The girl quit her telecommunications job and started a business with a green business model.

From an online idea to the first vegetable beds.

Before starting her agricultural business , Ms. Pham Hien Duyen (Dan Phuong, Hanoi) worked as a telecommunications network support employee, primarily serving local residents. This job gave her frequent opportunities to interact with farmers, observe vegetable gardens, and gradually develop a passion for gardening. Starting with small potted vegetables at home, she began to learn about plant care.

The idea for building the Home Garden model came to her after watching a video about a farm model in China on social media. In that model, each garden was numbered and monitored by cameras; customers could observe the process of caring for plants, and even animals, whenever they wanted.

Ms. Duyen envisions this as a new way to connect city dwellers with agricultural production. Instead of simply buying vegetables from the market, families can rent a private garden, choose the types of vegetables they want to grow, and take care of them themselves. If they don't have time, they can delegate the task to a service provider.

The idea became even more plausible when she realized that many urban families cared about food but lacked the time and space to grow their own vegetables. Meanwhile, back home, agricultural land still had the potential to be utilized in other ways.

Based on that idea, Ms. Duyen and her husband, Mr. Vu Cong Khoa, decided to get started. The couple rented land from farmers, established the Vuon Nha Agricultural Services Company Limited, and began experimenting with the model on an area of ​​approximately 2,000m².

The initial capital of a few hundred million dong was raised by the couple themselves, combined with a small loan from the local Social Policy Bank's preferential loan program. With limited resources, they had to carefully plan each investment item, from designing the garden frame and selecting materials for the fence to improving the soil and arranging the vegetable plots.

The process of selecting the design and measuring the area of ​​each garden plot took about a month; nearly another month was dedicated to installation. During that time, the couple took the opportunity to prepare the soil with organic fertilizer in preparation for sowing seeds.

However, the first crop of vegetables did not yield the expected amount due to a lack of experience. For someone new to agriculture, that failure was a practical lesson about the gap between ideas and production organization.

Not only did Duyen face difficulties in the cultivation process, but she also had to rethink her business model. Initially, she wanted to apply almost all the methods she had learned from China, including livestock, a separate camera system for each garden, and an online platform for customers to choose seeds and monitor their crops.

However, the investment costs, labor, and animal care expenses make this option costly. If fully implemented, the garden rental price could reach over 2 million VND per month, exceeding her target budget.

Instead of trying to invest in everything from the start, she decided to cut back on unnecessary items. The camera system was replaced with taking photos and videos to update customers on the garden's progress; livestock and other expensive amenities were put aside. The model focuses primarily on growing vegetables, caring for them, and supplying products according to the needs of each family.

This approach helps Garden House reduce capital pressure while also enabling the service to reach customers at a more affordable price.

From private gardens to green business models

With her garden rental model, Ms. Duyen targets families living in apartments in Hanoi , especially those who work office hours, care about food quality but don't have much time to grow their own vegetables.

She started introducing the service through apartment resident groups, friends, and acquaintances. Under this model, customers can rent a garden of about 20-30m² for 1-1.2 million VND per month. They can choose to take care of it themselves or entrust the entire planting, tending, and harvesting process to the Home Garden team.

For families who cannot visit the garden regularly, the company sends updated photos and videos of the care process. Vegetables are harvested and delivered to the home according to the scheduled time, helping customers be more proactive in preparing meals.

To date, the Garden House has over 50 households renting its gardens, mostly young families in the Tu Liem, Cau Giay, and Tay Ho districts. Some families even bring their children to the garden on weekends to experience planting, watering, and harvesting vegetables. Therefore, the value of the model lies not only in the food source but also in the opportunity for urban residents to get closer to nature.

Alongside her rental service, Ms. Duyen also utilizes the unused garden space to proactively grow seasonal vegetables, catering to the needs of city consumers. The vegetables are supplied to regular customers such as friends, colleagues, and residents in nearby apartment complexes.

Each week, the couple harvests and cuts vegetables 3-4 times to deliver to customers. After harvesting, the vegetables are sorted and packaged in paper or woven bags to minimize the use of plastic packaging. This method not only helps to efficiently utilize the production area but also creates an additional source of income besides the money from renting out the garden.

For Ms. Duyen, developing both activities simultaneously is also a way for the model to adapt to real-world needs. Unoccupied space is not left vacant but is still used for production, creating products that can be sold through the existing customer network.

During its operation, Vườn Nhà employs a number of local women on a seasonal, hourly basis. Although it has not yet formed a large, permanent workforce, the model initially creates more flexible employment opportunities for local women, suitable to their available time and income needs.

Financially, the couple gradually overcame the initial pressure. The preferential loan from the Social Policy Bank has been fully repaid. This is a significant milestone for a startup model built from self-arranged family capital, in a context where they had to invest in infrastructure, organize production, and find customers simultaneously.

For Ms. Duyen, what motivated her to pursue this model was not only the demand for vegetables from city families, but also the desire to help consumers be more proactive in addressing concerns about food prices and origins. When customers can choose the vegetables they want to grow, monitor the cultivation process, and receive products from their own garden, the relationship between producers and consumers becomes closer.

Nevertheless, she still has many plans for Home Garden, including investing in more technology to make it easier for customers to monitor their gardens. For now, she chooses to develop step by step, based on actual resources and customers' ability to pay.

Starting with an idea learned from social media, Ms. Duyen began with a pilot plot of land, experienced failures with the first few vegetable crops, adjusted her investment plan, and gradually found a suitable customer base. Combining land leasing with self-growing and supplying seasonal vegetables also demonstrates an effort to more effectively utilize available land resources.

The journey of "Home Garden" shows that agricultural entrepreneurship doesn't necessarily have to start with a complete model or large capital. The important thing is to identify market needs, dare to experiment, know how to adjust when difficulties arise, and gradually build a method that suits the actual conditions. For Ms. Duyen, small gardens are becoming a bridge between vegetable growers in the suburbs and urban families, while also opening up a path for economic development from local agricultural resources.