How Moonshine Is Empowering Farmers And Encouraging Us To Rethink What Honey Is (2022)

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How Moonshine Is Empowering Farmers And Encouraging Us To Rethink What Honey Is (2022)


Entrepreneurship isn’t straightforward, however when was the final time you heard of a model that spent years bringing a few change in state legal guidelines in order that they may introduce their product? If that wasn’t spectacular sufficient, this model additionally boasts of teaching individuals, supporting native farmers and establishing their attain by promoting honey and mead.

Presenting Moonshine Meadery and the Moonshine Undertaking – millennial manufacturers that created area for themselves in a populated but uncharted Indian market that’s anticipated to achieve a valuation of INR 30.6 billion by 2026

Based by Rohan Rehani and Nitin Vishwas, these manufacturers not solely introduced again the world’s oldest alcohol (meads) but additionally raised consciousness about pure honey.  

And so they appeared on Shark Tank India!

Moonshine Meadery.
Photograph courtesy of: Moonshine Web site

Interested by this superb model and its journey? We’ve acquired you coated. 

We talked to the Moonshine staff to find out how they began the Moonshine Honey Undertaking, realized about their distinctive excursions, and their expertise on Shark Tank India. Learn on to know extra.

A not-for-profit challenge

Based mostly out of Pune, Moonshine Honey Undertaking was began as a hive-to-table premium honey model. This ardour challenge was launched to coach individuals about what pure honey regarded and tasted like.

However let’s begin from the start. In any case, we will’t speak about Moonshine Honey with out mentioning Moonshine Meadery.

Moonshine began out by creating meads, an alcoholic beverage made by fermenting honey. Whereas creating mead, Rohan and Nitin realised that business honey wouldn’t work as the primary uncooked materials for the mead. Mead requires good high quality honey as a result of adulterated honey doesn’t ferment. 

The founders determined to study bee-keeping and arrange their very own bee containers to supply pure honey from the farmers straight. This resulted in Moonshine having access to pure, high-quality honey straight from the supply.

Moonshine Meadery.
Photograph courtesy of: Moonshine Honey Undertaking Fb

They determined to check the waters by promoting small batches of honey primarily to indicate individuals what actual honey is, they usually discovered that individuals actually preferred it.

Moonshine Honey Undertaking was began within the 2020 lockdown and continues to encourage native farmers to realize supplementary revenue by turning into beekeepers. A win-win for all, together with the ecosystem!

The model additionally prides itself on incorporating sustainable practices whereas sourcing and producing its merchandise.

In the event you’re trying to turn out to be a sustainable model too, listed below are some assets that can assist you in your quest: 

It was fascinating to notice that Moonshine provided two merchandise that weren’t essentially straightforward to promote. Each honey and mead had stereotypes connected that required the model to first educate the viewers after which take into consideration conversions.

Their preliminary efforts had been centered on convincing folks that honey isn’t too candy and mead isn’t beer. With main manufacturers taking on most area within the honey market, it was powerful to get seen, not to mention garner a loyal viewers.

The model believes that India doesn’t have a honey provide challenge however has a honey demand challenge. Most individuals are unaware that business honey will not be actual honey. As a result of they’re  unaware of how pure honey tastes, they assume that it’s not their cup of tea (or mead, ought to we are saying), and  forgo shopping for honey altogether. 

This made us surprise – how would a model create consciousness and promote its merchandise in a market that lacks each consciousness and demand? Properly, Moonshine Honey Undertaking did each and grew its on-line gross sales by 20x.

Reaching nationwide with Shopify

Moonshine needed to promote its merchandise throughout India and opted for Shopify instantly. They’d entrepreneur associates who already had Shopify shops and beneficial making an attempt the platform.

Moonshine didn’t need to spend so much of assets at first to arrange an internet site, they usually had been in a position to obtain this goal with Shopify. 

The Moonshine staff has had a clean crusing with Shopify due to a number of causes:

  • It was straightforward to arrange their retailer and get it working
  • Shopify’s platform is dependable and doesn’t crash even once they obtain giant volumes of visitors
  • Cost and logistics are a breeze for them due to the integrations

However the half that they love essentially the most about Shopify? It’s Shopify analytics! 

Shopify reviews make it straightforward to trace geographical insights. The geo-analytics permit Moonshine Honey Undertaking to know the place they get essentially the most visitors or demand. This has helped the model benefit from its retailer and scale its enterprise successfully.

Although the Shopify retailer was initially set as much as promote honey on-line, the model thought, why cease there? They began promoting tour tickets for his or her Meadery via Shopify as nicely.

Involved in organising your individual Shopify retailer? Listed below are some assets to get you began:

Benefiting from the Meadery (and Shopify)

Moonshine began internet hosting meadery visits by providing tour tickets offline. The guided tour had individuals visiting the primary full-scale meadery in Asia – Moonshine Meadery. 

The behind-the-scenes entry allowed the model’s viewers to study Moonshine’s brewing course of. It additionally included honey and mead tasting periods.

The model needed to depend on third-party tour firms to enlist and purchase the registrations for these excursions. The tour frequency was much less they usually needed to promote the tour closely via social media.

Moonshine Meadery.
Supply:Moonshine Meadery Fb

However in 2021, they experimented with itemizing excursions via their Shopify retailer. And guess what? They began buying the tour bookings with little to no promotions. 

Now, they host weekly excursions via only a registration web page on their Shopify retailer that enables individuals to enter their data and guide a tour.

The tour is a good branding exercise and a direct income supply. What’s extra? It permits the model to attach with its viewers outdoors of a digital area and construct a loyal group.

Carving their very own path

Rohan and Nitin launched Moonshine Meadery  in 2018 although they began engaged on the thought in 2014. The delay was brought about as a result of lack of legal guidelines concerning manufacturing  meads in India

Nonetheless, Moonshine didn’t let this cease them. Rohan and Nitin labored with the exicse division and managed to get some readability on the legal guidelines round mead

However their largest problem was advertising, as you can not promote alcohol manufacturers on digital platforms. Moonshine’s success can principally be credited to its distinctive method to advertising.

Moonshine Honey Undertaking depends on social media training and guerrilla advertising to achieve its potential viewers. The model has tried all the pieces – from pop-ups to masterclasses, company tie-ups and tasting periods.Chances are you’ll come throughout their collaboration posts that includes manufacturers like Nomad Meals Undertaking, Subko Espresso and Pack-a-Pav. The model has additionally began the ‘Moonshine Highlight’ challenge via which they promote indie artists acting at venues the place their meads are served.

Moonshine Meadery.
Supply:Moonshine Meadery Fb

Need to know extra about guerilla advertising and promoting on social media? Take a look at these guides, together with suggestions and examples to encourage you:

All these advertising ways had been nice, however Moonshine needed one thing to assist them acquire widespread visibility and put the model on the map. Enter – Shark Tank India.

The buzzworthy Shark Tank India look

Moonshine’s televised Shark Tank India look was the speak of the city – not solely as a result of the model was pitching a uncommon alcoholic beverage but additionally as a result of they had been one of many few manufacturers who rejected the Sharks’ provide.

Moonshine determined to audition for the sequence, seeing that it’s a nice opportinity for constructing consciousness for a brand new class. The model went via a rigorous audition course of – beginning with sharing a pitch deck and video to the shortlisting interview rounds.

Their aim was to realize visibility and get a advertising push for his or her meads, not essentially gaining funding. And what higher approach to obtain this than to look on nationwide TV?

Moonshine Meadery.
Supply:Moonshine Meadery Fb

The model wowed the Sharks with their meads however sadly left the present with out funding because the Sharks’ counter-offer didn’t align with the model’s valuation.

We requested the founders why they walked away from the funding provide. “We had hoped for negotiation in keeping with what we sometimes see from personal fairness buyers”, they claimed.

However that didn’t imply that Moonshine didn’t profit from their look. They garnered a number of optimistic suggestions and, in fact, elevated gross sales. The model noticed 2 lakh guests on its website in a span of two hours after the episode was aired.

Like most entrepreneurs, Rohan and Nitin loved interacting and studying from different founders. “What was significantly good was to see that Vineetha, who has apparently been following our model for some time, gave us an enormous thumbs up on the path of our branding.”

The founders additionally had no regrets and didn’t really feel that rejecting the Sharks’ provide brought about any repercussions. “We’ve really acquired a number of optimistic suggestions for holding our floor and never decreasing our firm’s valuation simply to simply accept the Sharks’ provide.”

Listed below are just a few extra enterprise classes D2C manufacturers can study from Shark Tank India.

What’s subsequent for Moonshine

Moonshine Meadery went into growth mode in 2021 and is on the market via retail in states together with Maharashtra, Goa, Bengaluru, Himachal and Uttar Pradesh. Given that every state has completely different legal guidelines and mechanisms for alcoholic merchandise, the model is rising the mead challenge slowly however certainly. 

As for Moonshine Honey Undertaking, the model is pleased with Shopify’s conversions and isn’t trying to characteristic these merchandise on every other platform.

They’re additionally in talks with Printrove to combine their merchandise into their Shopify retailer. Having their merchandise on the identical platform as their merchandise (honey + tour tickets) would make it straightforward for his or her viewers to search out all the pieces ‘Moonshine’ with much less navigation.

When requested about their subsequent strikes, the model claimed that they’re engaged on one process at a time. One factor is for certain – Moonshine will proceed to thrive and construct its group with its distinctive launches whereas contributing to the surroundings, one jar/bottle at a time. 

And Shopify will proceed to help the model with new options and options.

Like hundreds of thousands of different companies, Moonshine discovered a dependable ecommerce accomplice with Shopify. Whether or not you want to attain a nationwide viewers or present on-line buying ease with versatile integrations, Shopify has all of it.

Arrange your on-line retailer and begin promoting with Shopify’s 14-day free trial!



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