With the festive season right around the corner, brands are already gearing up. That means testing flows, cleaning up tech stacks, and figuring out the right copy and discounting strategies. And while there are a lot of people behind a great festive season, the magic usually starts now.

So we put together a newsletter that’s equal parts helpful and honest — the good, the bad, and the “you need to fix this ASAP.”

What’s Inside:

• How GPT-5 can be your unfair advantage this festive season

• A critical Shopify update that could derail your entire retargeting funnel 😬

• A D2C job board with some of the hottest openings in the space

But first — Shopflo’s report card

(please sign and return 📝)

⏱ 7,534+ hours saved for Indian shoppers
💰 ₹282 crores in additional revenue across 1,000+ brands
(~30% jump from June)

ChatGPT-5 and how to use it this festive season

The rollout of GPT-5 isn’t just for tech bros.

It’s like getting a content writer, brand strategist, and data analyst — all in one. And this time, it’s smarter at handling brand voice, analytics, and campaign planning.

Here’s what makes it useful for D2C teams:

1. Smarter, faster campaign planning
Switch between writing Instagram captions, drafting email flows, and analysing drop-off data — all in one thread.

2. Better data insights
Less hallucination = more trust. Feed it 6 months of your campaign data, and get real analysis on CAC vs. LTV or AOV uplift.

3. Brand-safe tone lock
Define your tone once — witty, premium, Gen Z — and GPT-5 sticks to it across LinkedIn posts, WhatsApp retargeting, and festive pitch decks.

4. Creative + copy, together
Upload an ad screenshot and ask GPT-5 to:

• Suggest high-impact edits

• Adapt the message by audience

• Spin out 3 versions for Meta, Google, or WhatsApp

5. Faster creative testing
The new “safe completions” system means fewer annoying refusals, and more bold, compliant creatives.

6. Heads-up: Slight tone shift
GPT-5 can feel more “formal” than GPT-4o by default. So if you want cheeky, make sure to set that tone early in the chat.

Also yes, it helped us write this newsletter.

🚨 Shopify Update: Your Retargeting is in DANGER

Starting 28 August 2025, Shopify is removing additional scripts from their Thank You Page.

Yep — the section where your retargeting and post-purchase flows get triggered.

No UTMs, no triggers, no CRM handoff. Just a broken funnel right before Diwali sales kick in. Not great.

Luckily, the Shopflo Thank You Page has you covered:

• Works with Meta, Google, Snapchat, WebEngage, GA4 — no code rewrite needed

• Tracks UTMs, cart contents, and payment info — just like before

• Secure & privacy-first — no risk to PII

• Zero-code migration — just send us your scripts

And in true Shopflo style, you don’t just get the bare minimum.

So, while you prep your storefront and ad creatives — don’t ignore the last step. Fix your Thank You Page before it tanks your entire festive funnel.

💼 D2C Job Board

1. The Sleep Company- Performance Marketing Manager

2. Nap Chief- Social Media Manager

3. Two Brothers Organic Farms- Project Manager

That’s all for this edition of the newsletter. Let us know what you liked and what you HATED.

So stay tuned!

See you next month!

Until then 💛,

Stuti

PS: This is every D2C marketer each festive season.

Another month, another (fashionably late) edition of the A2Z of D2C.

This edition we bring to you, some very exciting updates. One, about our new product, and another on how one of our products are doing. Along with that, some really fun ads, I am affectionately calling this edition the Alice in wonderland edition, ONLY because of the Ad-miration club. But I’m getting too ahead of myself.

Here’s what you’ll find in this edition of the newsletter:

1. News on how one of our best features just got better.

2. A look into how brands have been able to unlock revenue with Shop Pass.

3. Some sneak peaks into who’s hiring for your next big break!

Curated with 💛,
Stuti

But first, let’s take a quick peek at what June looked like for Shopflo.

Shopflo Report Card

6278+ hours saved for Indian D2C shoppers in the last month

Rs.271 Cr in additional revenue for 1000+ D2C brands

The Latest and Greatest from Shopflo

Here are the latest drops from Shopflo that will help you create experiences your audience will love (and pay for).

The New Analytics Tab

🧩 Deep-dives into Conversions, Payments, Orders & Discounts

Each section comes with detailed analytics to help you understand what’s working, what’s not, and where to act.

🛒 New Checkout Funnel

A fresh view of your checkout funnel that tells you exactly where users drop off: checkout started → login → address → payment → order placed.
Fix the cracks in your funnel before they cost you more.

🌊 Shopflo Impact

We want you to get the most out of your Shopflo fee. That’s why we added Shopflo Impact badges, clear indicators of the revenue we’re helping you unlock.

📊 Better charts, smarter views

Compare trends over time, break down performance by channel, and spot red flags instantly.
Looks cleaner, works harder.

Get started now

Maziken’s recovered ₹1.1L in lost revenue in just 7 days.

Here’s how.

Mazikien identified a gap in converting high-intent anonymous users—particularly those dropping off from product, cart, or checkout pages. They had the following challenges:

• High daily website traffic (~1,500 users), but only 3% were reaching the checkout stage.

• A conversion rate aligned with fashion D2C norms (1–2%), but given their traffic volume, Mazikien knew there was room to improve.space where they can share any extra information with the brand.

Shopflo introduced Shop Pass, enabling seamless logins that convert unknown visitors into known users—unlocking deeply personalized retargeting.
By leveraging behavioral signals, Shop Pass identifies and tracks user journeys that would have otherwise remained anonymous.

Limechat then triggers smart, conversational nudges based on the user’s drop-off point, presenting exclusive, personalized offers.

Together, this combination allowed Mazikien to deliver timely, relevant messages that brought users back to complete their purchases.

Check it out

“Ad-miration Club”: Down the Rabbit Hole

In a world where every brand says the same thing with the same influencers, standing out is harder than ever. What if we flipped the script and spoke about our products in a surprising, subversive way?

This idea isn’t new. Remember the iconic Happydent ad? Indian advertising has always embraced absurdity. It just feels like the internet has finally caught up.

1. Shark Tank India

To announce registrations for Season 5, they took the idea of a corporate slave to the next level. A dramatic plea asking CEOs to work overtime and not apply somehow became a compelling message.

2. Swiggy

An AI-generated video featuring a man on a flying elephant surrounded by men in black. Whether it’s about the savings from Swiggy BLCK ONE or finally affording premium AI tools, the result is strange but memorable.

3. Palace x Gucci

For the last one, we bring to you an international feature. A flying house. A room full of puppets running an ad agency. Just chaos and charm that somehow land.

None of these ads particularly showcase their products. Yet the message is clear.
Maybe it’s time to take one of your products and tell its story in a totally unexpected way. See how it stacks up against your usual benefit-driven ads.

D2C Job Board

Looking to make your mark in the D2C world? Take the leap and apply now. All the best!

1. P-Tal- E-commerce Operations Executive

2. The Sleep Company- Senior brand manager

3. Dot & Key Skincare- Brand Marketing (influencer and collabs)

4. RENÉE Cosmetics- Assistant Manager NPD(Color Cosmetics-Ahmedabad)

Want to feature your job openings here? Reply to this email or DM me on LinkedIn.

That was it for this edition of A2Z of D2C! Let us know what you liked and what you HATED. We have a lot more up our sleeves, when it comes to the product and this newsletter.

So stay tuned!

See you next month!

Until then 💛,

Stuti

Imagine this: a customer opens your shopping website and it not only understands what they want, but when, why, and how they want it.

From letting customers try on outfits virtually to finding the best deals in their sleep, Google’s new AI Mode proves the future of shopping is here. Then there’s ChatGPT, offering personalized product picks. Add to that Amazon Rufus digital agent with a ‘Buy for Me’ mode that lets users shop beyond its own platform. It’s clear that AI is rewriting the rules of retail.

It’s exciting, no doubt. But let’s pause for a second — where does that leave your Shopify storefront?

Not obsolete. Not in India. Not yet. Let’s keep it real. These flashy AI shopping experiences are still in early stages and mostly geo-fenced to the US. They’re not replacing your online store anytime soon.

And even if (read: when) they do arrive here, the real questions will be:
Will they reduce RTOs or make them worse? Will they drive prepaid orders or just lead to more impulse-driven COD returns?

The truth is, no one really knows. But here’s what we do know: AI tools that already work in the Indian context, for real D2C businesses, right now. Like DisCo, Shopflo’s AI-powered discount assistant (currently in beta). It helps you create, manage, and optimise personalised discounts effortlessly.

Another important takeaway from these global trends? Personalization isn’t just the key, it’s the whole door. And yes, we took notes, seriously! (on our cart).

Here’s what you’ll find in this edition of the newsletter:

• Learn to win your customers’ hearts (and wallets) with tools that help you personalise their shopping experience

• Mumbai event for founders hustling with big dreams: Go beyond the usual dashboards and uncover hidden insights that your tools aren’t telling you.

• Curated list of cool ads to take inspo from: Trust us, your founder will love the fresh marketing moves you bring to the table. No need to thank us 😉

• Eyeing your next big break? We’ve handpicked relevant D2C jobs you might’ve missed but definitely shouldn’t.

Curated with 💛,
Soundarya Athimuthu
Content Writer @ Shopflo

But first, let’s take a quick peek at what Shopflo achieved in May.

Shopflo Report Card

5708+ hours saved for Indian D2C shoppers in the last month

(10.2% increase from April 2025)

Rs.268.7 Cr in additional revenue for 1000+ D2C brands

(10.1% increase from April 2025)

Mumbai event you don’t want to miss

What if the biggest leak in your funnel isn’t showing up on your dashboard?

It’s not about tools or metrics, it’s the insight you didn’t even know you were missing. That’s why Limechat and Shopflo are hosting a power session for D2C founders in Mumbai: “What Your Tools Aren’t Telling You.”

Join 25+ fast-scaling founders for an evening of honest, no-filter growth talks, uncover hidden blind spots, and hear real tactics that actually work, all while enjoying great food.

If you're serious about scaling your brand, this is the place to be. While this is an invite-only event, we've saved a few passes exclusively for our newsletter readers.

📍 Mumbai | June 5 | 6 PM

Register now: https://tinyurl.com/shoppassbyshopflo-x-limechat

The Latest and Greatest from Shopflo

Here are the latest drops from Shopflo that will help you create experiences your audience will love (and pay for).

Time to experiment with “Experiments”

Tired of making changes and just hoping they work? That might be acceptable in life in general, but not at checkout. That’s why we built Experiments, think of it as your own A/B testing engine for checkout.

Want to see if that new discount actually boosts conversions? Or if that CTA text/colour makes a real difference? Set up your test, define traffic splits, and let the data do the talking. No more guesswork. No more hunches. Just clear, actionable insights.

Get started now

Cart Notes: The Sweetest add-on yet (Note: It’s made with love)

Whether it’s a birthday wish, festive message, delivery instruction, or a cheeky “don’t open till Friday,” your shoppers can now leave notes directly in their cart. This is also a space where they can share any extra information with the brand.

Introducing Cart Notes, designed to make your customers love you more. You’ll see these notes directly on your dashboard, making it easier to fulfill orders with a personal touch. Set your own price, tailor the experience, and make unboxing extra special for your customers. We truly believe small notes can bring big smiles.

Get started now

“Ad-miration Club”: D2C ads that deserve a standing ovation!

Bold Care Nails Bold Marketing

Bold Care tells you to be bold and actually walks the talk. They nailed the timing, riding Samay Raina’s comeback after the India’s Got Talent controversy to promote condoms on Raj Shamani’s podcast. Smart, cheeky, and fearless. That’s how you turn buzz into brand power.

Garnier’s Roast-to-Revenue Marketing

Garnier turned a viral joke into a winning ad by cleverly flipping comedian Anubhav Singh Bassi’s roast of face washes. They brought him face-to-face with John Abraham, turning critique into collaboration. This smart move not only addressed the joke head-on but also showcased the product’s benefits with relatable humor and star power.

La Shield’s Sunscreen Day stunt

La Shield went all-in for Sunscreen Day turning its entire feed purple to make you stop, stare, and rethink sun protection. This purple alert campaign nailed grabbing attention while driving home the hidden dangers of UV rays. Impossible to scroll past right?

D2C Job Board

Looking to make your mark in the D2C world? Take the leap and apply now. All the best!

Conscious Chemist - Head of Marketplace

Orange Sugar - Ecommerce Specialist

Healthify - Sr. Director of Marketing

Want to feature your job openings here? Reply to this email or DM me on LinkedIn.

That’s all for now but not for long. We’ve been cooking up something big behind the scenes, and let’s just say… Shopflo 2.0 is almost ready to make some noise.

Stay tuned.

See you next month!

Until then 💛,

Soundarya Athimuthu

At Shopflo, we’re always talking about how you can delight your customers with innovative products we build for you.

But this May, we may have flipped the script. We may have built something with you. And you may just fall in love with it. (Okay, enough with the “mays” — you get the drift.)

We are talking about Shopflo app store, our token of love for you (More deets inside 👀)

Here’s everything you MAY find in this May edition:

• You may catch the highlights from "To Raise or Not to Raise", the fiery debate event we hosted in Delhi last month.

• You may learn how Shop Apps can enhance your Shopflo experience.

• You may just find THE job you’ve been eyeing at some of the top Indian D2C brands.

• And you’ll spot ads you may not want to miss — because we know creativity is 20% using your brain and 80% getting inspired by the best. (who said? someone important in the marketing world we may never know)

We may now proceed to know the updates in store for the month. (Okay, this is the last time I'll use “may” – I promise! 😉)

Curated with 💛,
Soundarya Athimuthu
Content Writer @ Shopflo

But first, let’s take a quick peek at what Shopflo achieved in April.

Shopflo Report Card

5180+ hours saved for Indian D2C shoppers in the last month

244 Rs. Cr In additional revenue for 1000+ D2C brands

An event worth remembering – ‘To raise or not to raise?’

Last month, we organised ‘To raise or not to raise’ in Delhi. How was it?

Think of it as Shark Tank... if the sharks and founders got real over coffee. No pitch decks, no filters, just raw stories from the D2C trenches.

The event steered clear of clichés and easy conclusions. Instead, it offered raw, real-world perspectives and candid reflections on risk, resilience, and the realities of building something from scratch.

Founders Ajay Thandi (Sleepy Owl Coffee) and Shamika Haldipurkar (d’you) brought two radically different and equally compelling perspectives to the table.

Ajay shared how external funding can fuel a brand’s big leap, while Shamika offered a masterclass in building a profitable, bootstrapped business with patience and product obsession. Team Investors with Archana Jahagirdar (Rukam Capital) and Sanil Sachar (Huddle Ventures) didn’t sugarcoat a thing.

From what they actually look for in founders to why saying no to capital can sometimes be the smartest move — even when the money's on the table — their takes were sharp, honest, and, yes… a little controversial. And we loved it.

Here are the key takeaways to ease your worries about not being in the room:

• Funding is a tool, not a mandate or a badge of honour. Bootstrapping can turn scarcity into strength, pushing founders to build lean, focused, and fundamentally healthy businesses.

• Building a “pull” brand (one with strong recall that attracts customers organically) and understanding your industry are key to long-term success, regardless of funding.

• Investors bring more than just money, but their value varies: Good investors can offer guidance, strategic input, and even emotional support.

Still feeling FOMO? Next time, be in the room.

But for now, don’t worry; clips from the event are coming soon on our socials.

The Latest and Greatest from Shopflo

Shopflo's App Store Experience

Tired of long sales calls just to understand what a feature does?

Shopflo App store is a one-of-a-kind experience on Shopflo where merchants can explore, select, and manage the best of Shopflo’s features— all from one powerful dashboard.

Just like your customers browse and pick their favourites on the Play Store, now you can explore and choose the best of Shopflo on our very own App Store. Whether it's upselling, letting customers choose their freebies, or enabling one-click add-ons like insurance or gift wrapping — we’ve got all the features listed on the app store.

It's never been this easy (or this fun) to power up your store.

Get started

Suggest a new feature right on your dashboard!

Just to be clear—you do know we're serious about building with you, not just for you... right? We always keep you in mind every time we come up with any product or feature (not in a creepy way, of course).

That’s why we’re rolling out a shiny ‘Suggest a new feature’ form right inside your dashboard! Now, you can easily raise feature requests, track their status in real-time, and see exactly what's being picked, built, or paused—with full transparency.

Bonus? You’ll get notified at every stage of the journey. Thanks for helping us build something better — Shopflo truly belongs to you.

Get started

“Ad-miration Club”: D2C ads that deserve a standing ovation!

D2C brands, take notes! At the Ad-miration Club, we spotlight ads that turn heads and set new standards for creativity and impact.

Bring out your finest campaign by Daawat

This ad is a masterclass in emotional branding. It proves that even everyday products (like rice!) can feel magical when wrapped in love, care, culture, and nostalgia.

Unlike the usual "celeb holding product" trope, SRK plays a character in a story. He doesn’t treat food as just a meal but as a love language. It feels less like an ad and more like a film — keeping you engaged till the last grain (pun intended).

Samsung Bespoke Cordless stick vacuum cleaner ad

Who needs civil engineers when your vacuum cleaner can fix world wonders? Let me explain.

In one of the boldest CGI stunts we’ve seen lately, Samsung (almost!) straightened the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Yes, you read that right. They did it with the sheer power of its Bespoke Cordless Stick Vacuum Cleaner.

It’s outrageous, over-the-top — and totally unforgettable. What makes it work is the visual exaggeration: it doesn’t just tell you the product is powerful, it shows you in a way that’s impossible to ignore. For D2C brands, the lesson is clear: go big, go visual, and don’t be afraid to turn your product’s strength into a full-blown spectacle.

Krackjack’s Sweet & Salty April Fool’s Prank

Krackjack’s April Fool’s prank campaign, which hilariously hired a "Sweet & Salty Officer" was a crazy hit that added the perfect maska-chaska to their brand!

The quirky idea of appointing someone to ensure the perfect balance of sweet and salty in the biscuits grabbed attention with humour and surprise, making it a great fit for April Fool’s Day. The campaign worked because it was timely, humorous, and highly shareable, capturing the essence of the brand’s playful personality.

D2C Job Board

Here are this month’s top job opportunities in some of the best D2C brands! Apply now, and let us know if you get selected — we’d love to celebrate with you!

Ambrane India Product development manager

Two Brothers Organic Farms Chief of Staff- Revenue and Growth

Traya CRM Manager

Want to feature your job openings here? Reply to this email or DM me on LinkedIn.

That’s it for now! We’d love for you to explore our new features and let us know what you think. Got feedback about the newsletter? Just hit reply—I’m always up for a good chat.

See you next month!

Until then 💛,

Soundarya Athimuthu

March was an incredible month for us — with our latest launch, Shop Pass, you can now turn invisible website visitors to invaluable customers.

And no, this isn’t an April Fool’s joke.

Shopflo’s been helping hundreds of brands extract more $$$ from shoppers since 2021. Well, we took that one step further and can now help you extract more shoppers out of your website visitors.

This April edition is in full bloom, and here’s what we’re springing forward with:

🤝An exciting networking opportunity in NCR to meet fellow D2C founders and investors.

👀💰Shopflo’s latest launch will help you turn anonymous website visitors into paying customers.

🤩👌Amazing D2C ads to take inspiration from (read: ideas worth stealing)

💻D2C job openings – Your dream role might just be a scroll away.

And many more.

Alright, enough teasing! Scroll down to dive into the latest from our checkout world!

Curated with 💚,
Soundarya Athimuthu
Content Writer, Shopflo

Before we jump into all that, here’s a quick look at Shopflo’s impact in March:

Shopflo Report Card

5741 hours

saved for Indian D2C shoppers in the last month (3% more than Feb 2025)

Rs. 271 Cr

In additional revenue for 800+ D2C brands (3.4% more than Feb 2025)

An Event You Can’t Miss — To raise or not to raise?

If you live and breathe D2C and love a good, unfiltered debate, block your calendar.

April 17, 6 PM, South Delhi—this is the place to be.

India’s top D2C founders and VCs are coming together under one roof to answer the one question every founder has about startup funding. Should I, or should I not raise money? Expect nuanced revelations on topics like:

• The more you raise, the less you own—so how much control should you be willing to trade?

• As a bootstrapped founder, you're only accountable to yourself. But doesn’t a little external pressure help you grow?

• How do you know what the best funding decision is for your organisation?

Ready for an entertaining debate that’ll also give you clarity on the best path to scale your brand? No PR-safe answers, no sugarcoating—just raw, real insights you can act on.

Spots are limited, so RSVP now.

Register here

The Latest and Greatest from Shopflo

Drumroll, please… Here are some BIG releases from Shopflo that are sure to lead to bigger results for you!

One Click Add-on

Ever had that moment at checkout when you wished you could add just one more thing—a gift wrap for a birthday order or insurance for peace of mind?

‘One Click Add-On’ makes that possible, letting shoppers enhance their purchase in seconds. No extra steps, no second thoughts—just a seamless way to personalise their order while boosting your AOV and conversions.

Get started

RTO Smart Automations

You know, with the RTO Intelligence suite, we have the superpower to identify risk scores and keep scam COD orders at bay.

But now, we have one more up our sleeve—the ‘RTO Automations’ feature, which can automatically block and restrict high-risk COD orders using smart rules based on cart value, product type, UTM source, pincode & many more.

Get started

Freebie Selector

Everybody loves freebies, but nobody wants to feel like the brand just handed them something they couldn’t sell—like a leftover piece they wanted to get rid of.

With ‘Freebie Selector’, customers get to choose what they want—whether it’s a specific shade, product type, or variant that suits their preferences—making them feel delighted, not disappointed.

Get started

Shop Pass by Shopflo

Every day, countless shoppers visit your site, browse, and leave—some disappearing into thin air without a trace. But what if you could bring them back?

Meet Shop Pass, Shopflo’s powerful new product that does just that:

• Converts anonymous visitors into known customers

• Turns invisible clicks into real revenue

• Uses smart retargeting to transform “maybe later” into “buy now”

With Shop Pass, no more ghosting from high-intent customers—just more conversions, more sales, and more money in your pocket.

Learn more

Something big is on the way… and it’s not just any app. Keep guessing or reach out to us to know about it.

“Ad-miration Club”: D2C ads that deserve a standing ovation!

Remember when we said we’d round up the best D2C ads? Well, we kept our word and did our homework—welcome to the ultimate Meta ad hall of fame! Here’s what your peers are doing right—and what you can learn from them!

• The #ChoiceIsYours campaign by Rhea Kapoor x Zouk nails aspirational storytelling—it’s not just selling bags, it’s selling empowerment. By featuring influential women who embody strength and individuality, Zouk creates deep emotional resonance, turning a product into a statement.

• It all started when a content creator confidently mispronounced "croissant" as "Prashant," and the internet did what it does best—turned it into a full-blown meme fest. And Britannia? They went all in, rebranding their croissant, tweaking the packaging, and transforming an internet joke into real sales. Now that's a marketing masterclass D2C brands can learn from!

Here’s how the small business Ovenly India jumped on the trend and gained attention.

• Traya’s influencer marketing is like that brutally honest bestie who calls out your hair struggles, cracks a joke, and then actually helps you fix it. No wonder their reach is growing, just like the hair they’re saving!

• You don’t always need to sell. Sometimes, heartfelt storytelling and celebrating emotions around special festivals create the most memorable branding. Mamaearth’s Holi video and Diary milk’s ad prove that a little kindness goes a long way!

Spotted (or made) a killer ad? Send it over, and we might just feature it next!

D2C Job Board

Bridging the gap between D2C talent and opportunity like it’s our major mission—because we know great teams build great brands. Last month, we listed cool opportunities from Dot & Key, Supertails, Peesafe, and Minimalist. Happy to share that some of those openings were closed.

Here are this month’s job openings:

• The Sleep Company - Ecommerce Executive

• Nestasia - Performance Marketing Manager

• Mother Sparsh - Assistant Manager, Ecommerce

Want to feature your job openings here? Reply to this email or DM me on LinkedIn.

And that's a wrap! But before you go, tell us—what’s on your mind? What else would you like to see in the next edition? . We pride ourselves on the fact that our customers shape our product; there's no reason our audience shouldn’t shape our newsletter. So just hit reply and send it my way!

See you next month!

Until then 💚,

Soundarya Athimuthu

Thanks for reading a2z of d2c by Shopflo! Subscribe for free and get future editions sent straight to your inbox.

Subscribe now

A2Z of D2C, our dear old newsletter, had drifted out of sight in our endless list of priorities. But now, we’re bringing it back.

Why should you care? Excellent question!

Here’s what you’ll find in this edition of the newsletter:

• Top D2C agencies to help you fast track your growth

• New strategies to make more money lose less money?

• Relevant job opportunities in Indian D2C brands

• And more…

Let’s dive in, shall we?

Curated with 💚
Murugappan Meiyappan
Marketing Manager @ Shopflo

Shopflo Report Card

5,573 hours

saved for Indian D2C shoppers in the last month (6% more than Jan 2025)

Rs. 262 Cr

In additional revenue for 700+ D2C brands (5% more than Jan 2025)

Agency Spotlight

Shopflo can help you squeeze out more conversions from every corner of your Shopify store, but there are some business problems that do need human expertise.

For those, we highly recommend these Shopflo-certified agency partners.

1. Beyond Ads: A skin-in-the game performance marketing that only works with 30 handpicked brands at a time. Perfect for brands that want an agency that works like an extension of their internal team.

They live and breathe performance marketing - and care for clients as if they were part of the team. In the months we have worked together, he has set a standard for excellence.

— Hanna Strömgren Khan, Co-founder and CEO of Simply Nam, Leezu’s

2. Told You So: Perfect for mid-level brands that need a supporting arm to scale different aspects of their marketing. They have deep expertise in helping brands grow sustainably through Meta, Google, & Amazon. They also help with retention and UX design.

Two years with TYS and our brand is thriving! From performance marketing to stunning web design, they’ve been with us every step of the way. We’re now industry leaders thanks to their continuous support.

— Poonam Agarwal, Founder, Pink Supply

3. A3 Mediacom: A performance-driven digital marketing agency with a focus on brands in the personal care, apparel, and lifestyle industries. Perfect fit if you’re looking for fresh ad creatives or world-class retention strategies.

A3 Mediacom is a formally recognized Meta and Amazon business partner.

The Latest and Greatest from Shopflo

Shopflo ships updates every single week — they don’t call us the most innovative checkout for no reason!

From quality-of-life tweaks to game-changing features, every update is designed to make your shopper’s experience smoother, while making your profits soar.

Most Shopflo features are designed to help you make more money. But there’s a twist with our recent releases — these were actually built to help you lose less money.

Weight-based shipping

Do you manage shipping rates based on product weight? Then this one’s for you.

Brought to you in partnership with Clickpost.

Get started

A/B testing

If you’re a marketer, chances are you’re obsessed with A/B testing everything.

Then you’d most definitely want to optimize your checkout.

Watch video

RTO intelligence suite

Shopflo can now tell you the risk score of every order.

Depending on your brand’s COD revenue share, you can set a custom risk threshold to suit your preferences.

Get started

Pssttt… did you know? Word on the street is that Shopflo can now identify anonymous website visitors and help you turn it into revenue 🤫

Write back to us if you want us to confirm / deny the rumors.

D2C Job Board

We’re opening doors for the whole D2C ecosystem.

Lowkey kicking ourselves for not having done this before, but here we go… we have an audience that includes hundreds of D2C founders and thousands of D2C professionals.

About time we connected the dots – go ahead and apply to these jobs.

• Deputy General Manager (Brand) // Dot & Key

• Customer Success Manager // Supertails

• Founders Office Associate // Peesafe

• Associate Product Manager // Minimalist

Want to advertise a job here? Just write back here or reach out to me on Linkedin.

Closing thoughts? Let’s not get so sentimental — it’s not goodbye forever.

We’ll be back soon with our next edition!

Meanwhile, we’re curating a list of top D2C ads on Meta.

Send us your favorites in the comments: it could either be your own brand’s ads or something you screenshotted / saved while doomscrolling. We’ll feature the top contributions in the next edition.

Until then 💚
It’s been Muru.

In the previous weeks articles, we’ve read the wonderful story behind the creation of iD, the ups and downs the company went through, and the innovative packaging that sets them apart. As we reach the last newsletter in the iD series, let’s kick it off by taking a look at the numbers. 

A zero debt company, iD used it’s investments to scale operations

Although iD officially began operations in 2005, it took them 9 whole years to get an investor. A $5.2 million Series A Funding from Helion Ventures, followed by a $25 million investment from PremjiInvest, the private investment firm of Wipro Ltd chairman Azim Premji allowed them to move beyond Bengaluru and expand throughout India.

In 2013, they ventured into the UAE where they identified a huge target market in the Indian community settled there, and the area soon became their no.1 market in terms of revenue. “We understand the pangs of being away from home, in a foreign land. If familiar, home-cooked foods can bring joy and comfort in our fast-paced lives, we want to make that sense of happiness and wellbeing accessible and affordable for all. Just like it is made back at home.” said Musthafa.

In a Series D funding in 2022, NewQuest Capital Partners, a private equity firm focused on emerging markets invested almost $68 million along with PremjiInvest. This round also saw the exit of Helion Ventures, their first investor. iD was their last exit in India and they left with a 10x return after a seven year investment.

iD plans on using the funding to establish new manufacturing plants across the globe. In 2021, they launched the world’s largest idli-dosa factory at Anekal in Karnataka. Its fully automated Giant Kitchen produces over 1 lakh kg batter and three lakh parotas per day. They currently have factories in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Dubai, and are looking to open three factories in the US soon. 

How iD leverages technology to ensure freshness

iD identified early on that consumers considered products with a shorter shelf life to be healthier. “We understood the customer mindset that motivated us to play with ideal shelf-life to bring to market the right products for Indian homes," Musthafa says. As a company that has positioned themselves as one with 100% natural, fresh products, maintaining high quality becomes equally tough and important. 

iD supplies to over 30,000 retail outlets. To run on a zero-inventory model, and supply to the right place at the right time, they leverage AI and ML technologies. Each store is integrated and geo-tagged, which helps the company with logistics, route optimization and freshness at scale. “The challenge is to have intelligence that detects and comprehends fast-changing, short-term variables along with slow-moving directional trends,” says Sujeeth Ravindran, CTO, iD Fresh Food.

Considering iD’s high scale operations, the impact this technology-led approach has had is massive. The company has seen a 20% reduction in stock-out losses, 10% reduction in closing inventory, and 30% reduction in food wastage. “We use Kronoscope, a Fountain9 advanced solution, to help us with daily demand predictions and replenishment planning at all levels, and offer the same intelligence to all teams across the business, from a common base,” adds Mr. Ravindran.

Even with this heavy involvement of technology, the need for a human interface isn’t overlooked at iD. Since many time intensive tasks are already taken care of, the team has the scope to better utilize their time to address other critical issues, and respond to queries in real time. 

“iD runs on IT. We are not just a batter company, we are a fresh food distribution company that runs on technology” says Musthafa

The future looks good?

Currently the company produces enough batter to make more than 1.5 million idlis every day, and they are expected to close FY22 at an annualized run-rate of ₹550 crore. "In two years time we should be a ₹1,000 crore company, 50% of which will come from international markets." 

When a company seems to be doing so well, the next question in everyone’s mind revolves around IPO plans. However, iD seems to not be in a rush to jump into that bandwagon.  “Not immediately. It is too early.”

This story of a batter company started by the son of a coolie who failed school, and overcame numerous hurdles to become a loved and respected brand in India and abroad, seems straight out of a business fairytale. As the company scales up and makes its mark in new countries, it’ll be interesting to see how they maintain this winning streak. 

With that we wrap up iD’s Brand Breakdown. You can find the previous parts of the series here.

Coming up, we’ll be a covering a brand that is at the intersection of derma, skin care, and hair care, with a unique proposition built on a keen market insight. Stay tuned.

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

A brand communicates through its branding, campaigns, and its service. This week, we understand how and what iD values in its communication.

Previously on Brand Breakdown, we discussed the adversities faced by iD, and how they turned them into lessons to implement. Few aspects that make iD such a loved company by those that use it, is their commitment to customer service, their unique packaging designs and the messaging in their campaigns. This week, we take a look at all of these. 

A product is known by the design of its packaging

When it comes to packaging innovations, iD has been a disruptor in the fresh foods business. In this article, we’re picking four of our favorite ones:

1. The Idly-Dosa Pack: Using packets of batter used to be a bit of a pain. You’d have to cut them open and transfer it into another container to store and use (spilling some in the process). The tub version wasn’t feasible financially and had its storage limitations.

   To avoid a messy encounter and keep it within the budget, iD’s packaging idea was inspired by a boat and a transformer toy. The shape of the packet is such that it serves as a pouch during transportation and storage, and a vessel during cooking when you open the zip lock.

   

2. The Grated Coconut: One of their latest innovations, after idly, dosa and vada, chutney seemed to be the only thing missing in their portfolio. And what is a good chutney without freshly grated coconut? Staying true to their philosophy of producing 100% natural products, after numerous experiments, iD decided to use nature’s own packaging for this product.

3. The Filter Coffee: The filter coffee product was ready and the packaging was being debated when Musthafa took a trip to Tamil Nadu with his family. Seeing the coffee being served in a cup and dabara, turned out to be the inspiration they needed, and they ended up incorporating a 3-D image on the packet.
   
   Another criterion based on which the package was designed was ease of travel. This sachet allows their consumers to carry their favourite filter coffee along with them while travelling. 

   

4. The Vada Pack: One of their most innovative packaging designs to date is their vada batter pack. Vada, a crispy, deep fried, doughnut-shaped food made of lentils, is a South Indian favourite. But even for those with expertise, creating a perfect vada with a hole in the centre is a difficult task. 

   During the experiment phase, they tried numerous things including using a pepsi bottle with a hole created on the cap. Three years later, they finally nailed their final design, inspired by an umbrella, which allowed consumers to create perfectly hole-ey vadas by just squeezing the batter through the spout!

   

   The marriage of design and functionality is what makes iD’s packaging stand apart. Specifically in the fresh food category that consists of high-involvement products, reducing human effort through packing is a game changer.

Through their campaigns, iD re-emphasizes their commitment to transparency

iD’s perception amongst consumers is generally one of a human brand. From Musthafa P.C’s #JugaadStory series on his LinkedIn page (a series of small stories behind certain innovations and decisions), to their customer service and campaigns, the brand has always remained transparent about their journey. 

Their most loved campaigns include #TheirLoveMixedWithOurs , Meet your Neighbour, and the iDeal Women series. Throughout these campaigns, the underlying theme has been the significance of home cooked food, and how it binds us. During the Meet Your Neighbour campaign, Musthafa sent letters to residential societies in three cities, emphasizing the joy of knowing your neighbor. 

On World Idly Day in 2022, iD kicked off their 5-day ‘TransparenSee’ campaign, which offered a real-time view into its batter factory located in Bengaluru. The entire process of batter-making was streamed, from the raw material feeding area, urad dal feeding zone, fenugreek feeding zone, water fixing zone, and grinding zone, to the batter ready zone, packing zone, chiller entry point and chiller exit point.

Branding is a collective effort. Asking ‘why’ at each stage of the way, is the first step to innovation, and packaging is one arena where iD has innovated extensively. By reinforcing their values of transparency and trust through their media communications, iD has maintained the image of being a friendly, approachable brand. 

As they look towards the future, data and Ai have been playing an increasingly important part in their business model, especially when it comes to wastage and ensuring freshness. More about this next week. Stay tuned, it's the last one of this month!

In the last edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we finish it off with iD’s investments, plans for the future, and how they utilize data in ensuring freshness. 

Last week, we delved into the beginnings of the brand ID, and how Musthafa and the team took the company from a 50 square feet kitchen to one that is supplied to over 6000 retailers in Bengaluru.
The journey of growing this brand, however, wasn’t a smooth one, and the team faced a lot of critical challenges and learned their fair share of lessons along the way.

#1: The importance of food technology

In the hot summer of 2006, 4 months after they started operations, they got a call from a store manager in Bengaluru saying that there was a blast in his store that was caused by their batter. Musthafa and his team initially thought that the store manager was playing a practical joke. "We laughed. We said if you have a bomb blast in your store, please call the nearest police station, we don't handle bombs,” Musthafa recalled telling the store manager.

Once they realized that the manager was furious, they rushed to the store and were ordered to clean out his fridge and take their batter. "Batter ferments during summer. It expands, it forms gas and beyond a point, it explodes. We had no idea about food technology before we started this business. In fact, I learned about this term called fermentation after this incident," Musthafa said.

#2 Staying true to what the brand stands for
From day 1, iD positioned their product as 100% natural, and the company stayed true to their values of not adding preservatives to their batter even when faced with lower priced competitors. Chennai would seem like the ideal market for an idli-dosa batter product, but iD faced stiff competition from brands that were priced at Rs.10 vs their product that cost Rs. 45 at the time.

They weren’t even making enough money to pay salaries. However, instead of resorting to adding cheaper soda, to keep the batter fluffy, lower their costs, and keep up with competitors, they decided to shut operations in the city. We shut the factory, paid workers with the rental deposit, and went back to the drawing board,” Musthafa says. 

#3 Embracing innovation and moving beyond dosa-idli batter

Until 2010, iD was still a one-product, one-city brand. From there, they began experimenting with different products; most that were misses, but some hits. The parotta was one of them. However, finding the right technology that could master the thin layers unique to a parotta, proved difficult.

They turned to Greece.

Not because the country had even the remotest connection to parottas; but because they made pastries. This seemingly odd gamble paid off. They worked with the manufacturers of pastry-making machinery to customize their own parotta making ones that created the light layers perfectly. 

Taking cue from the success of the parotta, they made a wheat version of it, and also grew to include chapatis, vada batter, curd, bread, coffee, paneer and even grated coconut. Keeping pace with the emergence of the popularity of superfoods, they created a range of healthier alternatives like ragi batter and wholewheat bread as well. 

Innovating their products, keeping their consumer base that is increasingly conscious of ‘eating right’ in the centre, is what guides the brand in their product portfolio expansions.

#4 Turning adversity into opportunity

The covid-19 lockdown period was a tough time for businesses, especially for restaurants and fresh food industries. iD’s B2B model took a hit, as retail stores were pulling down its shutters, but they re-invented their distribution model to end FY21 with 33% growth. 

They shifted to B2C started distributing their products to residential complexes directly, and added a feature on their website that allowed consumers to locate the nearest store that had iD products in stock

"Our-direct-to-home delivery was a trust-based model. We left the product at the security gate and the consumers would pick it up and drop the money in the box at the gate or pay online. There was no monitoring and that got us great brand mileage," explains Mustafa.

Picking up from this model, they partnered with Big Basket to start a co-branded venture called ‘iD-Fresho’ which is aimed to further expand their B2C model to wider geographies. 

A brand that sticks to their roots sticks with its customers

The scaling of a business comes with unexpected adversities. iD’s courage to constantly stick to their brand’s ideals and values is what has helped build such a strong sense of trust amongst its consumers. 

iD’s learnings weren’t confined to product portfolio and distribution models, another aspect they’ve actively innovated on is their packaging. Stick around for next week’s newsletter to discover how iD approaches their packaging.

Ever noticed the striking packing iD’s products come in? In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we discuss the inspiration behind the unique and practical packaging designs adopted by iD as well as their much loved campaigns. 

Indians love their dosa. This South Indian breakfast staple dons many hats across the country due to its versatility. While this dish is enjoyed with just a simple sambar and chutney in the South, you will be hard-pressed to find a curry that doesn’t work with a dosa. From Mysore masala to whackier avatars that even feature a Chinese crossover, the humble dosa has seen it all.

The story begins with a school dropout who worked as a daily wage worker

A heavily fragmented and unorganized industry, till the mid-2000s, dosa batter was either locally purchased through trusted nearby vendors, or was homemade. Regional players were prominent, but they never quite managed to match the quality of the homemade version. In 2005, 5 young men in Indiranagar, Bengaluru, decided to try their hand at perfecting the batter.

Hailing from the Wayanad district of Kerala, Musthafa PC was the son of a coolie, and had dropped out of school by the age of 10 after failing in his class. A money crunch at home led him to join his father as a daily wage worker. At this point, his middle school teacher intervened and encouraged him to return to school, even tutoring him free of cost. 

“My cousin Nazer had run away from home. He just wanted to get away from all the struggles,” he recalls. “I realized that to grow and make more money I needed to study and joined school again. I ended up doing my engineering from NIT Calicut”

The magic was made in a small kitchen in Bengaluru

After completing his engineering, Musthafa eventually landed a job in the US. In 2005, his cousins, who owned a small kirana store in Bengaluru told him about local vendors who sold dosa batter in transparent, unbranded pouches. After numerous customer complaints about quality, Musthafa and 4 of his cousins decided to make this batter on a trial basis. 

The company was named iD- for Idli and dosa batter, and they paid a designer 2000 rupees to design their logo. Work began in a 50 square feet kitchen with 1 grinder, 1 mixer, 1 weighing machine, 1 sealing machine, a second-hand TVS scooter, and a 50,000 rupee investment. 

The complexities that accompany the world of dosas and idlis dawned on the cousins once they began experimenting with the batter. “We went through multiple combinations to find the right mix of rice and urad dal by talking to customers,” remembers Musthafa. They spent nearly 6 months and 3 tonnes of rice to finally perfect their ratio, and finally, in December 2005, the batter was ready to be sold. 

The plan was to sell 100 packets a day as a trial run, in the Indiranagar area. They identified 20 stores and were confident that they’d be able to achieve this target in a month. 

It took them 9 months. 

“In the beginning, we would supply 100 packets a day, five to each of the 20 stores, of which only 10 would get sold,” Musthafa says. They then identified 1000 stores around Bengaluru and started scaling up their operations. The profits they made were reinvested to spur the company’s growth. 

From 20 stores to 6000 and beyond

What spurred the initial growth of the company was choosing to establish its own distribution teams, rather than relying on established channels. “We don’t know how they [distributors] would store our product,” says Musthafa. “And, for them, to drive growth they would put the product in each and every store, which would not be good for the brand.” 

They carefully identified the stores that did not switch off their refrigeration at night, and only supplied to them (which amounted to approximately 6000 stores). The brand’s strong connection with the network of Malayali-run retail stores also worked in their favor.

By 2006, they upgraded to a 900 square feet kitchen in CV Raman Nagar, Bengaluru. Out of the 15 lakhs that Musthafa invested in building that kitchen, 6 lakhs was spent on operationalizing it. “The idea was that we will produce 2,000 kg of batter per day from that kitchen,” he says. “To our surprise, by 2008, we ended up producing 3,500 kg of batter per day.” Another 2,500 square feet factory was then set up on the outskirts of Bengaluru in 2008 to cope up with the scale. 

In the middle of setting up this business, Musthafa also managed to complete a Post Graduate Programme from IIM Bangalore and joined the company full-time by 2008 (signifying the true hustle culture of Bengaluru's start-up world) 

Perfecting their batter and supplying to stores was just the beginning of their journey, as the company scaled their operations from city to city, went through numerous ups and downs, found investors, and added more products to their portfolio. We’re covering all that and more in the newsletters to follow, stay tuned!

In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we discuss the perils and advantages of running a fresh food business by taking a look at iD’s business model and product range.

A brand that has found residence in the urban women’s closets, AND is a trailblazer that brought global contemporary silhouettes to India. This week we look into how AND set itself apart from the H&Ms and Zaras of the world, by successfully implementing sustainability initiatives that are unique and impactful.

Sustainable fashion may be an oxymoron. For an industry that capitalizes on material progress can hardly be flag bearer for responsible consumption. However, accountability towards the environment falls on everyone, including retail houses. Sustainability in the fashion industry isn’t and shouldn’t be restricted to the garments and their raw materials, but operations and work practices as well.

Small steps in a big organization go a long way

AND has, over the years incorporated sustainable practices into its business model, culminating in an initiative called rECOgnize that pledges to bring responsibility into sourcing and manufacturing processes. Through this, they have set up a series of goals: 

1. As of  2022, 100% of their packaging is made from sustainable sources.

2. By 2025, more than 65% of AND’s clothing will be from sustainable fabrics.

To meet these goals, the packaging material used in both their stores, and warehouse operations consist of recycled plastic bags, tapes, and boxes. The textile waste from the office and factory is collected and composted. 

They have also partnered with Lenzing, a group headquartered in Austria, that supplies EcoVero and Tencel fabrics that are derived from raw wood material, and responsibly processed. To gradually reduce the carbon footprint, 79% of their Exclusive Brand Outlets are equipped with energy-saving LED lamps as well. 

For this house of brands, the office is where the heart is

For Anita Dongre, causes related to the environment and animal shelters have been close to her heart. A strict vegan and animal lover, she has numerous rescue dogs in her house and in her corporate office in Rabale, Navi Mumbai. 

An HQ built on a sprawling 100,000 sq ft area, the office is dotted with huge french windows which overlook hills where the employees can enjoy the mini-waterfalls in the monsoon, and cattle grazing in the summer months. An eco-conscious unit, the office runs on solar power and recycled water. The wet and dry waste is segregated and is later composed in the in-house sewage treatment unit. 

“Ever since I started my career, what used to really put me off about the garment industry was the industrial buildings in Mumbai where everyone worked. All the factories in Lower Parel and Ghatkopar are in grimy condition, and I used to dream of a utopian space like this," says Dongre.

Building a culture of sustainable practices

The nine wings across the three floors in this building house office, cubicles, brand showrooms, meeting rooms, canteens, tailoring and embroidery units, inventory, and a studio. Every person involved in the creation of a garment is available under one roof to instill a sense of collaborative work.

What is significant about this process and setup is that every single employee, starting from the watchmen at the gate to the staff at the mess, tailors, designers, and managers, right up to the corporate employees, come to work every day and is part of a system that follows eco-conscious practices. They are thrust into an environment where small, but significant practices like segregating waste, not dumping fabric waste into the bin, and using the blank side of a printed paper to make notes, are the norm. 

Habits are built by routinely repeating actions, and for people who spend more than eight hours at the office, these practices become part of their daily lives, even when they go back home. The ripple effect created by small actions goes way beyond the organization, and that’s how you truly measure the social impact a brand has. 

How does a fashion brand not invite eye-rolls when it talks about sustainability? 

By choosing to not be vocal about their initiatives on social media and conversely making it a part of their brand ethos, and imprinting it in the actions of their employees, AND makes it clear that they are committed to achieving their goals when it comes to running an environmentally conscious organization. 

When you think AND, sustainable fashion is not what comes to mind. They make the conscious choice to not make sustainability come across as something extra the brand does, but rather, a way of life that begins right at the office.

With this, our second brand breakdown comes to an end! You can find the previous parts of the series here.

Next month, we'll be covering a brand that's become a staple in Indian refrigerators, a brand that took a food item that was traditionally made at home, and standardised it for the masses, a brand whose success you’ll be rooting for from the first article itself!

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

A brand that has found residence in the urban women’s closets, AND is a trailblazer that brought global contemporary silhouettes to India. This week we look at how AND’s messaging shines through their social campaigns that have been indicative of the aspirations of women at the time.

A brand’s identity hinges on the stories they tell and the themes they maintain through its communication. A consumer’s opinion of the brand is consciously and subconsciously formed through what they read/see about it. Today, a brand’s voice is most loudly heard through social media and marketing campaigns. 

Along with the garments that they create for each season, the AND team also takes a lot of effort to ideate the campaign that will accompany it. The evolution we see in their communication over the years is reflective of the times they were released in and is an extremely telling way of understanding the priorities of the consumers at the time.

They started releasing campaigns in 2013, and from that time, each successive campaign has spoken to the cultural shifts in women’s idea of empowerment, and what they are looking for in the brands they purchase from. 

The Glamourous Woman

AND’s style at the time was one that appealed to young working women, because of the brand’s portrayal of that generation as one that works hard, and parties harder. They had two main types of collections in stores: workwear that was made more feminine and stylish, and party wear that was young and glamorous. AND also had shows at the Lakme Fashion week and social events that featured celebrities like Priyanka Chopra and Gul Panag.

This linking of the brand to high-profile names while keeping the clothes affordable to the middle class, is what made AND so appealing at the time. You could be wearing what Priyanka Chopra was wearing without paying through the nose. 

The Sophisticated Woman

In the next 3-4 years, the young women that bought from AND grew older. Their priorities changed, and along with it, AND’s campaigns as well. Designed to cater to this new demographic, AND signed on Kareena Kapoor as the brand ambassador and kicked off each new season with a major campaign launch.

The message was still to working women, but now it grew to focus on women who manage to effortlessly balance work and families without compromising, and look great doing it. The collection became more sophisticated, and the silhouettes more elegant. The brand moved away from the bold prints and styles of the previous seasons to colour their social media with richer, muted tones and pastels. 

The Aspirational Woman

Come 2018, along with the #ANDiRISE campaign, which included the release of a series of empowering ads featuring transgender model and activist Anjali Lama, army officer turned model and director Nikita Sahay, and protest rapper and content creator Sofia Ashraf. This campaign also included a series of short interviews conducted by Anita Dongre of international swimmer Rujuta Bhatt, and architect Namrata Kalia amongst others. 

The brand had realized that they were losing base with their original, younger audience who were increasingly migrating to brands like H&M and Zara that were fast establishing themselves in the Indian market. This campaign sought to attract the younger consumer base again, and celebrate everyday women who rose above adversity to live their happiest lives and tell their stories. 

The Relatable Woman

With time, aspirational content started losing relevance and consumers grew to look for relatable characters and stories. Identifying this shift, AND changed its marketing strategy to release a series of campaigns with relevant, relatable content. An Instagram campaign featuring the designers of AND put faces to the people behind the clothes and humanized the brand for its audience. 

The #ANDyouLEAD campaign was a series for workwear that was released in 2021 after the pandemic as we were slowly beginning to go back to work. A series of videos by influencer and content creator Nupur Singh made the brand more relatable to her vast following. 

In all relationships, communication is key

In a crowded digital landscape, brands can often drown under all the clutter. Staying true to your brand’s vision while identifying and changing the brand’s tone to suit social sentiment is a mean feat. Listening to your consumers and incorporating their feedback without compromising on the brand’s values is a delicate balance. AND was created to make comfortable, wearable clothes for working middle-class women. Two decades and a wide variety of campaigns later, it still continues to do so.

In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we’ll look into AND’s brand ethos and the practices they follow to help the brand achieve its sustainability goals.

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

In case you missed the previous edition, here you go

A brand that has found residence in the urban women’s closets, AND is a trailblazer that brought global contemporary silhouettes to India. This week we take a look at the work that goes behind each AND outfit, and the operational processes the company follows.

Western clothing for women in India was an evolving concept in the 90s. At a time when India opened its gates to the brands of the world (read: economic liberalisation), women working in corporate offices also grew in number. As we read in the previous edition, this was also the time when a young Anita Dongre was spurred to start her own brand by the rejections she faced. 

AND identified a gap in work and casual wear for women in India

One thing that liberalization did not bring with it was brands that designed clothes for Indian women. The uniqueness in our culture brought with it: women of different needs, comfort levels, and values. The scarcity of contemporary silhouettes to choose from that cater to these requirements is what resulted in the creation of AND. 

Indian women do not come in a ‘one-size-fits-all’ mold. Each region of this country presents a unique version of what it means to be a woman in this country. AND is a brand that has chosen to celebrate this diversity by tailoring its merchandise mix of each store to suit the characteristics of the region. In terms of color, silhouette, patterns, and even the visual merchandising of the store, every detail is carefully curated. 

With each year that passed, AND grew to widen its collections to include casual day wear, denim, evening gowns, a linen line, winter wear, maternity wear, fragrances, accessories, and by 2019, even sportswear.

AND Girl was launched later on the consumer insight that most of the women who shop at AND, are young mothers, looking to also dress their girls in comfortable, fashionable clothes. Working two seasons in advance, the final garments that hit the store conceal the amount of planning and work that goes into them. 

Creating garments for AND is a multi-step process

The design team at AND consists of designers, along with a designer solely dedicated to the denim line, and graphic designers that work on the prints for the season. Phase one of the designing journey kicks off with Research. 

The color, trends, silhouettes, fabrics, and patterns are discussed, and mood boards are created more than two seasons in advance. This period also includes speaking to, and visiting numerous vendors, to discuss the fabrics to be purchased for the season. 

The team then moves on to the next phase: Ideation. This phase involves a lot of sketching and pattern creation. Each designer sketches their ideas out on paper and sits with the head pattern-maker who creates each part of the design on pieces of thin cardboard, to be later used while cutting the fabric. Every measurement, right down to the length of the fabric left to stitch the seams is discussed. Mockups are created on muslin and tried on (humans, not mannequins) to gauge fit and wearability, and tweaks are made. 

Every step of the process has been refined over the years for smooth operation

The Creation phase comes next, along with a lot of chaos. Fabrics are ordered in small quantities to make samples, and designers spend their day running between tailors, pattern makers, cutting masters, vendors that do embroidery, women who do the finishing (buttons, embellishments, etc), and their own desks. There are numerous trials during this time, and collection is slowly built. Brainstorming with the Visual team to ideate shoots and store layouts also takes place during this phase. 

This culminates in the final Decision phase, where the entire design team sits with the merchandising and buying teams, to present the collection which usually consists of around 200+ styles at the time. Each and every garment is tried on and discussed, and goes through numerous rounds of tweaking before the final orders are placed. A good chunk of the styles gets rejected (due to reasons ranging from measurements and fits to costing and available fabric quantities).

The quantities and fabrics for the stores in different parts of the country are considered, and the final quantities are locked. The very last event before the styles go for production and hits the stores is the Trade Fair. A showroom is set up with the upcoming collection and accessories for the viewing of buyers from various multi-brand stores such as Pantaloons and Shoppers Stop. 

Keeping the consumer at the centre has been crucial in AND’s growth

Once this is wrapped up, the designers immediately jump into the research phase for the next collection, and the cycle continues. Simultaneously, consumer feedback is taken from the stores on a weekly basis, and smaller collections with shorter lead times are created to cater to fads and consumer preferences as well. The insights gathered from observing consumer shopping behavior are analyzed and incorporated into future collections.   

Garments tell stories, and for a brand like AND that was created with the purpose of clothing women in wearable, comfortable fits, there is a person behind each small detail. As consumers, we are unaware of the numerous processes and people that run behind the clothes that we wear, and understanding them, gives us a deeper appreciation of the operations that have been perfected over the years. 

In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we’ll check out AND’s marketing strategies, and the stories the brand told through its social media and campaigns.

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

In case you missed the previous edition, here you go 

There are more than 600 fashion design institutes in India churning out millions of fashion design graduates every year. In the 1980s, Anita Dongre was one of them. 

The 80s and 90s were a period that saw India’s fashion industry thrive. For the first time, a designer seemed like a viable profession for Indians with the emergence of Ritu Kuman, Abu Jani, Sandeep Khosla, Tarun Tahilani and Sabyasachi Mukherjee.

The culture of boutiques gained its footing, and NIFT was set up in 1986 to pioneer fashion education in the country. The first ever Lakme Fashion Week took place in 1999, and the fashion industry became synonymous with celebrity and glamor.

Never underestimate the power of a pissed off woman

Growing up in a Sindhi family in Mumbai, Anita Dongre had seen her fair share of successful women in business, which inspired her to both break away from the traditional Sindhi housewife mold, and identify an opportunity to create workwear for women. 

Armed with a degree from SNDT, Mumbai, Anita Dongre’s story begins in 1995 in a small 300 square foot space that she rented out with her sister Meena. With just two sewing machines, they’d create western outfits and supply them to well-known stores across Mumbai.

This period also came with a lot of rejections from fashion retailers and mall owners who refused to lease her space to set up her own shop. This just fueled the desire to create a brand even more. “I got so angry that I decided to start my own brand and do it myself,”

And thus, in 1999, AND established its first store in Mumbai’s mall-Crossroad.  

From a street in Mumbai to world domination

With each collection AND grew its consumer base, and store after store popped up throughout the country, and even ventured abroad with a store in Mauritius (more on this in the next edition). Her sister Meena, and brother Mukesh joined the company and they set up a factory and office with a dedicated team of employees. AND soon became a staple in the Indian working woman’s wardrobe.

Anita Dongre’s unrelenting faith in her vision helped her grow her company to include four other brands under its umbrella:

Anita Dongre Bridal Couture: A brand created for empowered women and new-age brides (their lehengas have pockets!), Anita Dongre’s bridal couture line, strikes a balance between conscious and luxury with exquisitely embroidered and printed pieces created in collaboration with SEWA, and other Indian craftsmen. 

Pink City: Inspired by family heirlooms and watching the women in her family lovingly craft pieces for special occasions, Pink City was created to add a quiet, effortless grace to her bridal outfits. Inspired by jewellery from Rajasthan, this collection aims to revive the traditional craftsmanship of jadau and polki.

Global Desi: A brand that pays homage to India’s rich tradition of colours, textures and prints, and combining it with modern silhouettes, Global Desi is a brand that appeals to an international audience as well. A fusion-wear brand, the collections aim to bring a creative spin to everyday clothes. 

Grassroot: “My core passion is to design clothes that hold a purpose”, and that’s the ethos Grassroot lives by. A collection of contemporary clothes that use traditional handweaves, embroideries and other textile crafts like block printing and bandhani, Grassroot was Anita Dongre’s entry into the US market with a store in New York.  

Brands that are built on the bedrock of purpose are the ones that stand the test of time

At a time when fashion designers were only catering to the higher end, luxury segment, Anita Dongre started her business for the average working woman. The biggest key to the success of all her numerous brands has been a consistent focus on wearability (did we mention that the lehengas have pockets?). Each style that goes out to the store is painstakingly taken through numerous rounds of fits and trials to suit each body type. 

The House of Anita Dongre has been a house of brands that shines a spotlight on the Indian artisan community, whether it be training and employing women in their own headquarters to releasing a luxury pret collection that incorporates Pichwai painting. Conscious practices are encouraged not only in the clothes the brand puts out, but also in the daily practices that go into creating these garments(more on this in the upcoming edition).

A company that has been consistently keeping a focus on sustainability for more than 20 years is rare to come across, and from this lens, the empire that Anita Dongre has built is one for the ages.

In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we’ll take a deeper look at the growth journey of AND, and the factors that contributed to it. 

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

It's good news for all coffee lovers because Blue Tokai is this month’s pick. In today’s newsletter, we discuss marketing and social media strategies that set them apart.

One of the troubles of being a player in a market with a lot of competing brands is that consumers won’t hesitate to switch to a rival brand after one bad experience, and consumer experience is one of the most powerful tools to drive brand loyalty. One of the reasons for the rise of D2C brands could be attributed to, is their focus on maintaining a personal connection with their consumers.

Blue Tokai’s differentiation lies in the manner in which they sell you the idea of the world of coffee, as the one you’re missing out on, rather than just the tangible beverage. This extra mile that they take is why most of their consumers are also advocates for the brand. Let’s take a look at a few of the reasons why this brand has made its way right into the hearts of its loyal consumers.

It’s not just about coffee, it’s also what you have it with!

One of the best ways to indulge both coffee lovers and non-coffee enthusiasts is by showing them the range of your product. Through its website and social media, Blue Tokai showcases a variety of easy desserts and drinks that can be tried out with its coffee. Whether it be a seasonal change or an upcoming festival, their recipes are perfectly timed to capture the zeitgeist. They also encourage their followers to come up with recipes that they include in their feeds as well.  

The Producer Series

One for the true blue enthusiasts, Blue Tokai’s Producer Series is an elevated collaboration between Blue Tokai and four farms (so far). Grown in small quantities, these limited edition offerings stand apart due to the innovative processing techniques employed and their unique floral, fruity flavors. Each time a new lot is released, a minor build-up is created through email and social media. A miss for the general coffee drinkers, but cause for excitement for the ardent followers who look forward to each new product in the series.   

Taster’s Club

Created to help their consumers explore the world of specialty coffee, the Taster’s Club was created to satiate the curiosities surrounding this world of roasts, and brewing techniques. Currently, on their second season, each season comprises 9 episodes. Each episode is specific to a single topic and comes with a separate handbook, a worksheet, an exercise, three 75g coffee pouches, and a kit to get some hands-on experience.  

Whether it be to understand coffee better, or a fun activity to do with a partner, this club is a means to join a community of coffee lovers that engages and educates. 

Building communities around coffee and beyond

Although a D2C coffee brand, all of Blue Tokai’s community-building activities aren’t confined to the world of coffee. Their cafes are hosts to numerous events and seminars that range from modern calligraphy to latte art. A propagator of engagement, the brand has also in the past, hosted a pouch designing contest, with the winning artwork being incorporated into their new launch. 

Through these events, the brand becomes synonymous with shared experiences, rather than being known for anchoring itself to only coffee drinkers. 

Breaking glass ceilings in the coffee world

With great collaborations come a greater consumer base; and over the years Blue Tokai has entered into some interesting, off-beat collaborations. In a surprising collaboration with Adidas Originals, Blue Tokai released ‘Nite Jogger Blend’ in 2019, a limited edition line that brings together the ‘creators who chase their dreams into the wee hours of the night. In another surprising twist, Bira, in collaboration with Blue Tokai’s cold brew blend, released a line of ‘Malabar Stout’ in 2021.

Whether it be creating a line of body scrubs with The Switch Fix, or syrups with SWA Naturals, Blue Tokai fearlessly enters new spaces in collaboration, breaking barriers maintained by traditional coffee companies. In a world where brands are investing heavily in consumer acquisition, these creative partnerships work on an often-forgotten aspect of marketing: the first step - consumer awareness. 

Consumer Connection is King

There is a section on Blue Tokai’s website that details their beliefs. The three beliefs that they’ve highlighted broadly touch upon transparency, propagating a culture of constant learning, and their drive to maintain quality. Through all the content they put out and the initiatives they take, these beliefs are evidently centered at the core.

To build a sustainable business, creating a 360° consumer experience is extremely important. With increasing means of digital communication, a human connection is what consumers crave, and that’s where Blue Tokai’s marketing efforts really shine. 

Happy Brewing!

With this, our first brand breakdown comes to an end! You can find the previous parts of the series here.

Next month, we will be covering (drumroll please) a powerful women’s clothing brand that started in the 90s but keeps reinventing itself to stay relevant. A visionary woman who created a fashion empire that houses a few of our wardrobe staples, her story is one of a kind. Stay tuned.

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

It's good news for all coffee lovers because Blue Tokai is this month’s pick. In today’s newsletter, we study the design elements that constitute the brand and how their unique branding helped them differentiate their product.

So far, we’ve looked at the market dynamics of the coffee industry and the business decisions that have led to the creation and sustenance of Blue Tokai. But eventually, what truly sells is how much a consumer is able to relate to the entire brand experience; which also consists of the brand story, the colors, and its visuals.

While Matt took care of the logistics and finances, the unique design and communication that is associated with the Blue Tokai were designed by Namrata. 

What’s in a name? Quite a lot, as it turns out

Have you ever wondered why Blue Tokai is named so?
Let’s play a word association game. Peacocks are often known to be flying through coffee estates in India, and coffee estates are mainly concentrated in the Malabar area. ‘Tokai’ is an ancient Malabari word that means the plume of a peacock. When you think peacock, you think blue. Hence the name ‘Blue Tokai’, although seemingly random for a coffee brand, makes a lot of sense when you break it down. 

This idea was translated into the logo of the brand as well, where the plume of the peacock is the most apparent feature and is featured in different colors on the packaging. 

Do judge your coffee by the cover 

The most differentiating feature of this brand is its packaging. A packet of Blue Tokai coffee can be identified from any aisle that it's a part of, and the attention to detail that's gone behind each element shines through and elevates the experience.

1. The Logo: The biggest and most noticeable element of the front side of the packet is the logo. The large size of the logo helps with the recall element and builds an association with the brand.

2. The Material: The foil-lined paper packaging ensures that the coffee retains its freshness while maintaining an earthy image. The stability of the package also keeps customers from transferring the coffee to a different form of storage once opened. 
   

3. The Description: The description on the front of the packaging, although minimal, conveys a lot of information. First comes the name of the estate (Attikan Estate), then details about the type, grind, and weight of the coffee (Arabica | Whole Beans | 250gms), the flavor notes (Dark chocolate | fig | roasted almonds), followed by the details about the variety, roast level, location, and elevation of the estate.

The transparency in communication when it comes to the origin of coffee is one the main factors that sets D2C coffee brands apart from mass brands.

4. Personalization: The most endearing aspect of Blue Tokai’s packaging that delights a lot of consumers is the ‘Roasted especially for you’ bit on the package. When ordering directly from the website, they make sure to print the customer’s name on the package.

   

   This small element of personalization is something unique to Blue Tokai and makes all the difference between a one-time customer and a loyal customer.
   

5. The Art: An ode to the regions and estates the coffee is sourced from, the unique Gond artwork behind each package is yet another reminder of how much Blue Tokai celebrates their farmers.
   

6. What’s That Hole?: The valve present at the back of the coffee package has functional as well as sensory benefits. Carbon dioxide is a by-product of the coffee roasting process. Sealing freshly roasted coffee in a packet causes it to expand, and rupture; while exposing it to oxygen kills the freshness.
   
   The valve allows for the escape of carbon dioxide from the package, without letting oxygen enter; as well as providing a means for a consumer to smell the fresh coffee.

The packaging of Blue Tokai’s Easy Pour variety of coffee is also designed to tell the tale of process, farms, and taste by using Gond and Kalamkari styles. A more colorful take (arrived at after hours of consumer research at supermarkets), the brand wanted this line of coffees to stand out in shelf spaces (both physical and digital) to help widen its consumer base.

The brand’s design isn’t merely limited to their products

The design of their cafes encompasses every value the brand is built on. Their focus on transparency and trust is reflected through the large glass windows that break the barrier between the customers and the roastery area. You can see the machinery and the coffee being ground and prepared.

Often adorned with art, books, and coffee products, the customer can design their own experience with their cup of coffee. The blue ceramic cutlery is a callback to their brand colors and identity. The entire offline experience of Blue Tokai has been carefully curated to elevate the experience from just a beverage you take on the go to one that requires you to take a pause and enjoy it.   

In a world full of coffee clones, be a Blue Tokai 

Blue Tokai’s strength lies in the subtleties of its differentiation. They’re not a brand that's shouting its uniqueness through the rooftops, but rather quietly staying true to its values. Their story seamlessly weaves itself throughout the packaging, website, and service. Firmly rooted in its brand ethos, Blue Tokai is a brand that’s taking the simple idea of delivering coffee from farm to cup, and breaking barriers with it.

Happy Brewing!

In the next and final edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we decode Blue Tokai’s marketing strategies and social media presence, because if you didn’t post about it, did it really happen?

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

In case you missed the previous edition, here you go

It's good news for all coffee lovers because Blue Tokai is this month’s pick. In today’s newsletter, we discuss the beginnings of the brand, the challenges faced by the founders, and how they grew the brand in a market that is getting increasingly crowded.

The coffee industry in India is undergoing a massive change, and in small ways, it could be owed to Blue Tokai. Started by a couple who had no background in coffee- Matt Chitharanjan and Namrata Asthana, the brand is a result of their quest to find good coffee.  

A finance graduate and an economics graduate met in Chennai

Matt Chitharanjan whose parents were from Chennai, grew up in the US, with degrees in finance and economics. His work with Institute for Financial Management and Research brought him to Chennai, where he met his wife Namrata Asthana who was working in the same organization. A psychology major, she had previously worked in the communication departments at Pepsico and the American India Foundation. 

When work took the couple to Delhi, they missed the fresh filter coffee they had gotten used to in Chennai. The instant coffees that lined all the supermarket shelves just didn’t cut it. After initially toying around with the idea of starting a microbrewery and eventually discarding it due to the difficulty in licensing and logistics, they finally landed on coffee. 

Scoffed upon by the older generation of farmers, the couple didn’t deter

At the time, ‘good quality’ coffee meant either extremely high-priced imported coffee, like Davidoff, or lattes and cappuccinos at the booming cafe chains that were serving average-quality coffee. India was also known for its low-cost, low-quality coffee, while in fact, there were a lot of estates within the country producing high-quality beans that were being exported all throughout the world. And that was their starting point. 

They began by attempting to set up meetings with numerous coffee estates. After a long period of tortuous silence that usually accompanies the practice of cold calling, the farms started getting in touch with them one after the other. Although they were initially scoffed upon by older generations of farmers who didn’t think India was a market for specialty coffee, they eventually managed to convey their vision and win them over. 

9 years steady and one thing has remained constant

They began by investing in a roaster and roasting the beans they sourced from these farms; thus, the brand Blue Tokai was born in 2013. Sales started coming in online, and their lives were an endless cycle of roasting, hand-cutting labels, and delivering the perfect package of coffee. To this day, they roast in small batches that are made to order as flavor compounds break down as time from the day of roast increases, and the coffee won’t taste as fresh. 

Their first investment came in 2016 in the form of seed funding from Snow Leopard Ventures and Bold Ventures. Over 8 rounds, they’ve now raised $15.6 million with the latest funding coming from Mauryan Capital and Negen Capital Services on March 8, 2022. In 2020, they had a turnover of 42 crores, with a CAGR of 85% in the previous 6 years. With the coffee industry touted to reach over $4.3 billion in 2025, Blue Tokai aims to keep pace and constantly innovate.

The offline coffee experience is what elevated their brand 

Out-of-home consumption of coffee is expected to account for 20% of the market in 2025. This outlines the growing importance of the experiential aspect of coffee. Around the time Blue Tokai launched online, Starbucks was heavily expanding their outlets in India. The cafe experience at Starbucks played a huge role in defining the lifestyles of young, mobile, metro-dwellers. 

Blue Tokai’s first cafe opened in Delhi. It began with the vision of an espresso bar where customers could taste their coffee before buying roasted beans. Once they started serving flat whites and pour-overs, the demand for food options and wifi service increased. Revoking the franchise model, they decided to expand while owning and operating all their stores to maintain quality. 

From home brews to Japanese cafes

Currently spread over 51 cafes in 10 cities, the innovation in the menu is apparent in the coffee and tonics and kombuchas. Consumer education is a top priority when it comes to Blue Tokai, and some of their cafes host brewing, roasting, and cupping sessions. Raising the bar in terms of different formats of coffee, Blue Tokai also started flavored coffee cans, coffee pods, capsules, and cold brew bags to make the process of coffee consumption more convenient. 

Blue Tokai has also entered the Japanese market in a joint venture with Nichiin Food Creative Corporation. With a B2B model, Blue Tokai carved a space in numerous cafes and online stores in Japan, where the feedback for their products was strongly positive. This intercultural food collaboration also opens up the possibility of cross-border alliances in the food industry.   

For a couple that did not come from an F&B background, the drive to provide good quality coffee is what took Matt and Namrata from roasting beans at their home, to the cafes of Japan. By differentiating on the basis of both the length and breadth of the product range, they’ve managed to lead the way in terms of innovation in the specialty coffee space. 

Happy Brewing!

In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we’ll be catering to the creative minds’ by discussing Blue Tokai’s branding: the packaging, colors, and visuals that have helped build a unique identity for the brand. 

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

In case you missed the previous edition, here you go

Brand Breakdown is Shopflo’s monthly 4-part newsletter, in which we deep dive into an Indian D2C brand, and understand its constituent elements to figure out what makes it tick ⏰

It's good news for all coffee lovers because Blue Tokai is this month’s pick. In today’s newsletter, we discuss the market dynamics of the industry that set the stage for this brand to flourish. 

India and its beloved chai go way back. A steaming cup of chai comes with a lot of emotion attached to it. Everyone has a chai story, whether it's enjoying a quiet evening with your parents or having a cup in between classes at your favorite tea stall. Although this love story with chai is still going strong, the coffee industry has been flourishing lately, and how.

Coffee is a drink that has grown from an after-dinner ritual to a voguish beverage in the span of 200 years
The commercial cultivation of coffee only began in 1840, when the British established coffee plantations all over the south of India. By the middle of the 19th century, coffee was being served in all the clubs, starting from the Bengal Club in 1827. Within the British administration, coffee became somewhat of an after-dinner ritual at banquets. This tradition carried on to upper-middle-class Indians as well, and varieties of instant and filter coffees perforated the market. 

A rebirth of sorts for the coffee industry came about in the 20th century with the sprouting of numerous Cafe Coffee Days, Baristas, and Costa Coffees all over India. Cafe culture became a lifestyle that found its roots at this time. From dates to work meetings and study sessions, cafes were the go-to place; but even then, taking the effort to brew your own coffee at home was still unheard of. 

The ‘third wave’ of coffee is a term that originated in the United States in the 1990s and reached India by the late 2000s. This movement shone a spotlight on the region of production, the roasters, and the flavor of the beans; and introduced the concept of ‘premium coffee’. Premium coffee consists of three stages: Sourcing, Roasting & Brewing, and ensuring high-quality standards at all three stages; thus began the advent of numerous D2C coffee brands like Blue Tokai, KCROASTERS, Third Wave, with even Tata entering the market. At this time, home brewing saw a huge spike, especially during the lockdown in 2020 (is there anyone who didn’t Dalgona?). Coffee transitioned from a ‘pick-me-up’ beverage to an art form that went way beyond just meeting at a cafe. 

The new D2C brands leveraged social media as a means to reach their TG, share recipes, educate their followers about brewing equipment and grind sizes, and to build an overall ecosystem of coffee lovers. Along with this new-found experiential drinking of coffee, discussions over flavour notes, roasts (those who preferred more complex flavours sought lighter roasts, while those with a penchant for an acidic, bolder flavour opted for darker roasts), beans, and journeys from farm to cup found its footing. 

Each of the newer D2C startups broke the monotony in the coffee industry to carve their own niche and offer unique solutions. Whether it be Rage Coffee which brought new flavour profiles into the instant coffee space, Sleepy Owl which introduced varieties of cold brew to India kicking off a new craze, or Subko which sells an entire coffee experience, the range of the industry has been widened. 

Single-origin coffee rose in acclaim. The estates that the coffee originates from and the story behind each bean were woven into the brand narrative, which was prominently displayed on each brand’s website, creatives, and even their packaging. This practice of creating a brand story has played a major role in creating communities and establishing a relationship with their consumers.

When it comes to coffee, the future looks good

Currently, we might just be in the seed stages of a fourth wave, with innovations that are frequently cropping up in the coffee industry. Whether it be experimentation with the product packaging in the form of drip bags, capsules, and coffee pods, or flavour profiles with Blue Tokai’s coffee and tonic water, Sleepy Owl’s collaboration with Greater Than for a coffee gin, or even in terms of purchasing models with online monthly subscriptions; the coffee industry currently seems to be ever-expanding. As they are moving into unserved sections of the market, it’ll be interesting to see how the future business models for coffee shape up.

Happy Brewing!

In the next edition of this month’s brand breakdown, we’ll take a look at the beginnings of Blue Tokai, and how the founders took the desire to drink ‘freshly roasted coffee’ and created a brand out of it. 

Write back to us for any suggestions, feedback, or collaborations! Happy to connect

Lego started with wooden toys and slowly expanded to the now famous building bricks

The year was 1932, and Ole Kirk Christiansen was making wooden toys in his workshop in Billund, Denmark. His carpentry and joinery business wasn’t going very well, and he had just lost his wife. To concentrate on his toy production, he named his company Lego; derived from two Danish words ‘Leg Godt’ which translates to play well. It was named so with the intention of supporting children’s right to enjoyable and quality play.

Ole Kirk Kristiansen writes later about devoting his life to the manufacture of toys:

“It wasn’t until the day I told myself ‘you’ll either have to drop your old craft or put toys out of your head’ that I began to see the long-term consequences. And the decision turned out to be the right one.”

Quality was so strictly imposed in their factory that Ole once sent back a wooden duck that had two coats of varnish instead of the mandated three. A wooden sign that read “Only the best is good enough” hung in their factory to remind the employees about the company’s attitude. Ole’s interest in new forms of technology that would improve quality and rate of production saw him invest in numerous machines despite high amounts of investments, and the company grew. 

In 1947, Lego began producing plastic toys, despite a prevailing notion that plastic would never replace wood when it came to children's toys. They released the first model of the now familiar interlocking bricks in 1949, with studs on top and tubes on the bottom. This was patented in 1958 by Godtfred Kirk, who replaced his father as the head of the company.

The 90s were a rough patch for Lego with the rise of video games and a couple of misguided innovations

By 1951, the Lego bricks caught on throughout Europe and the blocks contributed to more than half of Lego’s sales. In 1968 the first Lego-themed park, Legoland, opened in Billund, Denmark (there are currently 8 Lego Lands around the world), and by the 1980s, they were doubling their profit every five years. In the late 90s however, their market share began to drop. Video games and other toys enjoyed more popularity amongst kids, and Lego, which couldn’t provide them with the same instant gratification, didn’t seem all that cool anymore. A series of attempts to rectify this were seen as a series of misguided innovations. 

A Power Rangers line of action figures, a Lego TV series, and a clothing line were a few amongst many of their releases at the time that didn’t see success. Furthermore, they were releasing increasingly intricate sets that didn’t have a demand at the time, which only led to inventory that was harder to manage. Their innovations were only leading to increased costs and risks.

Lego was executing a plethora of ideas that didn’t add any value, and failed to understand consumer needs, as they were creating products based on assumptions and not consumer feedback. They also could not compete with the cheaper Chinese toys that were able to copy Lego’s concept and manufacture them at a much lower cost.  As an effect of the crisis, the company laid off more than 1,000 employees and Kjeld Kristiansen (third generation of the Kristiansen family) stepped down after heading the company for 20 years. By 2003, Lego had lost $300 million.

Their turnaround was orchestrated by Jørgen Knudstorp, who was appointed CEO in 2004. In order to survive, he sold the majority stake in their Legoland theme parks (now owned and operated by the British theme park company Merlin Entertainments) for $640 million and moved their production out of Denmark to outsource the bricks from cheaper sources in Mexico and the Czech Republic.

To keep up with the changing trends, they still had to innovate; but this time, under the leadership of Knudstorp, Lego made conscious choices to maintain the company’s core ideals which were to provide toys that were family-friendly. Every idea went through numerous rounds of testing, they brought back the original Lego brick and created more of their original firetruck and police station sets. Lego developed a design process model called “Design for Business” (D4B), which heralded a shift in innovation strategy to being more ‘company-focused’ than ‘product-focused’.

The Lego Friends set met all their business goals but invited a lot of criticism

An example of a success story that was a product of Lego’s innovation is Lego Friends. The company spent 4 years doing research and testing prototypes for capturing the girl’s market. By 2011, 90% of the company’s sales came from boys. Lego Friends consists of five distinct little dolls with names like Andrea, Mia, Olivia, Stephanie, and Emma. The set encourages young girls to build numerous spaces for them like veterinary offices, karate studios, beauty parlors, etc. It was released in 2012, and Lego finally managed to bridge its gender gap by tripling its sales in the girls’ category in that year alone. 

The launch however was met with a lot of criticism, as the figures were called out for gender-stereotyping through excessive use of pink, and slimmer figures as compared to their standard square shape.

How Lego dealt with saturated markets in Europe and US

After enjoying more than a decade of growing profits, Lego hit a slump once again in 2017. This time, the problem lay in their European and US markets reaching saturation point. Up until then, the brand invested massively in its workforce and product lines. Which ended up negatively affecting them in the form of stockpiling up in warehouses and stores running out of shelf space to display the products. This again led to job cuts and rethinking of the organization structure.

Lego identified the need to expand into growing markets like China. They set up a global factory in Jiaxing to supply to the Chinese market and other neighboring ones like Japan and South Korea.

“The fact that hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers will form an increasingly affluent middle class in the coming years is a huge opportunity for us,” said Lego spokesperson Roar Rude Trangbaek. “Lego products – the whole idea of creative play experiences – is something that resonates strongly with Chinese consumers.”

The strategy paid off as Lego saw a 5% increase in the first half of 2019, with double-digit growth in China. The store expansions in the area created experiences, built an emotional connection, and promoted Lego in areas that weren’t familiar with the brand. 

A lot of Lego’s success can be owed to its marketing strategies. They’ve modified their voice to match the changing relationship with their consumers. Being a leading brand on social media sites, a 2020 analysis of YouTube showed Lego as the most trendy brand with 10.04 billion views. Their popularity on social media has inspired a host of fan-created pages and accounts like “Beyond the Brick”. Apart from their social digital presence, they’ve ideated a host of marketing strategies to aid awareness and loyalty:

Customer Experience: Lego has successfully identified different consumer segments that buy its products and caters to all of them by providing exclusive customer services. They encourage young users to engage through social platforms by creating Lego Life, a social network application for kids under 13. It encourages them to share pictures of their creations and other users to comment on them. Their adult community allows the users to contribute to the creative process by authorizing them to vote on ideas that the company is planning to produce.

Merchandising and Licensing: Lego diversifies from its toy sets by branching out through multiple mediums. Apart from the Lego-themed parks, The Lego movie franchise and The Lego Batman movie celebrated Lego’s philosophy of play. Their collaborations with Disney, Marvel, and DC Comics, saw a wide variety in their Lego figures. Lego also has a sandbox video game called Lego Worlds that allows users to create worlds using lego bricks. 

Collaboration with the education sector: To empower children to be imaginative, engaged learners, Lego promotes its construction bricks as educational toys. In 2020, the LEGO Foundation committed $24 million in educational aid for schools, foundations, and educational programs in multiple countries. Beyond this, Lego Education is its own education company that offers building products to help students in the fields of Science, Math, Technology, Engineering, and Art. During the pandemic, they also offered distance learning resources. These offerings allow Lego to be ‘parent approved’ which keeps them incentivized to keep buying.

Beyond its obvious target audience of kids, Lego has also started to focus its attention on establishing its adult fan base. Although adults have been buying Lego products since its release, in 2020, they began to include sets that would appeal to adults like star wars, the F.R.I.E.N.D.S cafe, the Batmobile, and football stadiums. They also redid their instructions manual to engage adults. Building Lego sets is an activity that requires you to focus, while simultaneously helping you relax, and for those adults that are stressed out with their daily routines, Lego helps them unwind and remain mindful.  

What is the future for Lego?

In march 2022, Lego opened its corporate headquarters in Billund, Denmark. A ‘mini-city’ with streets and courtyards, this office was designed to encourage productivity and play. For future expansions, Lego has identified India as a fast-growing market, similar to China, and plans to establish an office in Mumbai.“Within 10 years, there will be 100 million kids in India living in middle-class families.” They also plan to invest heavily in e-commerce and open more stores around the world. To keep pace with the growing emphasis on sustainability, Lego has pledged to use sustainable materials in its toys and packaging by 2030, by using sugarcane-based plastic.

How is Parle related to the Swadeshi Movement?

Mohanlal Dayal, hailing from a family of Mumbai-based silk traders, was deeply influenced by the Swadeshi Movement, which called for the promotion of Indian-made goods and products. He sailed to Germany to learn the art of confectionery making and came back with both skills and machinery. An old factory located between Irla and Parla in Mumbai was bought and set up in 1929 with just 12 employees, (most of them from his own family) who served in different capacities as engineers, managers, and confectionery makers.

Amidst the daily struggle of managing the factory, it is said that the managers forgot to name the company, and it was finally named after its place of birth, Parle. It is a little-known fact that Parle’s first product was actually orange candy, which was followed by other toffees and confectioneries. The biscuit operations only began a decade later in 1939.

At that time, biscuits were considered an extravagance that was usually imported and consumed almost solely by the elite. Huntly & Palmers, Britannia, and United Biscuits were some of the popular British brands in the market. To counter this notion, Parle released Parle Gluco as an affordable source of nourishment for the common people. Meant for Indian palettes and made accessible to all areas, this biscuit gained popularity quickly. This biscuit was also much demanded by the British-Indian soldiers during World War II.

Who is the girl on the cover of the Parle G packets?

Following Independence and the partition, India suffered a huge shortage of wheat due to which Parle had to stop production of its most popular product in 1947. Despite their hardships, they put out an ad saluting the Indian soldiers and urging their consumers to compensate with barley biscuits until the normal wheat supply was restored. 

By the 60s, there were other players such as Britannia that entered the market with their own variety of glucose biscuits and Parle began to feel the competition. Confused by multiple brands, consumers would just ask shopkeepers for ‘glucose biscuits’ which resulted in Parle losing out on a lot of potential sales.

To counter this confusion, Parle launched a new packaging that was a yellow wax paper wrapper on which there was an image of their biscuit and their brand name, along with the image of a girl. There has been a lot of contention about the identity of the girl with names like Neera Deshpande and Sudha Murthy being tossed around; however, the girl is a mere illustration created by Everest Brand Solutions.

However, this packaging did not help them distinguish themselves from the host of other glucose brands. Finally, in 1982, they changed their packaging material to low-cost printed plastic to avoid duplication. Parle Gluco was rebranded as Parle G. Parle products finally carved a unique identity for themselves, along with a cheeky tagline “Often imitated, never equaled”.

In the meantime, Parle had widened its portfolio and released a slew of other biscuit brands and confectioneries that are still a staple part of every grocery store today. The famous Monaco cracker was released in the 1940s, followed by Cheeslings in 1956 and Krackjack in 1974. In the confectioneries segment, Kismi and Poppins were introduced in the 1960s, and Melody and Mango Bite in the 1980s. All these products were united in their mass appeal, especially targeting children. 

In 1996, the company entered the premium segment with Hide & Seek. This segment was further widened by the introduction of Nutricrunch and Milano, a range that was later rebranded as their ‘Platina Range’. The products in this segment were soon marketed without the Parle brand name, as the name was synonymous with a mass brand.

Indians are compulsive snackers, and extending into that industry was a natural progression. Although a late entrant in 2008, a time when players like Pepsico, Haldirams, and Balaji wafers enjoyed high market share, Parle approached the segment differently. They zeroed in on smaller towns and villages with a high-volume, low-cost strategy. At the time, for Rs.5, a pack of Parle Wafers contained 15.6gms of chips while Lays only had 12.5gms of chips for the same price. 

As of 2022, Parle has 200+ products in its portfolio spanning the snack, cake, biscuit, rusk, confectioneries, Platina, atta, and cereal segment.

In the last 28 years, Parle G’s price has only been hiked by 1 rupee

In 1994, a small packet of Parle G cost Rs.4. In 2021, it was hiked by all of 1 rupee to get to Rs.5 per small packet. How are they managing to stay profitable? A major psychological hack was employed to pull this off. Instead of incrementally increasing the prices, they slowly reduced the portion size over time while still maintaining the ‘small packet’ perception. 

In 1994, a packet that held 100gms of biscuit was reduced to 92.5gms, then 88gms, and now the Rs.5 packet weighs 55gms. This technique called graceful degradation is one that is employed by chips, toothpaste, and chocolate companies, where the changes are so minute that the customers don’t realize it. Parle has managed to reduce its packet size by 45% without inciting complaints. At their price point, the price of the product becomes more important than its weight.

Unlike the trajectory of most companies, Parle clocked its best growth during the lockdown 

In 2013, Parle became the first FMCG brand in India to cross the Rs.5000cr mark in retail sales. However, it was during the lockdown in 2020 that Parle made its highest sales. Parle saw its overall market share increasing by nearly 5% in May and 80-90% of this growth came from Parle-G sales. 

During natural calamities and emergencies, when there is an urgent need for food rations, Parle G is known to be the go-to comfort food. “It has a longer shelf life and the packaging keeps the biscuits fresh, thereby making it an ideal storage item,” said Mayank Shah, Sr. Category Head, Parle Products. Various NGOs include Parle G in their donation kits and many people even stocked it in their homes for emergencies.

From ‘G Maane Genius’ to ‘Melody Itni Chocolatey Kyun Hai’ Parle has released a lot of well-loved ads throughout the years

Over the years, Parle products have managed to carve a niche for themselves in the content and advertising space, with each brand owning a  unique identity. It’s impossible to say ‘Melody’ without following it up with ‘itni chocolatey kyun hai’. Similarly, Hide and Seek with its ‘innocent love’ appeal, Parle G and ‘G maane Genius’, and Monaco’s witty ad films, it is impossible for an average consumer to identify that all these brands belong to the same company. Each of these brands has revived its messaging with changing times while staying strong in its positioning, which is why consumers still remember these ad films so fondly even today. 

Pre-pandemic, their budget for digital was just 12% of their total ad spends, however currently they spend close to 25% on digital, aiming to communicate their message through digital channels as well. In 2020, Parle launched a co-branded video on Amazon Prime Video in partnership with the film ‘Shakuntala Devi’, to build a stronger association with the ‘Genius’ in Parle G.

When it comes to diversification, for Parle, the sky’s the limit

In an interview in 2018, Mayank Shah, Category Head, Parle Products said, “If you look at Parle as a company, we have always been known for biscuits and confectionery. But we have got into quite a few categories over the last two years. We have entered into the bakery items segment like cakes and rusk, high-end chocolates, snacks, and of late into pulses. So, I think now is the time to consolidate before we move forward and get into new categories.”

At a time when a lot of segments are moving from unorganized to organized segments, one category that is set to grow starkly is pulses. To fill the gaps in their offerings, Parle has launched a new brand, Fresh Harvest that offers numerous types of dal. Although they are focusing on Karnataka and Maharashtra at the moment, they hope to expand in the coming years. 

Parle Products has remained a privately owned company after all these years, which is an ode to their calculated business decisions, whether it be their advertising tone or entering a new segment. By diversifying their offerings, they’ve managed to capture the length and breadth of Indian consumers. While the company is moving full steam ahead and aiming for a 20,000 crore turnover by 2024, all we can do is raise a glass of cutting chai and a Parle G to its continued success.