Beauty and Hygiene Promises e-Com, a $11 Bn Market


BENGALURU: With the population deriving constant awareness about the aspects of living like sanitation and personal grooming in India, beauty and hygiene segment of online market is going to be the next big thing in the coming future. Capturing the growing influence of the internet on beauty and hygiene (B&H) products, a report released by Google and Bain & Co. on Friday revealed it would influence $11 billion of the total sales in the FMCG sector for such products by 2020. This represents two-thirds of B&H sales of $17 billion in 2020, the report said.

While the total influence of the internet will impact $35 billion worth of FMCG sales, which is 1/3rd of total sales, in India, beauty and hygiene will see two times higher impact. With more and more users getting online to research about this category, the prediction of market trend is going rounds that beauty and hygiene arena will garner exponential profit and is likely to hit its purple patch, as stated by the report.

Fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) or consumer packaged goods (CPG) are products that are sold quickly and at relatively low cost. Examples include non-durable goods such as soft drinks, toiletries, over-the-counter drugs, processed foods and many other consumables. In contrast, durable goods or major appliances such as kitchen appliances are generally replaced over a period of several years. FMCG have a short shelf life, either as a result of high consumer demand or because the product deteriorates rapidly, and beauty and hygiene products fall comprehensively under FMCG coliseum.

Projecting the growth of online shoppers who will buy beauty and hygiene products online, the report estimated 130 million Indians to shop online by 2020 making the internet a prominent sales channel forming 20 percent of total sales estimated to be $3 Bn. Apparently, a predominant hike in the number of women consumers is most likely to be witnessed, which is likely to hit the figure of over 200 million women. Resultantly, the dominant agencies of ad world are upto leverage on the sales expectations and are gearing up to entice the female fraternity to reap extensive revenues. The internet is expected to reach over 250 million rural users in India by 2020.

This is backed by the strong growth in the number of overall online users in India, which will continue to see rapid adoption reaching approx 650 million by 2020. The population of online shoppers will continue to see rapid growth in India, reaching 250 million by 2020 - 40 percent of all internet users, as stated by the report. This estimation would surely throw luring bait to the already existing e-commerce portals, and furthermore a large number new of e-commerce business trading units are likely to see the light of the day. The result would ultimately be a great rise in the entrepreneurship stature of the nation and a raised GDP conclusively.

Speaking about the key findings of the report after studying the behavior of the lead consumers from an FMCG standpoint, Vikas Agnihotri, industry director, Google India said, "It is clear that FMCG companies in India need to start thinking of digital as a more strategic medium and chart out a digital growth path for their products.”

Read Also: Top 5 Productivity Tools for Entrepreneurs
Why Enterprises Need DRM