Nykaa Aims At 100% Growth This Fiscal, To Open 200 Stores By 2020

Nykaa reported a revenue of 570 crore in 2017-18. The brand has been EBITDA positive for two quarters in a row. The retailer is on a path to 100 percent revenue growth in the current financial year

- Charu Lamba

In 2012, investment banker turned entrepreneur, Falguni Nayar, Founder & CEO, Nykaa.com, left the comfort of her 19-year-old job to pursue her dreams. She entered into the beauty space and launched a beauty portal, Nykaa, for the growing number of beauty consumers in India and since then there has been no looking back.

Talking about the idea of entering an altogether new space in the business of beauty, Falguni says, “I once walked into a Sephora store and was amazed by the profusion of brands, the beautiful displays and the women behind counters who offered advice, sold beauty products and helped women discover a whole new side to themselves. This and other exposures to multi-brand online retail made me realise there was such a huge gap in India with a severe dearth of good multi-brand retail experiences in the beauty and wellness space. I saw the need for a multi-brand retail format that gives unbiased advice to consumers, being able to guide them on the right products for their beauty and health concerns. It was a risk I was willing to take but, I am happy to say that they have been well-received by our customers.”

And there is no doubt, Falguni has achieved what she dreamt of. Today, Nykaa is one of the strongest players in the e-commerce space, which is all the more impressive since the portal caters to a niche category unlike others that have a multi-category offering.

“We started as a multi-brand player with 500 brands onboard. And at that time, there was no other like us. It was not so tough to attract customers and make them to shop from Nykaa.com, but at the end of the day, our private label is an incremental value add for our customer. We will never push only our private label and we continue to be a multi-brand retailer. Currently our private label business contributes less than 10 percent to the overall revenue,” says