M’sians throw in support for family farm after its Twitter plea to sell 3,000 Japanese rock melons

Twitter users came through, buying almost half of their upcoming harvest.

Jean Chien Tay| September 06, 2021, 03:27 PM

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On Aug. 29, a tweet asking for "a miracle" to happen went viral on Twitter in Malaysia.

The miracle needed? Six tonnes or 3,000 Japanese seed rock melons waiting to be sold, and for Twitter to work its magic and help a family farm hard-hit by Covid-19.

The tweet was shared over 6,100 times and received 3,800 "likes". According to one of the family members, Sari, Malaysia's Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food Industries Ahmad Hamzah even paid a visit to the farm in Melaka on Sep. 4.

Sari: "Last time I used Twitter was in 2017"

After unsuccessful attempts on Facebook and Instagram to promote their rock melons, Sari and her family decided to take to Twitter to save their family business.

Speaking to Mothership, 26-year-old Sari said she only recalled that she still had a Twitter account -- the last time she was active on the social media platform was in 2017 -- when her family was trying to think of alternative ways to sell their rock melons.

After her tweet went viral, their family business appears to have picked up, as she announced in a subsequent tweet that the remaining stock has dropped to around 1,600 melons, which will be harvested in the coming weeks.

According to Sari, it was a "huge" moment that happened "fast", as she had just started to promote the family business on Twitter for less than a month.

Now, they have already sold nearly half of their upcoming harvest, not to mention that their farm had earned a visit from a deputy minister.

Idea for rock melon farm came to fruition when brother-in-law lost his job

The idea to set up a Japanese rock melon family farm only came to fruition in June 2020, partly due to Covid-19.

Sari's brother-in-law, Sayed Eryas Normayuddin, 39, found himself out of work when he was retrenched from his "comfortably air-conditioned" job at a travel agency due to the pandemic.

As he had an interest in agriculture, Eryas decided to take the leap and "turn his hobby into his main source of income".

And how did Sari come into the picture? Her brother-in-law came to her for advice and assistance in selling his rock melons, which Sari agreed to.

"Anything for family" (not to be confused with Vin Diesel memes), Sari thought then, and she agreed to help as she had a bit of experience with promoting goods online.

Another reason for the former manager at a Starbucks outlet to make a career change was that she had been let go from her job in July 2020 as well.

She has since been working full-time at her brother-in-law's venture.

Business impacted when MCO was extended

According to Sari, the business was off to a "good start" back in 2020, as retail sales for the melons were "great" initially, and they could rely on old-school "word of mouth" and "a little bit of social media" to tide through the first wave of Movement Control Orders (MCO).

However, their business was impacted when the MCO was extended multiple times. Many others suffered financially too.

Sari mentioned that wholesalers began turning to cheaper alternatives, a price competition that their small-scale family farm with only four full-time workers, three of whom are family members, was unable to keep up with.

Emphasis on "quality"

Expressing their determination to maintain the quality of their melons, Sari said they decided to utilise only half of the two-acre space that they had to plant the Japanese rock melons.

This is so that they could monitor the condition of the fruits daily even with limited manpower.

For context, an acre is roughly around 60% of a football field.

Here's a glimpse of their family farm:

According to Sari, Eryas would tend to his melons every day and trim the excess leaves to ensure the nutrients from the fertilisers will be "fully absorbed" by the fruits.

Responding to netizens' queries about why their melons were priced higher as compared to other options in the market, Sari explained that extensive care and effort were put into the harvesting of the melons.

"We aim to provide top-tier melons (for our customers)," she added, and stressed the importance of the "technique" used in growing the melons.

"Overloaded with heartwarming experiences"

Recounting her experience of trying to promote the rock melons online, Sari said it could be described by just a single word, "overwhelming".

She said she and her family were "overloaded with heartwarming experiences", as social media users whom they "haven't even met before" came together on Twitter and pooled their orders for the rock melons.

Some even paid for the melons and asked her to deliver them to "those in need". Others made suggestions on how to improve the business, such as using better fertilisers, and recommending her to switch to a business account on messaging app WhatsApp.

Sari said she "can never thank them enough", and wished she could express her gratitude to all of them in person.

Reflecting on her recent experiences, she further expressed her wish to encourage more people to work towards their goals, and "do it anyway" in spite of fear and anxiety.

Currently, there are about 1,600 Japanese rock melons left, selling at RM40 (S$12.95) for two, and RM50 (S$16.20) for three.

Orders are limited to Malaysia only.

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Top image via @sarizainal/Twitter