In close to three years, RENÉE Cosmetics has broken several glass ceilings in India’s beauty and wellness retail segment. The start-up doubled its revenue to Rs.200 crores in ARR in FY22-23 from Rs.100 crores in only one year and has Priyank Shah and Ashutosh Valani as co-founders, who had, in the past, scaled up BEARDO and Villain, sold them to Marico and Mensa. Today, they are developing a firm footing in Indian beauty industry with co-founder Aashka Goradia Goble. 

Priyank and Ashish Dewan, Sales Director – Mass & International Business Offline, RENÉE Cosmetics, share a detailed discourse on what makes the brand tug at the heartstrings of its evolving audience.

Product Differentiation

Dewan has had an illustrious career of launching international brands such as Maybelline in India, Nivea in Egypt and Pakistan, and has worked across Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, UAE, and Vietnam. Returning to India, he was impressed by RENÉE’s differentiated product strategy, none of which resembled competing product verticals. Some of the SKUs that continue to define the brand today are Fab 5-in-1, a product of 5 lipstick bullets in 1; the Bollywood Filter; the PH Madness stick; and their range of perfumes. 

Retail has come a long way within the last decade, when the concept of modern trade was shaping up slowly and e-commerce was still in the blueprints for even the biggest of the beauty brands. “However, the meteoric rise of India’s ambitious startups in the last 5 years gives huge opportunity to create world-class products that are Indian at heart and cater to the country. RENÉE’s major expansion will happen offline wherein we are already in 3,500 - outlets, and will add more 50,000+ stores by the end of 2023. We are going big on kajal, perfumes, and Fab 5-in-1 in mass trade,” said Dewan.

The sales veteran praises RENÉE for not mimicking western beauty concepts and actually studying the preferences of Indian users in light of the similarly huge South Asian beauty industry across Korea, Japan and Thailand. In terms of inventory, RENÉE Cosmetics has 275 SKUs and will double the figure with upcoming launches of lipsticks, nail, and eye innovations by this year.

“We want to make every day make-up affordable for women. Our latest cosmetics range titled ‘Princess’ caters equally well to pre-teens, teen, and even a fashionista in her 40s. The South-east Asian beauty industry is currently ruled by Japanese and Korean beauty standards wherein snail white and pearly tints are popular. European beauty brands haven’t been able to grow there as strongly, and this makes brands such as ours identify and introduce such standards to our broad-minded domestic target audience much faster,” he said. 

Combining Skin Care and Beauty

Finding a product-market fit for value-conscious India was an uphill task, and Priyank is glad that the team came up with pioneering products that nourish the skin and improve the user's appearance. Innovation was the lifeblood of the organization, and experiences from the PH stick and Bollywood Filter attest to the same.

"The Bollywood Filter is a pore minimizer besides being a primer. Some of our products have compartments for daytime and night-time care, thus saving expenses on an additional primer. Fab 5-in-1 lipstick, for which we now have a patent, is highly economical compared to buying 5 lipstick shades. The PH stick, when applied, turns to a unique shade of pink depending on your pH balance," said Shah.

India is a hot country with temperatures varying significantly from North to South. Adding the diverse skin tones, preferences, and spending power of buyers across Tier 1-4 markets in North, East, South, Central, and West India to the equation compels one to strike off the one-size-fits-all mantra.

The leadership of RENÉE Cosmetics realized this and manufactured products that can handle temperature variations. "In terms of the color palette, red shades work great in the North and East, and nude shades match the West and South. This also determines product distribution and sales geographically in terms of A, B, C, and D categories. Category A achieves a minimum of Rs 2 lakh in sales, while category D has to make Rs 75,000 worth of product sales. Similarly, A-grade outlets have more SKUs per store,” Shah explained.

The brand strongly targets the mass market and has a huge cohort to cater to, with their research indicating that a working woman in India nowadays spends at least 8-10% of her salary on beauty, cosmetics, and fragrances.

Growth and Expansion Trajectory

In the case of retail, the shop-in-shop (SIS) model has worked well for RENÉE. Currently, the brand is in 1000+ SIS stores and aims to double that in a short time frame. It has 10 exclusive business outlets across India, with a strong presence in 6 airports, and aims to grow to 50 EBOs by the end of 2023.

"Right now, we have 3,500 outlets and will be available in 50,000+ outlets by the end of 2023. Online, we are already present in the United States via amazon.com, the UAE through noon.com, and Australia via amazon.au. Six months from now, we'll be in a position to start offline retail in Dubai, London, and New York," Shah maintained.

All of these estimations rely on the increasing commoditization of beauty and wellness products in India. As products are commoditized, repeat sales increase. Although there are low repeats in the beauty category, the brand is going all out to monitor customer preferences and ensure that a happy customer buys RENÉE again with upcoming classic product ranges.