The Problem:
In India, mental health during pregnancy and postpartum is often overlooked, with focus primarily on physical health. Despite 26 million births annually, 1 in 3 expecting mothers facing anxiety and 22% suffering from postpartum depression, maternal mental health remains stigmatized and underfunded. Parents, struggling in silence, rarely seek help due to societal pressures and lack of awareness. This gap is further compounded by insufficient training for clinicians in maternal mental health. The lack of early screening, prevention and psychoeducation leaves many parents unsupported, impacting both their well-being and their child’s development.
The Idea:
At HappiNest, our mission is to create a platform and a community that supports the mental well-being of expecting and new mothers. We offer early detection, prevention and personalized support to tackle perinatal mental health before it becomes a crisis. The goal is to reduce the stigma and ensure that mothers receive care before they reach a breaking point.
The Challenge:
We’re currently in the early stages of our journey, having achieved some initial wins and generating revenue from day one. The feedback we’ve received from those who seek our support has been incredibly positive, but the road to scaling this up is challenging. Our biggest obstacle? The uncertainty of how to make this model scalable, accessible and crucially sustainable.
Seeking Insights:
Given that this is a niche cause that may not yet be widely prioritized, I’m looking for advice from the rainmatter team and people in this community on how to scale this and secure the funding needed to keep it going long-term, without promising quick returns.
What are the most important things you look for in a social impact startup at this stage?
What would make you believe that HappiNest can grow and succeed long-term?
Are there specific factors or metrics that would make this a “no-brainer” for investment in the future?
The Vision for the Future:
In the next 5 years, I envision HappiNest being part of every hospital’s maternal care protocol in India, offering mental health screenings and education as a standard part of perinatal care. Ultimately, our aim is to reduce the stigma surrounding maternal mental health and make it as accessible as physical healthcare.
Your Feedback Matters:
I’m open to any feedback or thoughts you may have on this and would be happy to schedule a 1-1 with anyone interested in learning more about our work at HappiNest.
Congratulations @Paridhi on the launch of HappiNest!
Drawing from my experience building two health brands, I’d suggest focusing on perfecting your unit economics at this stage. Once that’s in place, scaling becomes a natural and efficient next step.
Prioritizing product-market fit and sustainability early on will save you from high burn rates and set a solid foundation for long-term growth.
This is just a thought from my journey—wishing you every success as you support parents and their mental well-being!
I’m no entrepreneur, I am a mother who has gone through anxiety and stress after childbirth, like many or most mothers I know of. I’m also curious about the solutions in this space. Firstly, platforms like HappiNest are extremely necessary in this age where information is abundant, but the right kind of support is lacking. It can have a huge impact in different aspects of life. I can share some things that helped me and some things that I felt were missing through my journey. It will touch on the accessible and to some extent sustainable parts of your question only.
Given the busy, sleepless days and nights that follow delivery, I feel that any platform other than Whatsapp is too much effort. Whether it is online consultation, or a separate app, I eventually resorted to Whatsapp groups for any kind of support. So reducing the friction is extremely crucial.
One of the biggest challenges for new mothers is navigating through the complexities the previous generations bring in. Your vision of making this part of the hospital’s maternal care is great for the long term. But if there is a way to build that trust with family members, then more people will jump onto it and makes things a lot easier. This is a complicated piece as the emotions and sentiments vary a lot across the country based on the background and upbringing.
In cases where men are open to it, loop them in. In fact, make them the drivers for mental health care. I’ve experienced and seen this with many people that once the men are on board and take that initiative, it’s a different ball game altogether. They have the power (fortunately or unfortunately is a different debate) to make things stick.
Thank you so much for your thoughtful perspective Ramya. Much of what you have mentioned is in line with our own findings from the early trials.
We have seen that cases where family or husband is involved the outcomes or compliance is much better unfortunately because of the stigma many women still chose to keep it hidden which makes it so much more difficult. And in many cases the stressors may actually be the family members.
The long term goal is to destigmatize it such that they see it as a natural part of antenatal care not something that is a taboo and cant be discussed openly hence the focus on prevention and education and not just correction.
Happy to take this discussion offline and learn more from your own motherhood experience. If you are open do drop a msg on [email protected] would love to speak more.
