Fairness Case Study

Is the fairness industry ready for a revamp?

Is it time marketers repositioned fairness products to leverage features other than the promise of fair skin, regaining the trust of apprehensive consumers?

The market for fairness or whitening products, currently pegged at Rs 3000 crore, is huge in India, offering great scope both in the urban and rural markets. The industry consists of a surfeit of products that promise a fair and glowing skin in limited time. Tall claims by marketers and advertisers have won over unsuspecting customers, luring them with the depiction of fair-skinned models in glamorous advertisements. So what are the factors really responsible for the demand of these products? It’s a need created by marketers who operate in a highly competitive world and seek a winning edge.

This fascination for fair skin is not limited to women but is equally popular among men, thereby creating a whole new segment of men’s fairness products. In the year 2013 the men’s fairness creams segment contributed around 330 crores to the entire market.

Fair & Lovely, a 1000 crore brand from the house of Unilever launched in 1978 in India, claims to be the world’s first fairness cream and holds a lion’s share of around 50 per cent of the total market of fairness products. With the launch of Fair & handsome in 2005, Emami created a whole new market for men’s fairness products and presently holds a market share of around 57 percent.

With a view to distinguish itself in the cluttered market of fairness products, Nivea, a premium segment brand positions itself as a whitening products company for whitening of dark patches, dark spots, and sun burns, instead of a fairness products company.

“Nivea has products that help ‘Repair’ patchy sk...

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...the global impetus on racial inclusions has triggered a movement in India where dusky has begun to be considered beautiful.While at the bottom and middle of the pyramid the continued obsession with fairness is bound to continue owing to acceptability in the context of marriage, brands should not overtly take ‘the fair is beautiful’ stand point. They should, instead, pitch these products as beauty enhancers that inspire confidence and improve grooming!” she added.

Perhaps, the fairness industry needs to revisit its marketing strategies and leverage other more desirable aspects of the product than the mere promise of fair skin. Smarter and slicker marketing can be used for desired effects. The marketing of fairness products has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. The challenge is about how marketers can reposition the products , if they wish to do it at all.