Ben O’Connor, aged 16, from a dairy farming family in Co. Down, is already a serial entrepreneur. He set up his first business, a firewood venture, at 11, and at 13 founded Giftery, a mail-order gift basket business that went on to sell 200,000 gift boxes within three years. His latest project, FarmFlow, is farm management software he plans to make available for free, with a free tier always on offer. In an interview with Agriland, Ben O’Connor said: “This year I set up FarmFlow.” The product is in a “long soft launch” and will relaunch in August with offline use.
How did Ben O’Connor sell 200,000 gift boxes at 16
Agriland reports that O’Connor’s first “major” business was Giftery, a mail-order gift basket venture. It was set up when he was 13, and it went on to sell 200,000 units within three years.Running the business came with challenges. “It can be hard to get respect when you’re a lot younger than the people you’re going into meetings with,” O’Connor said. Agriland adds that the Giftery experience did teach him to “not give up”.On his latest project, O’Connor said: “This year I set up FarmFlow.” According to Agriland, the product aims to manage tasks for farmers or, in his words, “to try to solve problems with a farm”. He named issues as wide-ranging as relief milkers, feed rations and livestock weight tracking, saying “there’s no real thing that brings them together”.He said FarmFlow “learns over time” and is “intended to adapt towards the farm”. The product is in its early stages but is usable at present, and farmers are invited to take part in a “long soft launch”. O’Connor said: “The system can hold only so many, so we’re sort of trying to keep numbers limited while we further test it.” He added that, once it is fully launched, “anyone who wants it, we would be more than happy to have them”.
How will FarmFlow work offline on farmers’ phones
One planned feature is offline use. O’Connor said the app is currently web-based for demos but will relaunch in August, working offline with data stored locally within the phone. He said operational data is encrypted and “never leaves end-to-end encryption”, adding: “We’re figuring out how to make it better.”O’Connor plans for FarmFlow to be “completely free”, though there will be “revenue models in it”. He said: “There’ll always be a free tier available because I understand the problems that many farms have with cash flow.” Agriland reports that paid-for features are planned for the full launch. O’Connor also has his GCSEs ahead of him and an apprenticeship starting in September, but says FarmFlow remains “a priority”. “I’m just trying to balance those things at the moment,” he said, adding: “I’ll always be entrepreneurial.”
