Beauty Market Faces Growing Insurgency

Why Are Legacy Beauty Brands Sparring With D2C Players?

- CHRISTINA MONIZ

While Hindustan Unilever's Lakme and Honasa Consumer's The Derma Co have called a truce in their sunscreen battle, the episode once again underlines the fact that direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands in the online beauty and personal care (BPC) market have emerged a serious threat to legacy brands.

Over the past few years, over 35 D2C brands have thronged this category, though only a few have scaled up beyond the ₹100-crore revenue mark. Only a handful—such as Mamaearth, The Derma Co and SUGAR Cosmetics—have reached revenues of ₹500 crore.

But thanks to e-commerce and social media, smaller companies can punch far above their weight. The barriers to market entry are lower; distribution is democratised and messaging is scalable.