Farmley walked away from a ₹350 Cr B2B nuts business to become a D2C snack brand
Thin B2B margins and zero pricing power pushed the dry-fruits supplier to pivot in 2021; by FY25 it claimed INR 370 Cr revenue and a $40M Series C.
What was changed
Farmley started in 2017 as a B2B venture fixing inefficiencies in India's dry fruits and nuts supply chain: IIT Delhi graduate Akash Sharma traded in bulk with ecommerce firms and modern retail, and built five processing units near sourcing zones and import hubs — almonds by the port for California and Afghan supply, cashews near Maharashtra's fields. In 2019 it raised $2M, and by FY20 it claimed about INR 350 Cr of GMV.
But the unit economics were fragile. 'In B2B, customers change suppliers for a 0.5% price difference. There's no loyalty. No pricing power. You're just another manufacturer,' Sharma told Inc42 — with all that infrastructure, Farmley was still a replaceable vendor in someone else's supply chain. When the pandemic shifted Indian snacking toward nuts, seeds and flavoured makhana, and quick commerce took off, Sharma asked: 'are we ready to give up a INR 350 Cr B2B business and bet on something new?' The pivot began in 2021 with a small ecommerce site and a few SKUs.
The transition cost revenue before it returned it: INR 194.8 Cr in FY21, INR 203.8 Cr in FY22, a dip to INR 169.8 Cr in FY23, then INR 230.6 Cr in FY24 as a fully D2C brand (net loss INR 26.5 Cr) — and a claimed INR 370 Cr for FY25. Quick commerce platforms like Zepto, Blinkit and Swiggy Instamart fit snacking's impulse purchase pattern; once established there, Farmley moved offline. It raised $40M in a Series C led by L Catterton and now sells in over 15,000 retail counters across India plus US, Canada and Australia diaspora markets.
Why it worked
B2B was scale without power: customers changed suppliers for a 0.5% price difference, so the infrastructure advantage never became pricing power.
The pandemic shifted eating habits toward nuts, seeds and makhana — a consumer tailwind a commodity supplier couldn't capture.
Quick commerce fit snacking's impulse purchase pattern, giving the D2C bet a distribution wedge that was 'tailor-made' for it.
Four and a half years of processing infrastructure carried over: the pivot repurposed the moat rather than abandoning it.
What can be applied
Control of supply-chain infrastructure is an option, not a moat: in commodity B2B it makes you a better vendor, in D2C it makes you a brand.
Aftermath
Farmley says it keeps its 15 best-selling products in stock across all platforms and kills slow-moving SKUs quickly instead of holding stock. Distribution spans offline, online, government networks and international markets — reach Sharma says any peer would need significant capital and time to replicate. The $40M Series C from L Catterton funds a push into the US market.