Until recently, brands wanting a slice of India’s booming beauty market had to either go it alone or choose from a handful of partners. Among those retail partners, Nykaa was said to be leading Purplle and Sephora in the specialty segment while online giants Myntra and Amazon battled it out with department stores in the multi-category space. But earlier this year, two heavyweights of Indian industry threw their hats into the ring, launching multi-brand beauty outlets of their own.

Reliance Industries and Tata Group launched multi-brand beauty retailers Tira and Tata Cliq Palette respectively in a challenge to incumbents like Nykaa, Purplle and Sephora.

Reliance Retail clearly has big ambitions. “Our vision…is to be the leading beauty destination for accessible yet aspirational beauty… in India,” said Isha Ambani, executive director at Reliance Retail Ventures Limited, in a statement at the time of Tira’s launch in April.

But however aggressive a company’s expansion plan may be, building a physical footprint takes time. The more immediate threat Tira poses to incumbents in the market is in e-commerce. Read more in our #linkinbio

✍️ Arnika Thakur
📷 Courtesy