commerce companies have increased their use of warehouse facilities as demand for commodities has skyrocketed. The pandemic has increased cold chain warehousing space for organised food distribution. So, the warehouse business has become a resilient asset class and continues to rise in the real estate sector. For automation and efficiency, the warehouse invests heavily in technology. In addition, warehouse development is cost-effective. The low-cost boosts occupancy. Hence, warehouse investments are safer.

Stepped into the market

Santosh Sahu worked with a corporation and used Maulik Shah’s warehouses. Mr Sahu and Mr Shah discovered that agri-warehousing is specialised. The industry suffered from poor confidence and below-standard services, so the visionaries founded Go Green, a warehousing firm, to deliver personalised services, generate trust/transparency, and grow fast by involving management owners.

Grew into an enterprise

In 2018, Go Green Warehouses began offering integrated commodity management solutions. The company’s skilled personnel provide post-harvest services to stakeholders across the agro-value chain. Its strategically planned, electronically connected sites, innovative procedures, and stakeholder dedication allow the company to handle businesses of all sizes. Go Green Warehouses are changing warehousing and logistics for agricultural enterprises. Initially, bank institutions and start-up banks were inclined towards the formers industry players that created obstacles for the company to be empanelled. As technology is vital, the company has 1200+ warehouses in 25 states with over Rs. 8000 crore worth of commodities.

Breaking through the Challenges

Start-up Banks/Institutions were likened to former players where the company like Go Green Warehouses encountered several obstacles to obtaining empanelled to start a firm. Go Green Warehouses competed with 15+-year-old companies for top talent. The company also trained freshers to build it. The capital was one of the challenges that the company faced. Mr Sahu saw cash flow concerns force many ambitious plans to be scrapped.

Trust establishment and retention

As a leader, Mr Sahu thinks one must suffer to inspire colleagues to keep the company successful. Go Green Warehouses help firms address industry issues of transparency and trust by being dependable service provider. The company started the process in 2018, hoping to focus on specific Indian geography, but clients have responded well to the new firm. As a result, the company is now in 25 states with 450+ stores and 3500+ customers.
Go Green Warehouses’ objective is to serve farmers and be India’s agricultural storage leader. Its team uses creative methods to contact growers and FPOs with high-quality products and improve buyer ties with their warehouses to establish farm product markets.
Mr Santosh describes his unique business model: “the company tackle customers’ largest issues from farm to fork. It serves farmers who grow the grain and consumers like processors, retailers, importers, exporters, etc., who use the product.”

Go Green Solutions

In 2018, Go Green Warehouses began offering integrated commodity management solutions. Its personnel provide post-harvest services to stakeholders across the agro value chain. The company is changing logistics and warehousing for non-agricultural enterprises. It offers:

• Preservation and Storage
• Primary Processing (Sorting, Cleaning, Grading)
• Quality Testing and Assaying solutions
• Commodity Finance Facilitation
• Farmer support Services
• Inspection and Audit Services
•  Last-mile Farmers Finance and Market Linkage Solution

Monthly service additions on the consumption and production sides of the value chain have grown the Go Green Warehouses initiative horizontally and vertically. Its backward integration through micro-warehouses-based collecting centres allows direct procurement from farmers and FPOs.

Creating Brand Awareness

Mistrust spreads like wildfire in relationships. Mr Sahu believes unresolved doubt becomes suspicion, and the latter is an unproven belief. To build trust and awareness, Go Green Warehouses interact across markets. Honesty and integrity have always mattered to the company. Mr Santosh thinks the customers trust his company because it strictly follows the 8 pillars of trust, which every employee understands daily. The trust pillars are:

• Clarity: People distrust ambiguity.
• Compassion: Caring people inspire trust.
• Character: Righteous people stand out.
• Competence: Customers trust relevant and capable people.
• Commitment: Perseverance inspires.
• Connection: Friends are followed, bought from, and surrounded.
• Contribution: Results are instantly noticed.
• Consistency: People like small things done consistently.

Marking the warehouse Industry

If one looks attentively, one will see that the warehouse industry only handles bulk projects because of the profit margin; else, they would struggle to live. Go Green Warehouses has a microsite team. Hence, the company go closer to the farmer instead of asking farmers to deliver the produce 150 km to our warehouse. It has also built up a solar centre at the farm gate levels using the windows and link to the pilot so the transition can happen if someone wants to store produce for a while.

A Go Green Customer

Most businesses depend on customers because they pay for the business’s products. Mr Sahu believes that managing customers well can lead to repeat business. Hence, happy customers recommend Go Green Warehouses to other buyers, increasing sales. The CEO also believes that brands, especially consumer-centric ones like Go Green Warehouses, should stay connected.
The company’s CRM applications and relationship managers enable tailored central office engagements and personal encounters with customers. Go Green Warehouses find customers face-to-face and via phone or social media). The company appreciates its clients and solicits feedback from top management and others.

The Marketing Initiatives

The company sell products in four steps- Initiate, Communicate, Validate and Commit. It communicates and makes business proposals. Go Green Warehouses on-board customers after 40–50 meetings before closing the deal. Besides, customers seek trustworthy companies. After the first visit, the company build trust through smart and persistent communication.

The Upcoming Plans

To simplify transactions, Go Green Warehouses will automate warehouse activities, including 100% digital customer services. The company want to be the highly preferred agri-warehousing company in three years and attain 70-80 Lakh MT storage volume at peak with a CM portfolio of at least Rs. 15000 Cr in two years. Go Green Warehouses aim to work in all major ports, processing clusters, and commodity aggregation centres worldwide. It covers India and other countries where CM and warehousing are necessary. The company’s micro warehousing programs target villages, while dark store operations, cold chain logistics and 3PL target cities.

The First Impression

When the customers do deals with Go Green Warehouses, they see a dynamic, dependable, skilled, and experienced Service Provider who understands agro value chains and their needs better than anyone in the sector to build suitable offerings for every need.

Mr. Sahu- The CEO Journey

Mr Santosh is learning as a first-generation entrepreneur. He believes successful entrepreneurs are patient and persistent while creating a plan for their customers and employees. He also adds that any large-scale change effort teaches for life.

Mr Sahu’s five major lessons in his journey are:

• Constant growth requires severe prioritisation
• Diversify, trust, and communicate.
• Ask anyone for aid.
• Engage customers regardless of business development.
• Learn: Failure is the finest teacher.

Mr Sahu’s Vision for Go Green Warehouse

Mr Santosh wanted a self-sufficient team. He believes that a competitive founder makes his company more competitive and aggressive. In addition, he has seen many data-driven companies make metrics-based judgements. Mr Sahu is improving his and his team’s skills while making his company competitive and trusted. Go Green Warehouses’ culture has changed the most. Mr Santosh endeavours to shift the company’s mind-set for continual feedback and progress, which his team needs. For team growth, he will spend more time with each member. In addition, he will carefully organise the top 50 employees’ careers to advance ownership. He is also working on technology enablement inside and out that will double the company’s market profitability and share. As the company grows, he wants to invest in start-ups to keep learning.

Message for the Readers

Mr Sahu says, “Start-ups should avoid investment early on since cash flow is crucial. The capital should be used for expansion, not firm maintenance. Team, technology and time are the key assets that must be used well. Lastly, Company growth requires patience and persistence.”

 

 

 

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