A director of Veggie Kart, Subrat Ranjan Prusti, and (right) brand ambassador of the company Pallavi Sharda in Bhubaneswar on Monday. Picture by Ashwinee Pati

Bhubaneswar, May 5: K.C. Sahu, 72, a retired government employee who lives with his wife in the city, gets fresh vegetables every day at his doorstep. He has online vegetable selling portal www.veggiekart.co.in to thank for it.

“My son, who lives in Bangalore, orders the vegetables online and they reach my house in the evening. Sometimes he pays online and on other occasions, we pay when they are delivered at our home,” said Sahu.

Officials at Veggie Kart Marketing Private Limited said non-residential Odias have been taking advantage of their service to provide fresh vegetables to their parents staying alone in the city.

“We are trying to target these people more,” said K.C. Mishra, co-founder of Veggie Kart.

Veggie Kart, an initiative of eKutir Rural Management Services Private Limited, a social business venture and the local business partner MGM Agriventures Private Limited, has been operating this first-of-its-kind service in the state since November 25 last year.

The company held an online customer meet in the city today in which Bollywood actress Pallavi Sharda, brand ambassador of the firm, took part. Veggie Kart has been operating in the city in collaboration with the horticulture directorate of the state government.

At least 350 people buy vegetables regularly through this online portal. Besides the online selling of vegetables, the company also has marketing initiatives such as Veggie Wheel, Veggie Mart and Veggie Lite.

The wheels roam in the city — mostly in housing colonies — and sell fresh vegetables to residents. Marts located at different places provide vegetables and Veggie Lite sells the products in slums.

“We had to go to Unit-I market once or twice a week to get vegetables. But now we get it at our doorstep at a reasonable price,” said Banishree, a customer.

The company sells over five tonnes vegetables every month through its ventures and they are targeting to increase it to 15 tonnes in the near future. The company does business of around Rs 2 lakh a day.

“We are planning to expand the service by adding more wheels and marts in the city. Besides, the online service will also cover Cuttack,” said horticulture director Sanjeev Chadda, adding that there were demands from people of other cities to start similar ventures.

However, the directorate and the private firm are checking the feasibility of such requests.

Officials said that the firm gets vegetables directly from the farmers and sells them after processing them at its centre in Patia.

“We get majority of our supplies from farmers, while 10 per cent of the products are from our own farm. We need more land to expand our production base and we will do it in the coming days,” said Subrat Ranjan Prusty, promoter of Veggie Kart. More than 600 registered farmers from across the state supply vegetables to the firm.