In this article, we are going to look into the story of the Bihar homemaker Rekha Kumari who started a mushroom business and earned Rs.3 lakh every year. It is also an idea for many people who are interested in starting a business with less investment.
Also, it provides a good source of income for unemployed women who are looking forward to starting something on their own at home.
Know more by reading the complete story below of her and know how she succeeded.
Inspiring Story of a Homemaker Who Started a Mushroom Business
This is the story of Rekha Kumari, who is a 51-year-old, Bihar homemaker who started a business at home. Here in the below points, we are going to provide you with the complete story. Read now.
- Rekha Kumari is a housewife and also a mother of three children, she is from Hathua in Bihar.
- She was very busy until her children grew up and went out for further education after that, she wanted to use her time with some work to beat her boredom.
- Then she started searching for ideas, and one day she got to read about the mushroom business in the newspaper.
- She got attracted to it as it can be grown easily at home.
- In 2013, when she saw the potential of mushrooms, their nutritional quality, and the scope of growing them, she started reading more about fungi.
- Also interacted with many people who are growing mushrooms and discussed with them.
- At starting when she started a business, she experienced several losses, due to a lack of knowledge and proper training.
- After seeing losses she has taken training on how to grow mushrooms at home at Krishi Vigyan Kendra in Sipaya and also at Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University Pusa in Samastipur in 2018.
- After that, she started with oyster mushrooms and slowly she grew five varieties of mushrooms like Milky Button Mushrooms, Hericium Mushrooms, Shiitake Mushrooms, Paddy Straw Mushrooms, and many more.
- She started growing them in a bedroom in her house but now she grows mushrooms in six rooms in her house.
- She is now growing many varieties of mushrooms throughout the year under the registered venture Anand Jyothi Mushroom Utpadan Kendra.
Value Added Products To Increase Profits
Even she experimented with selling value-added mushroom products to increase their shelf life.
- Some of the value-added products that she produces are pickles, biscuits, mushroom powder, samosas, laddoos, and many more.
- She used to sell those products by giving them to shops and even through her center.
- And those products that she sells cost like for mushroom namkeen she used to sell Rs. 250 per kg, samosas at Rs. 300 per kg, and laddoos at Rs.400 per kg.
- After she succeeded in mushroom cultivation, she taught to train people in this cultivation as she did not want anyone to lose money like her.
- Especially for women, who are interested in starting a business, she wanted to help them by providing free online classes.
- She started providing classes to the people who are in Madya Pradesh, Mumbai, Kashmir, Andamans, and so on.
- Even she conducts paid training classes, every month at home. Since 2018, she trained 1000 people online or offline. Among them, 500 people are cultivating Mushrooms.
Key Outcomes
Even though Mushroom cultivation needs training and hard work one can adopt this just and earn a good amount of income. She says that Dr. Sanjay Kumar from Krishi Vigyan Kendra, and Dr.Dayaram Rao who trained her are the two persons who are responsible for her success.
After training with them, she never looked back. Now finally, with mushroom farming, she earns Rs. 3 to 4 lakhs per year.
If you are interested and want to learn about mushroom cultivation you can contact Rekha Kumari at 7667594296.