Dilip & Sammet Gugle: Indrani Cosmetics

After going through a tough childhood, Beauty Boss, Dilip Gugle decided to develop his own cosmetics brand and be his own boss. He researched and tested his products for 8 years until finally Indrani Cosmetics was born: a range of high-quality beauty products based in India. Sammet Gugle, his son, joined Indrani Cosmetics in 2017. After having studied (Hons) Public Relations at London College of Communication, University of Arts London, he is now driving the marketing and digital strategies at Indrani. Read on more to find out about this father-son duo and their brand:

 Can you tell us a bit about yourself and why you started Indrani Cosmetics?

Dilip Gugle was born in Maharashtra to a large family with 7 siblings. The youngest of all, he was the most determined to succeed in life. His family owned a grocery store which was shared ownership by 7 brothers including his father Takhatmal Gugle.  But unfortunately, his father lost his share of the business to his brothers who conned him out of his share and threw him out of the business. His father had to start his life again from scratch and had mouths to feed including Dilip and 3 other siblings. Dilip being the youngest sibling grew up in a family continuously struggling to reach a financially prosperous life. Coming from a humble background and having parents who couldn’t afford to send him to college, he worked hard to get a scholarship to Ferguson College Pune and Manipal Institute of Technology (MIT), India’s most prestigious Engineering University. He attained his degree in Chemical Engineering there. While in University he took part in a soap manufacturing competition, which he won, and that sowed the seeds of manufacturing cosmetics in his mind.  Despite this success, he was keen on developing his own brand and being his own boss. He researched and tested his products for 8 years until finally in 1995, Indrani Cosmetics was founded and laid the path for cosmetics innovation and high-quality products in the cosmetics industry. He started with a couple of products and soon invented and created a line of 61 products in a vast range that boasts of skin care, hair care, peel-off masks, face packs, waxes, soaps, shower gels, moisturizers, etc. Today, Indrani Cosmetics boasts of a range of over 100 products. Having such a vast range of cosmetics helps the customer fulfill their needs and issues that they might have with their skin and hair. Dilip Gugle and Indrani Cosmetics have over 2 decades of experience in the cosmetic industry.

Sammet Gugle joined Indrani Cosmetics in 2017. After having studied (Hons) Public Relations at London College of Communication, University of Arts London, he has been busy and responsible for the drastic makeover the company has undertaken since his arrival. He believes that no matter what you do or sell, you have to be different. Make the smallest things look genuine, fresh, and cool.  It’s his ethos to stand out from the competition which he has tried to bring into the company.  The new Premium Range of 44 products, their latest packaging, their change in vision, and shift in structure have been done since he has come into the business.

The reason we started a cosmetics brand was so that we can make people’s lives better through the medium of beauty and give people self-confidence, and dignity in their own body and looks, improve their outlook and showcase the qualities of Indian products on the global stage.

Can you tell us a bit more about your manufacturing process and what differentiates your brand from other companies?

Our main USP is our first-class quality, beautiful packaging at economical rates.  It’s like getting to buy a Luxury brand product at high street prices. We believe that we should not price a customer out and to cater to the vast population of India, its important our products are accessible to all and don’t burn a hole in anyone’s pocket.  Most brands first think of profits and how to squeeze a customer by giving high-priced products in small sizes.  Their packaging might be good but their prices are not.  We don’t like making the customer feel that after paying an exorbitant fee, the product he gets is unsatisfying in terms of quality, size, etc which is why we have over 7 sizes in most products to cater to all types of customers.  Our sizes are 50 gms/ml, 100 gms/ml, 200 gms, 300 gms/ml,  500 gms/ml, 1 kg/litre and 5 kg/litre.  In this way, we are able to satisfy both our retail and wholesale customers as well as salons, spas, parlors, stores, etc.

Our products are made with great care and undergo vigorous testing.  Our ingredients are sourced from the most reliable and best places. Each batch is sent for testing before it hits the market shelves.  We don’t sacrifice quality to gain quantity and profits. We would rather make a little less money than to use substandard ingredients.

What were some challenges you faced as you scaled the business?

In today’s market, there is such huge competition in cosmetic brands that weren’t there 10 years ago. Our main challenge is the lack of brand awareness as my father never believed in marketing and relied on word of mouth. We never had a marketing strategy until I arrived.  For the last 3 years, my goals have been to change our packaging, get our brand on all online shopping portals, have a vast digital presence, make our brand and product cool and make it stand out.   One of the problems in that is that I have had to take 10 steps at once to cover the distance that we fell behind with other bigger brands due to a lack of marketing strategy.  Covering all that distance in a short time in India has proven difficult due to the time-consuming nature of Indians, getting work done on time in India is an old-age hassle.  The economic challenges faced by the market due to demonetization, the introduction of GST, and now Corona has also posed huge challenges and made markets difficult.

How have you continued to engage with customers?

Our way of engaging with customers is through a multi-faceted approach online and offline.  For our retail place, we have begun to make our store somewhat of a Disneyland of beauty store. The old-age method of retail shopping is either dead or dying and customers are not that interested in going to normal stores where the products are just kept on shelves and you are attended by a store staff who asks you what you want and you buy and go.  It is important now to make the shopping experience of customers unique and interactive. Customers should feel like they are having an experience in your store and not just a routine task.  Hence we have a skin clinic, shampoo stations, and spas inside our store where customers get the opportunity to bask in our products firsthand.

For our offline work which is the main criteria in today’s world, we try to make sure we are available on as many portals as possible apart from the main online chains like Amazon, Flipkart. We also have a strong social media campaign in place with good SMO, SEO, a cool website, SERP, collaborations with beauty influencers, etc. We want to have an avalanche of presence on all digital and social media platforms.  Some of our next steps are getting the Indrani Cosmetics app for Android and Apple, getting our brand global in new unchallenged markets like Africa, South America etc.