At 17, Naavya Shah Is Building A Flour Business Where Women Set The Price

At just 17, Naavya Shah has turned a simple everyday staple into a way of creating sustainable livelihoods for women. Through her social enterprise Aata Girl, she has sold more than 3,000 kg of flour, supported 31 women, served over 350 families and generated more than ₹2.25 lakh in community impact. Scroll down to know more.

The Inspiring Story Of Naavya Shah, The Girl Behind Aata Girl

The idea began when Naavya was 13 and co-founded Dressing Hearts, an effort that collected and distributed refurbished clothes to underserved communities. During a visit to Shantighar, a women’s shelter in Mumbai, she discovered that something as basic as aata was a recurring challenge for the women living there.

“One kg of aata can mean so much to someone,” Naavya said. She initially began funding monthly donations of around 50 kg of flour using money raised through bake sales. However, she soon realised that simply donating flour would not create a sustainable solution. She wanted to build a model where purchasing flour could also directly support the women involved in producing it. That search eventually led her to women-run flour mills and inspired the creation of Aata Girl.

Aata Girl sources fresh flour from a women-run mill and aims to give the women involved greater control over pricing, customer relationships and their earnings. The model is designed to reduce dependence on middlemen and ensure that more of the value generated through sales reaches the women themselves. The venture currently handles around 30 to 35 kg of orders every week. Despite still being a student, Naavya manages sourcing, packing and delivery schedules around her school hours.

One of the women associated with the mill is Kaanchi, who moved to Mumbai from Darjeeling. When she first joined, she rarely participated in discussions around pricing despite being among the more educated members of the team. Over time, however, she began handling customer orders, coordinating deliveries and negotiating prices herself. “Watching her go from staying silent to confidently bargaining with customers, that’s the actual change Aata Girl exists to create,” Naavya said. The initiative has now sold more than 3,000 kg of flour, supported 31 women and reached over 350 families.

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Aata Girl’s Plan To Grow Across Mumbai

Naavya’s business venture work extends beyond Aata Girl. She has also co-founded the India chapter of Girls With Power, an initiative supporting young women entrepreneurs, and is working on a coffee-table book documenting the stories of six women entrepreneurs.

Her long-term vision for Aata Girl goes beyond building a single flour brand. She wants to create a network of women-run mills, with each mill supported by its own team of women delivery partners and supplying fresh, organic aata across Mumbai.

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She also hopes to take Aata Girl to quick-commerce platforms, with the aim of making it one of the first fresh, organic aata brands available through the channel. “I want any woman running a mill to be able to plug into fair pricing, real customers and real income, without needing a middleman,” Naavya said.

What are your thoughts about this venture?

Cover Image Courtesy: Supplied