8X 'dislikes' stable salary, returns to hometown to plant thorny trees and earns 500 million VND

(Dan Tri) - 10 years ago, despite having a stable salary of 10 million VND/month, Mr. Trong suddenly quit his job to return to his hometown to grow cacti, surprising his family.

In a garden of only about 1,000 square meters, Mr. Thai Dac Trong (39 years old, living in Chau Van Liem ward, O Mon district, Can Tho) planted more than 10,000 cactus pots of 500 different species, making it difficult for viewers to take their eyes off. To build the above garden, Mr. Trong also "shed tears" many times.

The 1,000m2 cactus garden helps Mr. Trong earn from 40 to 50 million VND/month (Photo: Bao Ky).

Sharing with Dan Tri reporter, Mr. Trong said that he previously studied Industrial Electricity and worked at Tra Noc Industrial Park, with a salary of nearly 10 million VND/month.

After 8 years of working, in 2018 he decided to quit his job and start a cactus growing business. At that time, Mr. Trong's income in Can Tho was considered stable, so his decision was met with strong opposition from his family.

"Since I was little, I have loved bonsai. When I grew up, I went to a coffee shop and saw many types of cacti displayed. I was fascinated, so I bought some to try growing. Before I quit my job, I tried growing cacti and found it promising, so I took the risk," Trong shared.

Initially, Mr. Trong used the area of ​​the porch in front of his house to grow cacti. However, due to lack of sunlight and lack of experience in caring for the plants, their growth was slow, and many plants suffered from root rot and died. Through newspapers and the internet, he researched more effective cultivation techniques according to the motto "correct mistakes as you go to gain experience".

After a year of care, from the initial 10 cacti, Mr. Trong separated 200 seedlings to plant and care for. Seeing the large number, he expanded the area to 200m2 and invested in a greenhouse at a cost of 20 million VND to sell cacti. The market segment that the farmer initially targeted was students and local people. However, the number of customers was not much, so he switched to selling online. Since switching to selling online, Mr. Trong has a large number of customers, the market has expanded to many provinces and cities across the country.

Mr. Trong finds outlets for cacti through social networks (Photo: Bao Ky).

In 2021, Mr. Trong upgraded the garden to 1,000m2, and imported many popular cactus varieties. The garden has decorative cactus varieties such as: Rabbit ears, elephant ears, Sony pillars, yellow candle pillars, ... or popular cactus varieties, small in size, beautiful flowers, affordable for students such as Gym Lobi, Echino, Aster ...

It is known that most of the cacti in Mr. Trong's garden are imported from Thailand and China. In addition, the garden also grows large, tall Kim Ho cactus to decorate the garden and villas, worth tens of millions of VND per tree.

"With imported cactus varieties, when brought back, we need time to domesticate the plants so they can get used to the climate in Vietnam, then proceed with breeding to create many new varieties.

There are two methods of propagating cacti: sowing from seeds or grafting. For flowering cacti that need to be quickly harvested, grafting is preferred. The time for sowing seeds is from 3 to 5 years to reach maturity, while grafting takes about 3-8 months," Trong analyzed.

Mr. Trong's cactus garden has more than 500 domestic and foreign species (Photo: Bao Ky).

Currently, Mr. Trong mainly sells on social networks and has customers from North to South. Prices range from 100,000 to 3.5 million VND/tree (depending on the variety and size). Thanks to that, this 8X earns 40-50 million VND per month, some months up to 60 million VND.

Sharing about his future plans, the 8X owner said he will continue to breed mutant cactus varieties to increase the quantity supplied to the market, creating products of higher value.

Dantri.com.vn