16 Mar 2021

Turn Tissue Culture into a Profitable Venture!

Anjali Singh, MS

As a content and community manager, I leverage my expertise in plant biotechnology, passion for tissue culture, and writing skills to create compelling articles, simplifying intricate scientific concepts, and address your inquiries. As a dedicated science communicator, I strive to spark curiosity and foster a love for science in my audience.

Table of Contents

Why Tissue Culture?

Tissue culture is a promising biotechnological tool that allows agricultural boosts in several countries. It provides futuristics solutions to the hunger problem in poor or developing countries. It’s a dazzling business idea because of its outstanding end product values.

In developed countries, several tissue culture hobbyists and small-scale businesses emerged in the last few years. These people have a good grasp of the tissue culture market and its benefits. But what if you are just breaking into the field and thinking of starting your own tissue culture lab? Several questions hit your mind “will it be profitable? How much profit will I be able to gain from culturing? Will the expenses be higher than my earnings? How can I do it? What are the factors that I should consider before jumping into this field?”

If these are the questions that are causing delays in starting up your tissue culture business, this article is a treat for you! It will answer the questions and help you to accelerate your decision-making process to resolve your confusion.

Is Tissue Culture a Profitable Business?

The short answer is yes. However, this is only true when you understand the fundemental market values to culturing. If you select a plant that has sky-high demands in the market, multiply, grow, and sell it, you've got it right! This venture will fill your pockets with the heft of money. For example, the market of Iran is active in the micropropagation of ornamental plants, and the Indian market is dedicated mostly towards the tissue culture of banana, sugarcane, and ornamental plants. Culturists in these areas will be able to gain more profit than others because they are working according to the market demands.

The other way of getting command over the tissue culture market is to grow a new, exotic plant that is not commonly present in the market. This way, you can lure and pull the crowd towards your business. But remember, you should have the right idea about the market of your area and the right marketing strategy before making an investment. Yes, “market-ing” is the key!!

Prerequisites before hitting the tissue culture business

The aspect of market analysis and marketing comes later in the picture. Some front foot skill sets in the tissue culture ground include:

1. In-depth study of the national and international market

Understanding the market trend is an essential prerequisite in the tissue culture area. Though the area you cover for analysis depends on the goal of your business, ask yourself who your ideal customer is: from a village, city, a few different states, country, or international market. This also depends on the resources you have available, guiding your business to target a particular customer or demographic!

2. Proper estimation of costs to set up a lab

Before starting out building the lab, get an idea of the budget you have. How much are you willing and can invest in this business? Depending on your budget, you can map out a plan of what and when you will require for your particular lab. To help you with this, here are articles “How to build your own tissue culture lab” and “The cost of setting up your own lab” that will help you to get started!

3. Experience and skill

Nothing can be started without any experience or skill set, and the tissue culture business is no exception. You should have a bit of technical experience and hands-on skills before working with in vitro plants. This helps you to understand where you are going wrong and where you can work on and improve. If you don’t have the required skill sets, then you can also apply to some tissue culture ventures offering short training programs. These companies train the enthusiast and hobbyist like you to get started in the field.

How can you skyrocket the profits in your tissue culture business?

At this point, you know if tissue culture is a profitable business or not as well as the prerequisites to get started in this field? What after this? It’s good that you have taken the first step. Now, you have to excel in the area and gain some more profit. Here are some tips that will help you to excel in the tissue culture business.

1. Do proper market analysis

Marketing is a pack of three skills: art, science, and common sense. Giving yourself a better chance to sell your product depends on how well you understand the need of your customers and how quickly you learn to fulfill that need. In order to effectively sell your product, an expert level understanding of your demographic is necessary.

2. Improve market strategy

Tissue culture businesses make money in different ways. Some are selling plants in their own nurseries, some are working in association with other nurseries, some are selling the protocols to successfully grow plants in artificial conditions, some are training other growing culturists in the area, etc. There are so many other available options. You should cultivate an idea of how you want to move forward: what are the available resources you have, what can work best for you. After this, you create a marketing strategy to grow your business that is in line with your plan.

3. Networking and communication

It’s a most valuable skill that you should have in every kind of business. You can meet people and talk about your business. Let people know what you and your business do, giving you many opportunities to learn and receive feedback from others. Networking is a smart way to get word of mouth, create a customer base, and increase your revenue.

4. Follow up with the customers

What do you do after you have created some product demand and closed some sales? After a sale is closed, make sure to follow up with customers and ask them to leave their feedback in the form of a review. This level of outreach and attention to detail creates a relationship with the customer and shows you care about them. The more attention you give to customers, the greater level of community you will build. These customers can turn into your long-term payers!!

5. Quality and effective delivery of products

You can lure your customers with quick, effective, and quality delivery. Do not compromise on the quality of demands. The healthy development of plantlets is your goal. So, keeping good care of your cultures is a must. You can also go for custom orders in case you have the resources. These orders can generate a whole lot of money!! Take some time to think and make decisions in reflection with what you want your business to look like!

There is a lot to talk about tissue culture business and how to get started. For more information, we created a video “How to make $4000 per week with Tissue culture”. So, if you are someone who is looking for ideas to begin, this is a must-watch video for you!! We are also helping hobbyists, small-scale culturists to start their own labs. You can inquire about it at info@plantcelltechonology.com.Till then, happy culturing!!