 Welcome to D2C revolution by exchange for media, we are in conversation with Sathriyam Tejpande and Deepak Gupta from the Bombay Shaving Company, please welcome to the show guys. Thank you so much Javitha, pleasure. Okay, so of course as everything in the background suggests, you just recently launched Razor Pranow, what is that in mind? Three things, Bombay Shaving Company was born out of the D2C revolution of the 2015-2016 cohort of companies. So a lot of those companies were born to sell on a website, on e-commerce, they targeted certain consumers, they targeted a certain kind of communication. A lot of those brands are now 7-8 years old, they are moving into shelves, they are moving into modern trade, they are moving into Kirana stores. The way the brand sells on a 5-inch screen and the way the brand sells in a store are very different. So brands evolve, the consumer side evolve, the products evolve, so our brand is evolving and you can see that in the way we have rebranded from our identity to the positioning to the consumer group. Number two, we are launching our Razors. Razors, we always played in the Razor category but never in a very systematic way, we always had our business coming from outside Razors. But we felt that shaving is the core of our business and Razor is the core of shaving, so we cannot not have a Razor portfolio. So we have launched a sensey range of Razors, extremely well designed, crafted for young Indians who feel that they need something more sensitive on their skin, something more caring for their skin. We felt it was a large, incumbent driven category that needed a challenger brand like us to really come and participate in the company. Thirdly, we launched a property called the Barbershop which is about entrepreneurship. We wanted to combine our business and entrepreneurship in a meaningful content play and the Barbershop was that. So Razorpreneur combines all three, new brand, Razor launches on the Barbershop. They are calling everyone from India to become entrepreneurs to learn how to sell. Sell a Razor, learn how to become an entrepreneur and then become a Razorpreneur. It's a one month challenge, the people who sell the most amount of Razors become the best Razorpreneurs. They come on the Barbershop, there's a lot of cash prize we will invest in their companies when they start their companies. So there's a lot of cool things, so that's what Razorpreneurs are about. Hopefully it's successful. Of course it will be a first. Also it brings me to the question there, how important do you think, and I think people who can also definitely contribute to this, how important do you think is content creation today for DTCs for a brand good, for a customer loyalty cohort to billion? I think it's very important because the new age consumer actually want to associate with the brand at very different level, beyond functions, especially men as a consumer has always been a very utility driven consumer, right? But no brand has tried to speak to these consumers beyond utility because that's what drives the sale for them. But the new age consumers want to associate with the brand at the basic value level to kind of also, the brand is offering in terms of his self-care to the environment and also to kind of fulfill his aspiration to large extent. I think that's where the rule of content becomes important. That's why Barbershop with Shantanu, I think it's a close to one year old property but it's one of the fastest doing Indian podcast. We got like more than 1.5 million viewers, all organic, right? And a lot of these viewers are asking questions on how I can become entrepreneurs. We are seeing a lot of trials for the brand are happening through viewership on the Barbershop with Shantanu. The consumers are kind of, because they associate now with our ideology, the value system, but we are kind of working towards and fulfilling their aspirations, spreading and of education around that. And now they are coming and also trying the brand, right? I think that's a different way of building the brand and also kind of fulfilling the aspiration for these consumers. Great, makes sense. And to move ahead, you see B2C brands are now moving towards a lot of targeted marketing, marketing which is measurable, which gives them returns and tells them how much their money has made them back. Whereas earlier, B2C brands were more focused to just brand building. So why do you think brands are moving in that direction and are you also moving in that direction in life? Want to take that? Yeah, so I think the world is evolving even on that. So when we started seven years back, because I think B2C allows you to break the barriers of traditional marketing and distribution. You can target consumers one-on-one and get an instant feedback, sales also. And then over a period of time, as you build a certain cohort of consumers, you start kind of finding ways to kind of now being accessible to them at scale, where e-commerce marketplaces come into play or then over your time offline come into play, right? But I think this performance marketing or one-on-one marketing allows you to do this far more fully and also launch something faster. But I think given now, so many brands are trying to do and target the same consumer, it's getting expensive. Second is I think consumer is also overloaded with a lot of targeting, clutter, right? That's happening across the space. So that's why I said I think now even the things are moving forward, the role of and this is something we were discussing, the role of our brand engages with the consumer beyond performance marketing, beyond discounts, beyond kind of making them click on a ad becomes very important. Okay. Your on-screen presence is about 50% out of which 8% is D2C and the rest is e-commerce. So is it the same now? Has that changed and why? Look, I think broadly yes. We are half online, half offline business. Certain times of the year, certain channels obviously over index will have sales that happen on e-commerce. There is Big Billion Day by Flipkart, there is Prime Day, there is Pink Friday. So during those days or weeks or months, certain channels over index, but broadly we are a D2C company where D2C is not, we don't view D2C as a channel. If you just look at it as a channel, it's not a sizable part of our business. But it is a very sizable part of our strategic foundational pillars because that's where the brand is built, that's where the consumer is engaged, that's where insights are born and then those insights help us build out other channels as well. But like I said, when we were rebranding, we are now an omnichannel business. Anyone who wants to buy Bombay Shaving Company or Bombay needs to be able to get the product in a channel of their choice. You want to buy the D-mart, we should be in D-mart. You want to buy the reliance, you want to search for it on Amazon, we should be on Amazon. And every channel requires excellence of sales, not only availability and access, but excellence. Selling on Amazon is a skill. Selling on D-mart is a skill. It's about relationships, it's about assortment, it's about merchandising, it's about discovery, it's about being able to market on, you know, through the right media in those retail environments. It's all of that. So our focus is make the product accessible. Consumer has to have the choice, but we have to create excellence in those channels and that's the skill that we have to bring to the table. It makes sense. It is strong for you. Also brings me to a very fun question now that I just saw the recent new D-mart. I would love to know what is that old cut about, which is diagonal yet. So I did see the visual eraser kind of cuts through the company, but why just company? Why not Bombay? Everyone wants to ask this question. That's the whole point, right? Myself, I'm a lot into psychology and I love visual branding psychology of brands. So that's an area I focus on and I would love to know why you wanted to cut it through company. Why not shaving or why not... There are two three things. I think one is it is big, bold, it's challenger, it's outlaw, it's rebellious. People... This might get into a little bit of a psychological discussion because you have... But people who want to stand out, I say this in a very positive way, have self-mutilating tendencies. Pure things and tattoos. They want to stand out. They are outlaws, they are rebels. Like I have tattoos, it is a mutilating thing. Cutting the company is a self-mutilating thing to be a challenger and outlaw. It shows how much we are willing to give up to actually win, to stand out, to be someone the consumer identifies with. That's what this brand is about. Also, Bombay Shaving Company in verbal conversations between our distributors, our teams, our offline teams, our Amazon relationship, everywhere. We don't call ourselves Bombay Shaving Company anymore. It's Bombay Shaving. Yeah. I'm from Bombay Shaving. Shantanu, my friend, is from Bombay Shaving. Deepak is the co-founder of Bombay Shaving. People don't say the whole thing. People start from everything. So, these two things. But I think the brand identity is one that has to stand out. You will have a lot of consumers who may not also like it. But that's fine. Thank you. Also coming to the logical part of the logo, I would love to know from you. I think you said that with the rebranding of this, you want to strengthen your offline presence. What was on the cards now after you already rebranded it? So, I think now brand has kind of these certain skills. And I think if you look at urban India, we are probably the number two shaving company in the country. So, we already present across marketplaces, e-grossery. All the moderate in the country, right from Deema to Reliance to Metrocash and Gary to more. So, all the moderate in the country and also in GT, now present across top 20 cities and 75,000 stores. But India is a deep generated market. Still 90% of the category sits in 5 to 7 million stores. So, kind of building that distribution will be focused. Standing out on shelf is important because when consumer kind of goes to a store, you just have three seconds to scan the shelf and pick the brand. So, the brand has to be kind of visible from a distance. Retailer kind of need to really kind of see the differentiation that like why this brand is there, but it is offering to the consumer so that he picks it from the shelf, especially in general stores, consumer is not able to kind of go to the category and pick himself, where the retailer will become important. So, I think it is kind of solving lot of these things. Our ambition is to go to half million stores in next three years and kind of scale the brand far bigger than what we are right now. Okay, makes sense. And as far as I know that your core target audience is mainly in the metro cities in tier 1, but also are there in tier 2 and tier 3 cities, have you noticed that? I think it is changing. Especially post-COVID, we have seen, we used to have 70% consumers from metro in tier 1 and 30% from the lower tier cities, but now it is close to 55, 45, 45% consumers now come from lower tier cities. And that reflect in our business also in channels like Flipkart with who have a lot of lower tier city consumer base have grown significantly in last few years. Over D2CC, a lot of traffic coming from these cities. We have EBOs in lower tier cities, even cities like Indore, Kochi, you see the business in those EBOs is better than metros, right? So, I think there is a consumer in those cities who is aspirational, but maybe do not have access, right? So, has income. Yeah, has income. So, how do we kind of also make the brand available to these consumers become important? Makes sense. And coming to demographics, I think your brand also cuts across many age groups and many demographics. Yeah. Which demographic in your charge does respond the most to the digital aspect of this brand? I think 18 to 35 years is where and actually is the nature of how the online consumer is. I agree. You will find it. But given saving as a category actually cut across all the age groups. We still see kind of a lot of consumer in the age group of 40 to 45, especially for our saving consumers like our saving forms or creams because we have micro innovated. We have a saving form, which is coffee, turmeric, charcoal, aloe vera, right? So, consumers who have been bored of kind of seeing the same old white form in a can for the kids now on to kind of also experiment and kind of have some fun in there. The only grooming activity they do in the day. So, we also see a lot of consumers, but as a focus we focus on more younger consumers in the age group of 17 to 35. On one side, their brand is focusing a lot on saving and all related because that's he's right. You're right. It's all about majority of men do saving. Consider as that one main event happening in the month for their lights that today I'm going to save is going to be a different kind of a day. But when it comes to men make up, what do you think about that? Should you enter into that? Too small, too small. We are believers in participating in consumer habits that exist and making those habits as pampered and high quality as possible. We understand that men's makeup is something that is picking up. At least, for example, under eyes or foundation cream, etc. Not really makeup, but looking better at the upkeep of the face. I don't think we have a right to win in those categories to be very honest yet. We don't understand the categories yet. We are a hygiene, hair removal, personal care brand. So, it's all about sticking to it. And there's just a lot of depth that we have not achieved yet in those categories for us to kind of leave those and focus on something that we don't understand fully which is small, which the consumer is very different for. So, five years back, had you asked us this question, we might have been, you know, we are the kind of company that gets attracted to shiny new things. So, it might have been an attractive thing, but today I think we have to resist the temptation of getting into new things and kind of focus on creating depth in our own categories. And that's something that we have struggled with, to be very honest, but something that we are, you know, at least between deep up and me to make sure that the company stays honest too. And because there's just so much depth in the categories that we have, you know, lots of razors and we have foams and creams and we have women's brand and so on, there's enough to do. So, for us it will be about that. Great. Just to end the conversation, one word from each of you about your brand, what do you think, in one word? So, India's Edge. One word, my goodness, you have taken a seven year vision into one word. I think the easy answer would be challenger or outlaw. But personally for me, I think the one word that comes to mind is probably legacy. I think this is a generation of the next 30, 40 years. We are going to build, we have always built services from India for the world. We have built IT from India for the world. We have built yoga, we have built out Ayurveda, we have built out mathematics, but I don't think we have built it at scale, built out global brand from India for the world. We have some brand that are global in nature, but not a lot. I think for us it's about legacy and our legacy is building a brand from India for the world. End this conversation. Thank you so much for this. It was great. Thank you. Thank you.