“Step aside, lady! The man, too, needs his time before the mirror.” That’s what, the makers of personal grooming products would like to believe, is a routine exchange across homes in urban India. For, they are betting big on bringing the country’s male population in their fold with products designed specifically for men, across categories like hair care, skin care and deodorants — the last being a category that has seen quite a bit of action lately.
According to analysts, shaving products like razors, shaving gels and after-shave lotions and deodorants constitute 70-80 per cent of the Rs 3,000-crore men’s personal grooming products market. However, in terms of actual consumption, the market could be thrice that size, says Technopak Senior VP (Retail) Purnendu Kumar. The reason: A large proportion of men use unisex or women-specific products (in categories like bath and shower, hair care and skin care).
Deodorants is the second-largest contributor to the space after shaving products. The overall market today stands at around Rs 1,500 crore, of which 65 per cent is men’s market. Industry players say, compared to skin care or hair care products, deodorants is an easier category to make inroads into by getting men to adapt to male-specific fragrances.
HUL’s brand, Axe, continues to be the market leader in the space, with a share of around 16 per cent. Park Avenue, a distant second, trails with half the market share. Other players like Nivea, Set Wet and Wild Stone follow, with 5-7 per cent shares each. Though Set Wet and its fellow brand Zatak have changed hands twice over the year — from Paras Pharma to Reckitt Benckiser to Marico. Industry players say, with changes in distribution models and possibly even strategy, the transition has slowed down the brands.
Besides, there also are several other brands — like L’Oreal’s Garnier for Men, J K Ansell’s KamaSutra and Wipro’s variant for men under the Yardley brand — jostling for the space. Yardley is even said to be planning to bring on board a popular Bollywood actor as brand ambassador.
The large number of players notwithstanding, experts feel most of the brands run the risk of being ‘Axe me-toos’, given the common platform of sensuality being used by almost all of these for promotion. On their part, these players feel limited by the peculiarity of the market.
All for the fragrance
“Developed markets traditionally use deodorants as antiperspirants. In India, however, these are mostly used as cheap perfumes. So, while the roll-on format is used in developed markets, in India it is mostly aerosol spray,” says Satyaki Ghosh, director (consumer products division), L’Oreal India. Despite this feature of the Indian deodorant market, Garnier for Men offers its products on an antiperspirant platform and has invested significantly in developing the category with a high-octane media campaign featuring Bollywood actor John Abraham.
Other players though seem to be content tweaking their offerings for the Indian market. Global skin care brand Nivea, for instance, has Fresh Active, a fragrance-led deodorant, as its flagship variant. “The variant is not very big in Brazil (the biggest deodorant market), or even European markets. However, being fragrance-driven, it suits the Indian market well,” says Nivea India MD Rakshit Hargave.
The audience for deodorants is young, says Ranju K Mohan, director and business head, J K Ansell. “The target group is mostly in the 15-35 age group. They carry deodorants wherever they go and use those to instantly freshen up and smell good,” explains Mohan. That’s another reason for deodorants being fragrance-driven in India. In fact, Mohan’s brand, never emphasises on the performance attributes like sweat absorption. The product is built entirely on the premise of fragrance. Also, the name of the brand, associated more commonly with its brand of condoms, reeks of sensuality and attraction, a platform strongly exploited by deodorant brands. Possibly, that’s why the brand has never used mass media to promote the product, hoping the name itself works the magic.
However, not every player seems to think so. Anil Kulkarni, business head, J K Helene Curtis, owner of Park Avenue brand, says: “Our brand has never been positioned as a ‘chick magnet’. We differentiate ourselves from the rest by staying true to the brand image of our mother brand, Park Avenue. So, we carry a formal, business-like, even an aspirational image.”
But, there is a high risk of consumers switching brands and loyalties quickly, for bettter fragrances. The solution, according to L’Oreal’s Ghosh, is keeping some pillar variants or constants in the portfolio, while also supplying new variants at regular intervals. That’s something Nivea did — by introducing its Dry Impact variant for a short period in India and pulling it out after creating some excitement.
Unlike categories like soaps and shampoos, where companies could introduce smaller pack sizes at lower price points, that’s a door closed on the deodorant category. “Reasons are purely technical. Due to factors like packaging, spray mechanism and aerosol, it is difficult to lower prices. Besides, the category has been developed over the years by upgrading consumers, and not through price cuts,” says Nivea’s Hargave. Either way, the promise of the segment is too alluring for players to mind such hurdles.
