The Viral Potato – The Story Of How A Potato Went Viral

At a time when sending mails has become quite an outdated means of communications, the internet world has been looking at enabling new forms of sending messages to the ones you love. Taking a page from the extremely successful idea, the Potato Parcel (based out of the United States,) a young couple, Simran and Nav, came up with a similar startup called The Viral Potato! Remember when you were a kid and sent secret notes of love to the person on whom you were crushing? The Viral Potato took this concept and turned it into an online business. The only difference? Instead of sending the love messages through notes, they send the messages on potatoes!

Picture credits: TheViralPotato

Two years ago, when Nav saw how successful the Potato Parcel was as a business, he knew he had a unique business. However, the idea was put to bed for a while and when the young couple returned to India, a random potato in the office pantry sparked it again. A scrawled number on a discarded potato inspired Nav to give birth to The Viral Potato and selling one potato at a time, the startup started picking speed. However, while sending messages on potatoes may seem like a romantic venture, the fact that potatoes could go bad was a problem which had to be factored into the equation.

Fortunately, the team had a solution for the rotten potatoes. Now, the team source special type of potatoes called “pahadhi potatoes” and ensure the vegetables they source last for 4 to 6 weeks! Once they reach their natural state of decay, the team sends replacement magnets and products as placeholders for these messages.

Picture credits: TheViralPotato

Using their individual savings as a roster for The Viral Potato, Simran and Nav have a wide array of services they provide under the umbrella of The Viral Potato. Ask them about their business plan and Nav says, “We are bootstrapping the company with the money we saved from giving consultations to big companies for over 10 years. However, we are not closed to an investment opportunity and it would help us spread  love on a potato much faster!”

With no immediate aim of switching to different vegetables, The Viral Potato team has plans of expanding their services from just providing love notes on Valentine’s Day to giving customers the option of sending special messages to their loved ones. The website is where you should go to buy these  love potatoes, “We have a website where you can buy our potato boxes for as low as Rs. 99 (plus shipping!) We have different packages for various occasions which run all the way to Rs. 299!”

Picture credits: TheViralPotato

Simran and Nav have grand plans for where they see their startup going. Ask Nav about their future plans and he quips, “We are aware of the existence of The Potato Parcel and our plans are to be bigger and better than the original brand!” The Viral Potato aims at making the world a more loveable place, one potato at a time!