Key Takeaways
India’s skin care market comes with its own distinct consumer needs and market dynamics: from hot and humid climates to quick commerce delivering products in just 10 to 15 minutes. At the same time, India is highly diverse, with consumer needs varying significantly across regions. Understanding these local realities is key to staying relevant. For Geetika Mehta, Managing Director Beiersdorf India, and her team, these insights are exactly where growth opportunities begin. Their approach combines Beiersdorf’s global skin care expertise with a close understanding of local needs, from products and price points to channels and cultural moments. We spoke with Geetika about how the Indian skin care market is evolving, how her team responds to local consumer needs and where she sees new opportunities for our brands.
Geetika: Indian consumers are highly informed and increasingly science-conscious, but they also have a strong sense of value. They want proven efficacy at an accessible price point. The conversation is increasingly moving from general product benefits towards ingredients and performance. Consumers actively look for ingredients such as hyaluronic acid, niacinamide and ceramides and want transparency behind the claims brands make. At the same time, India is not one market, but many. It is sometimes described as “a continent masquerading as a country.” Climate, skin concerns, cultural practices, and purchasing power can differ significantly across regions, cities, and even neighboring communities. That is why our teams spend time in local markets, looking beyond demographics to understand how and why people actually use products.
Geetika: Global scale and local intimacy are not opposing forces. The strongest brands combine both. Beiersdorf’s global expertise gives us access to world-class research, innovation capabilities, and skin care science. Our job is to translate these strengths into products that work for local realities. Take NIVEA Soft Daily UV. Many consumers in India’s warm and humid climate prefer products that absorb quickly and feel weightless on the skin. This insight inspired a product that combines lightweight hydration with sun protection in a format tailored to local needs.
But relevance is not only about the product itself. Accessibility matters, too. In India, value is about finding the right balance between efficacy, trust and affordability – the right value for money proposition is very relevant. That means making our brands accessible through different price points and channels, while delivering products consumers can trust to work.
Geetika: Absolutely. Local relevance goes far beyond the product, and we are focusing on high-impact consumer-facing activities to create this relevance. For the launch of NIVEA Body Milk, for example, we played with India’s love of language and humor. We created the “NIVEA Hyaluron, Neela Hyaluron” tongue-twister challenge, with neela meaning blue in Hindi. Together with influencers across different regions, we turned a complex product name into a fun and shareable cultural moment. And there are many different ways to create these connections. Reality television remains one of India’s most influential entertainment formats, so NIVEA partners with relevant platforms to become part of content and cultural moments people already engage with.
For younger consumers, the same principle has taken us from Lollapalooza India to immersive activations on Spotify and Snapchat. But connections can also be very personal. In some of our top stores, beauty advisors explain product benefits, answer questions, and build relationships with shoppers over time. Indian consumers value authenticity. When people feel that a brand understands their lives and supports them across different touchpoints, the relationship can go beyond a single purchase. Scale can buy reach, but relevance earns attention.
Geetika: India offers opportunities across our portfolio. Some skin care routines that are already established in other markets are still developing here. Daily sun protection, advanced face care, anti-pigmentation and preventative skin care, for example, offer room to grow as awareness increases. This gives NIVEA and Eucerin an opportunity not only to offer relevant solutions, but also to help consumers better understand these categories. The growing interest in science-backed and dermatologist-recommended solutions creates further potential for Eucerin.
Trust gives us a strong foundation. NIVEA has been recognized as India’s Most Trusted Skincare Brand by “Trust Research Advisory” for five consecutive years, while Hansaplast is the country’s #1 wound plaster brand. And geography matters. Rising aspirations, greater digital access and increasing purchasing power are creating opportunities in smaller cities beyond India’s largest metropolitan areas. E-commerce, social media and quick commerce are making products and information more accessible, while our offline sales teams provide reach through India’s extensive traditional retail network.
Geetika: Speed has become extremely important. Digitally native brands are moving fast, raising consumer expectations for speed, relevance, and continuous improvement. We see this in shopping behavior too. E-commerce enables consumers to discover products, learn about them, and gain easier access beyond the largest cities. And quick commerce takes convenience even further, with deliveries in as little as 10 to 15 minutes. For us, this means staying close enough for consumers to respond quickly. The closer decisions are to consumers and customers, the faster insights can be turned into action. The principle is simple: standardize the fundamentals, localize the execution, and build the organization to move at market speed.
Geetika: Spend less time looking at consumers through reports and more time understanding them in their real lives. Our teams regularly spend time in local markets and engage directly with customers Data can tell us what people are doing. Observation helps us understand why.
Also, I find the most interesting opportunities often sit in the gap between what consumers do today and what they aspire to do tomorrow. Understanding that gap helps us create products, experiences and innovations that are genuinely relevant.
Carolin joined Beiersdorf in 2019 in Corporate Communication with a focus on Pharmacy and Selective brands. Today, she is responsible for topics related to NIVEA and other mass-market brands such as 8X4 and Hidrofugal.
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