In a special dialogue with Mr. DP Jhawar, CEO & MD of Proventus Agrocom Limited and ProV Foods, we explored the journey and vision behind ProV Foods, known for its diverse range of high-quality nuts, dry fruits, seeds, and berries. Mr. Jhawar detailed their rigorous quality control measures and advanced production methods to ensure consistent product quality and safety. ProV’s marketing strategy leverages omnichannel sales networks, effective digital campaigns, and endorsements by figures like Chef Sanjeev Kapoor to build consumer trust and brand recognition. Their significant financial growth, marked by a 43% year-over-year increase in sales, is driven by a commitment to quality, quick delivery times, and expanded production capacity. Looking ahead, ProV plans to focus on sales channel expansion, product innovation, and enhanced marketing efforts to sustain their positive impact on the business, people, and the environment.
Could you provide an overview of ProV and the range of food products you offer?
At ProV, we pride ourselves on offering a diverse range of high-quality nuts, dry fruits, seeds, and berries, ensuring there is “something for everyone.” Our portfolio includes over 150 SKUs spread across 7+ sub-brands, encouraging our customers to embrace wholesome goodness regardless of their needs. Our products are organized into four themes: cost, nut size, end usage, and flavor.
- ProV Select: Our economical range designed for daily pantry use by homemakers or for healthy family snacking. This line focuses on natural or near-natural produce.
- ProV Premium: This line offers natural snacking products in resealable pouches for modern, anytime snacking, featuring slightly larger-than-industry-standard nut sizes.
- ProV Fusion: Curated trail mixes of nuts and dry fruits that create nutritionally functional mixes based on the benefits of various types of nuts and fruits, offering a “party in your mouth” experience.
- ProV Flavours: For those who crave an extra zing in their snacks, this line enhances natural produce with exceptional flavors like creamy cheese or piri-piri.
- ProV Regal and Celebration: Regal offers jumbo-sized produce in elegant packaging, ideal for the Indian tradition of gifting, while Celebration adds to this with a portfolio of elegant gift boxes at various price points and combinations.
- ProV Minis: Aimed at replacing junk snacks at local stores, this line offers on-the-go nutritious nut snacks at an affordable MRP of ₹30, perfect for anytime, anywhere snacking.
- ProV Lite and Indulgence: Lite introduces pre-soaked nuts that are light and easy to digest, following the age-old tradition of soaking. Indulgence pairs naturally nutritious nuts with indulgent ingredients like chocolate to create delectable snacks.
How does ProV ensure the quality and consistency of its products? What advanced technologies and production methods have you integrated into your processes?
Ensuring the quality and consistency of natural products is challenging due to inherent natural variations. ProV tackles this through stringent quality parameters covering moisture, texture, size, and visual appeal, ensuring our products consistently meet our high standards. We source many of our primary products directly from growers and aggregators worldwide, maintaining close connections with them to secure consistent quality produce throughout the crop year.
Our quality control measures span from sourcing to final consumer packaging. We rigorously vet suppliers, ensuring they meet our specifications, and conduct fumigation, efficient storage, and hand sorting of produce. Quality checks are conducted at three stages—incoming, online, and finished products—through lab tests to ensure batch-level consistency. We have implemented multiple packaging machines for rapid, automated packing post-sorting, minimizing exposure to the elements. Additionally, we are working on automating visual sorting to further enhance efficiency.
What measures are taken to maintain the highest standards of safety and hygiene in your production facilities? How do you ensure these standards are consistently met?
We adhere to global standards to maintain the highest safety and hygiene levels, evidenced by our FSSC 22000 certification. This certification embeds hygiene, quality, and process control into the SOPs of our processing facility, with constant recording and near-live checking against set standards. These standards govern effective storage, man-material movement, manpower hygiene, machinery upkeep, and critical touchpoints for sensitive product points. We strive to exceed statutory requirements, ensuring our production standards are always a step ahead.
How do you market your products and what promotional campaigns have been most effective? Can you describe your sales network and how it supports your growth objectives?
ProV is truly an omnichannel sales company, with a presence across modern trade (MT), general trade (GT), and e-commerce (e-comm) channels. This broad approach allows us to implement holistic marketing strategies. We adhere to a no-burn policy, designing marketing campaigns to maximize sales impact.
Our marketing efforts focus on brand recall and recognition through digital platforms and performance marketing, crucial in reaching even tier-2 cities. Collaborations with Chef Sanjeev Kapoor, whose endorsement on our retail packs builds trust, have been particularly effective. Additionally, our pan-India GT network enables regional consumer recall through collaborative marketing under our guidelines and support. Chef Sanjeev Kapoor’s endorsement, digital performance marketing, and GT collaborative marketing have significantly driven consumer recall and trust.
With many players in this category, what strategies does ProV employ to stay ahead of the competition? How do partnerships with figures like Sanjeev Kapoor and KS Narayanan enhance your competitive edge?
ProV’s strategy is built on an omnichannel, minimal-spend approach, recognizing that the transition from unorganized to organized markets in our category cannot be rushed. Our long-term strategy focuses on shelf presence across all sales channels, coupled with a consistent marketing plan. Chef Sanjeev Kapoor’s endorsement fast-tracks consumer trust, which would otherwise take longer to build through quality consistency alone. His insights on brand growth and consumer preferences, along with KS Narayanan’s strategic expertise in sales and product growth, provide invaluable guidance, enhancing our competitive edge.
ProV has reported significant financial and sales growth recently. What key factors have driven this success, and how have you managed to scale your production capacity to meet increased demand?
ProV achieved over ₹300 Cr in sales in FY23-24, marking a 43% year-over-year growth. Key drivers of this success include our commitment to quality, an omnichannel approach, a large product portfolio, and quick turnaround times for deliveries to channel partners. To meet growing demand, we have expanded our production capacity by moving to a 35,000 sq. ft. processing plant with 4+ automated machines, increasing our daily capacity from 60,000 to 1.25 lakh units. We are now planning a state-of-the-art packaging facility to boost this capacity to 3-4 lakh units per day in the coming year.
With the ongoing success and developments in the health food market, what are ProV’s plans for future expansion and innovation? How do you envision sustaining and enhancing your positive impact on the business, people, and the environment?
ProV’s future growth focuses on three key areas: sales channel expansion, product innovation, and marketing. We aim to grow our general trade network with a feet-on-ground approach, ensuring long-term stability while catering to evolving sales channels in India’s dynamic consumer market. In terms of product innovation, we are developing form-changed, value-added products to capture more of the consumer’s grocery basket and improve margins. As sales grow, we will intensify our marketing efforts to build brand recall and educate consumers about our innovative products.
We are committed to leading the nuts market’s transition from unorganized to organized, educating consumers about ProV’s promise of consistent quality and diverse product lineup. Our motto, “Think Nuts, Think ProV,” reflects our mission to promote wholesome goodness with every nutritious ProV product, benefiting the business, our consumers, and the environment.
