D2C's Chief Dad Being paranoid, millennial parents, Ghazal & Varun Alagh realized through their research that there was a glaring gap in the baby care industry for chemical free products, hence they ventured into baby care with Mamaearth.
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In the words of Varun Alagh, Co-founder & CEO, Honasa Consumer Limited, "When we decided to start out on the journey of creating Mamaearth, we were, firstly, starting small and secondly, the brand had a premium proposition so it wanted to reach out to only metro consumers to begin with. Hence, going online was the only available option to us. That set us on this journey and we are glad that we chose this path." Being paranoid, millennial parents, Ghazal & Varun Alagh realized through their research that there was a glaring gap in the baby care industry for chemical free products, hence they ventured into baby care with Mamaearth.
After a year of launching baby care, parents started enquiring about toxin-free products for themselves as well and that's when they diversified into personal care products for adults as well. What started as a brand with six baby products expanded into a portfolio of 200+ products across personal care. While they were busy growing Mamaearth, they realized consumer demands for personal care products varies depending on the life stage and challenges that they are facing. Hence, this gave them an insight into the changing need spaces of the consumers that led them to building the house of brands strategy with The Derma Co, which is an active based brand, followed by Aqualogica - a brand based on hydration to Ayuga presenting ayurveda for millennials. "As a company, we are committed to solving problems of millennial consumers at various life stages. Also, we have acquired two brands that complement our portfolio with a very different product proposition- Dr. Sheths and BBlunt," avers Alagh.
Through their D2C channel, they are connected with consumers directly that helps them with first-hand information on what they like or dislike and track demands. While diversifying the portfolio of brands has been a focus for the last 3-4 years, their depth of innovation has been built on data led insights.
The group retails across all leading e-commerce platforms like Amazon, Nykaa, Flipkart, Purplle and others. For the launch phase, they actually rely on their own channel as that helps them connect with the consumers directly and seek feedback on the product performance. Talking about the initial launch phase, Alagh states, "We spent almost two years just researching on the white space and working on the product portfolio. We spent a lot of time working with partners to create a portfolio of products that could clear the stringent testing standards by MadeSafe as that was going to be our primary differentiator for baby care products." While India is and will continue to be their focus market in the medium term, the intent is to expand its presence in certain international markets, such as United Arab Emirates, Nepal and Bangladesh.
FACTS:
>> Online platform resulting in maximum revenue: D2C is the leading online channel
>> Turnover for FY 2022- 23: INR 1000 Cr
>> Split between offline and online sales: Offline is 35%
>> Year of Inception: 2016 >> Team size: 750+
>> Customer Repeat ratio: 35%
