Case Study

Nykaa is an e-commerce platform for beauty and cosmetics products.

Nykaa was launched in 2012 by Falguni Nayar. The platform offers a
wide range of category including skincare, makeup, luxury products,
fragrances and hair care products for both men and women. Nykaa can
be accessed through its website (http://www.nykaa.com/) or you can
download the mobile application for Android and iPhone.

Falguni Nayar is the Founder and CEO of Nykaa.Nayar was born and
raised in Mumbai. Falguni is a graduate of the Indian Institute of
Management, Ahmedabad. She worked for Kotak Mahindra Capital Co.
for 18 years. When she left in 2012, she was the managing director and
head of its institutional equities business but she wanted to be an
entrepreneur.
After leaving her job from Kotak Mahindra Capital Co. Falguni as
looking for business opportunity in India and she noticed a huge gap in
the beauty products markets in India. She noticed that the demand was
on the top but there were very few places to get the genuine beauty
products. So she launched Nykaa with her banker husband Sanjay
Nayar.

Nykaa has managed to raise 25 million dollars so far from 7 different

investors in 4 rounds.

Series A: In the first round of funding held in July 2014. Nykaa abled to
raise 3.4 million dollars.

Series B: In series B round of funding Nykaa raised 9.5 million dollars

from series of investors including Michael Carlos, Dalip Pathak, TVS
Capital Funds, Atul Nishar, and Harsh Mariwala.

In the third round of funding the company was able to raise 820 million
rupees from Harsh Mariwala, Sunil Munjal.
The company has an Inventory-based model that has helped the brand to
gain its name in the fashion and cosmetics industry. The products are
100 percent genuine and authentic, sourced directly from the brands.
Nykaa provides a hassle-free shopping experience, the virtual makeover
tool, beauty advice and assistance on the phone, free expert advice and
articles on beauty trends and tutorials and celebrity looks.

Nykaa sells more than 35,000 products from 650 brands, both
international and Indian, luxury and mass, and is constantly adding new
labels to its stock. In 2015, Nykaa introduced her own brand and it has
gone on to become a best-seller on the platform.

Nykaa’s revenue has grown close to 300% in the last two years. In 2016,
it raised a total of 104 crore rupees from investors and the company
hopes to break even by the end of this year. The company is also eyeing
for an initial public offering in 2020.Nykaa is receiving 15,000 orders a
day, mostly from consumers between the ages of 22 and 35.

Nykaa depends on content marketing for their marketing strategy. They

provide high-quality content to showcase the global trends that have
proved a winning formula for the brand name. On one hand, where
Nykaa is using high-quality content to generate traffic on the website,
Nykaa uses email marketing and social media
marketing for remarketing. Nyka also collaborated with Femina to host
the ‘Nykaa.com Femina Beauty Awards’ in 2015 and 2016 to create the
brand awareness.

i). Compare and Contrast the advantages and disadvantages of e-

commerce over Brick and Mortar with respect to this industry.

ii). How Nykaa can boost its customer base through Electronic Customer
Relationship management and highlight the competitors strategy in this
regard?