When do web devs start looking at query planning as an optimization area? Maybe because I work in more startup roles with fewer people, but it always feels like

When do web devs start looking at query planning as an optimization area? Maybe because I work in more startup roles with fewer people, but it always feels like a premature optimization to worry about this. Especially with ORMs generating the sql, most of the time it is just an n+1 query that needs to be fixed. I guess I can see in latency critical apps where this would be useful. My experience to date has left me wanting to try these techniques out, but never having a justifiable case to do so