Vineeta Singh an entrepreneur, has dared to dream differently, turning down a job offer of Rs 1 crore when she was 23 and going on to launch a cosmetic firm that is now valued at Rs 4,000 crore. These pearls of entrepreneurial knowledge came from her Instagram profile.
Vineeta Singh, an alumna of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras, and the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad, made news in 2007 when she turned down a job offer from Deutsche Bank that came with a package worth Rs 1 crore. At 23, she made the decision to pursue entrepreneurship at a period when India’s startup “ecosystem” was nascent.
Vineeta has become one of the most successful self-made female entrepreneurs of our time more than ten years later. She used social media to develop one of the direct-to-consumer products, SUGAR Cosmetics, after going through several versions. Vineeta is a judge on the inaugural season of Shark Tank India, and her social media accounts, where she celebrates achievements both personally and professionally, are a veritable wealth of business advice.
Pivoting to the right place at the right
Vineeta explains how important entrepreneurial elements like location and timing may go either right or wrong. These two factors mathematically have four potential consequences, and Vineeta had to deal with each of them as an entrepreneur until she finally found success with Mumbai-based SUGAR Cosmetics.
She founded an online insurance company between 2008 and 2010, but it was finally shut down since her team was “early and I didn’t really grasp the sector.” Vineeta claims that this was an instance of “wrong place, wrong time.” The second scenario, “right place, wrong time,” presented itself to her in 2007 when she set out to create a lingerie firm.
The majority of venture capitalists at the time had not yet realized the potential of firms geared toward women. Vineeta claims that at the time, VCs believed investing in companies that catered to women was too “niche.” The entrepreneur was in the “wrong place, right time” between 2012 and 2016. She was developing the Fab Bag beauty subscription service when she realized there was a wider possibility. She observed that Indian women’s purchasing power was rising and that the popularity of beauty bloggers was expanding.
Only a few people at that time had Fab Bag, according to Vineeta. Her bank account was nearly empty, and her primary business was nearing its limit.
The “right place, right time” with SUGAR Cosmetics, a brand that is currently estimated to be worth Rs 4,000 crore, was made possible by one last pivot.
The only surefire method to get to a “right location, right time” scenario is to keep moving forward until all incorrect combinations have been exhausted and you are still standing when the stars align. It’s just that peculiar. Simply put, it’s that easy,” she writes on Instagram.
According to Vineeta, the business discovered the ideal market match by paying attention to its clients. Customer satisfaction comes first, says SUGAR Cosmetics’ CEO and co-founder. Using retail spaces for brand visual storytelling
Direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands are currently all over online channels, which is only natural given how severely the COVID-19 pandemic affected many traditional businesses. Many entrepreneurs however continue to think highly of retail establishments.
Vineeta posted on Instagram to mark the inauguration of SUGAR Cosmetics’ 100th location last week. Her passion for the retail industry is evident. It enables businesses to have their own area for visual storytelling, customer education, and influencer interaction, she claims, and is the less glamorous (in the VC world) but more profitable (if done well) cousin of D2C. Retail, she continued, also makes it simple for businesses to gain early consumer information, particularly when it is closely integrated with apps and online retailers.
“Yes, it is really difficult for brands to gain customers and turn a profit in the beginning. However, some challenging issues are best resolved early on for operating leverage and brand building over the long run, she continues.
Vineeta thinks that when brand recognition rises, retailers eventually become more profitable with lower variable acquisition costs.
Funding in and of itself is not a victory.
In May, the $50 million Series D financing headed by the Asia fund of the international private equity company L Catterton, which focuses on consumer businesses, saw success. The fundraising effort takes place as companies prepare for a capital crunch and the current economic climate. Vineeta has emphasized numerous times that receiving finance alone should not be viewed as a success milestone, implying that other aspects like sales are more important. She previously told YourStory that maintaining consistency and the desire to simply show up are more crucial than relentlessly pursuing specific objectives until they become frustrating.
“Entrepreneurship is similar to marathons. It actually teaches you a lot about simply turning up each day without giving anything else a second thought. Running a marathon compares to becoming an entrepreneur. Bus nahi karna hein, get off. Just don’t give up, she advised.
Don’t pay attention to gender stereotypes
Vineeta observes that some people will do anything to minimize a woman’s success. “Have a fantastic JEE rank? Definitely a “girls’ quota”! Obtain a fantastic employment offer? She must be being pursued by the hiring manager! Got money? There’s a “male cofounder,” I see.
She says, “The list goes on forever. The only female entrepreneur from IIT Madras in their network, according to Vineeta, runs a cosmetics business, which has led to others making fun of her efforts to grow SUGAR Cosmetics. The ideal answer, according to Vineeta, is to not worry about such people and to carry on expanding the business.
She writes, “I don’t have to carry the weight of attempting to show that women can be as capable as men in any sector since if someone still has this doubt, it’s an ongoing argument that I don’t have time for!
