The Mamaearth Marathon - From Babies to Boomers

Start using your instincts, sprint using your experience and aim for touching the finish line gracefully

Imagine you are standing behind the starting line in a race, where other athletes have already crossed several laps, and you are just standing, deaf to the booing around you, and planning your strategy – not on how to finish first, but how to start better than the rest. This is exactly what Varun and Ghazal Alagh, founders of Mamaearth did in 2016, when they became victims of the huge gap between supply and demand of toxin-free baby products in India. Defying all odds, they entered a niche category of baby products, dominated by the likes of J&J and HULs of the world!

For those of you who don’t know what Mamaearth is (have you been living under a rock?), let us give a brief introduction to the space that the brand plays in:

Mamaearth is among the slew of new-age consumer brands - known as direct-to-consumer (D2C) which have blossomed in the last few years (Sugar Cosmetics, Wakefit and Man Matters to name a few others). These brands target millennial consumers including young working professionals with high disposable income, who are also discerning and want to experiment with a niche category. Interestingly, this is also the segment which is not looking for deep discounts, and willing to often pay a slight premium for better quality or a differentiated product – especially when it comes to health and wellness.

Started with the struggle of newly blessed parents of a baby who could not find toxin free baby products anywhere online or offline, Mamaearth is brainchild of a couple set on a mission to develop a baby-friendly brand. The motto of the brand remained simple – to reduce the parental stress & constantly improve and innovate to make the world a safer place for both the babies and their parents.

With this motto at heart, Mamaearth went on to become Asia's 1st MadeSafe Certified brand which is toxin free and is loaded with natural goodness that our babies deserve.

Mamaearth might be a new brand in a new category, but it is backed by intense research by its founders. Finding the right ingredients, the right manufacturers, interested investors, the best manufacturing practices to formulate 100% toxin-free products is easier said than done. Mamaearth started with something that many leading brands today are struggling to achieve – out of the 8000 toxins known today, almost every leading brand uses multiple of these –  the chase to reduce the usage of these ingredients is still a challenge faced by the cosmetics industry at large (how many times have we come across cosmetics being accused of loaded with lead?). The only brand in the country claiming and proving that its products are 100% toxin-free was quickly picked up by highly informed young parents of today’s Google world.

But this was just a humble start for Mamaearth! Soon, this brand started disrupting another segment – the Rs. 9000 crore skin care market. The reason to take a stab at a new market was simple. Over 50 percent of millennials suffer from derma ailments. And the doctor to patient ratio for dermatologists in India stands at 1:15 lakh. After all, besides being parents, Varun and Ghazal are also millennials and they feel their problems! It has launched solutions for acne, pigmentation and hair fall under the brand The Derma Co. Without surprise, these products also became instant hits.

Even though the company boasts of over 80 products and 200 SKUs in its catalog currently, the journey was not all a path of roses. The couple also tried to enter food and nutrition segment via traditional recipes and products (tea, supplements) for mothers but had to exit within 6 months due to their already stubborn brand perception of being a personal care brand. Similarly, venturing into beauty products wasn’t a home run in the beginning as customers perceived the products to be only for expectant moms. The mistake was, however, rectified as the company took a unisex positioning, with at least 48% of their customers being men now. The digital first decision was also a bold step as the company decided to tap into the digital customers only in metro cities initially. However, as the brand saw acceptance and became confident of its products, they ventured into brick-&-mortar stores too. Today, the brand has over 2 million customers and serves 25000 pin codes. No wonder the brand is also considering expanding to other countries.

Image: IndianRetailer

Mamaearth is our personal favorite in the start-up world because of one more reason: its understanding of unit economics! The brand is not running blindly in all directions, has a clear path set, & knows that business is not just about staying relevant but also profitable – a virtue missing in more than 95% start-ups today. As of November 2020, the brand is seeking Rs. 2000 crore valuation! What we see today in this 4 year-old brand was probably seen 3 years ago by investors like Snapdeal founders like Kunal Bahl & Rohit Bansal, and son of Marico founder, Rishabh Mariwala, who rushed to give a boost to their development. All eyes on the power couple now to see how well they manage and maintain the fast pace of growth in the coming years - for they are not in a race, but a marathon!

By: Anmol Gupta | Isha Garg

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