The funding round also saw participation from existing investors S Ramadorai, former CEO at TCS; Pankaj Gupta, supply director at USL Diageo, and some senior executives at McKinsey & Co.
“We believe the market opportunity is tremendous as men have begun investing in the products they use and the ‘graband-go’’ mindset is on the decline,” said Kanwaljit Singh, founder of Fireside Ventures, which is focussed on early-stage investments, specifically in the FMCG sector.
“With expansion into more categories and an aggressive sales team, there is enormous potential to build a large, premium brand for men’s products.” Bombay Shaving Company works on a subscription-based model and supplies men’s grooming products modelled on the US-based startup Dollar Shave Club, which was acquired by Unilever for about $1 billion last year.
The startup, launched in June 2016, makes an array of men’s grooming products, including razors, blades, facial scrubs, shaving cream, post shave balms, shaving brush, towel, travel kits, etc.
“We built this range of products last year and are present on various platforms as also channels. We have now decided to expand into more categories,” Shantanu Deshpande, CEO of the firm, told.
Bombay Shaving Company is looking to use the capital raised to fuel its branding efforts, new product development and expansion into offline sales channels like salons and supermarket chains.
The company has launched its range of exfoliating soaps for men and will expand into facial grooming through products such as face moisturiser and face wash next month. The men’s grooming category has grown over the last few years to account for 45% of the Rs 70,000 crore grooming market in India in terms of usage, as per industry estimates.
Apart from traditional FMCG players such as Emami, Pond’s, Garnier and Gillette which have been bullish on this category, Beardo and Happily Unmarried’s Ustra are some of the digital players in this category that Bombay Shaving Company competes with.
The Delhi-based firm is also set to launch its new range of beard products by winter this year. Bombay Shaving Company claims it has over 25,000 customers across offline and online channels, including Amazon, Flipkart, Nykaa and its own website, and the number is doubling every quarter.
The company claims a healthy rate of margins that has led to a five times growth in the topline, clocking an annualised revenue run rate of about Rs 8 crore. Having inked partnerships with BigBazaar and Affinity Salons, the company is targeting a revenue run rate of Rs 13-17 crore by the end of the year.
Source: economictimes