Learn how to turn passion into business from CEO of Perfume Lounge

• ByStartupStory     |    January 13, 2023

“Smart entrepreneur will focus on building strong business mechanics,” says Shivam Sood, CEO and Co-founder of Perfume Lounge in an exclusive interview with Startup Story Media.

Based on the newest global trends, Perfume Lounge creates fragrances. The perfume brand Perfume Lounge introduces to the Indian market the newest worldwide trends in fragrances. To create high-caliber fragrances at competitive rates, the business collaborates with renowned international fragrance houses. Their mission is to democratize the perfume industry and make it available to the great majority of people in order to cater to a wide range of tastes and preferences.

Idea and Inspiration

Shivam Sood, Co-founder of Perfume Lounge shared with us his idea and inspiration behind starting up the company. He said, “I am an avid collector and user of perfumes and fragrances of various brands. Being highly passionate about fragrances I always wanted to do something in this space and share my passion and knowledge about perfumes with others. This is where the fit with Deepak and Parvesh was ideal since they both are industry veterans and share my level of passion in perfumes and fragrances.” He also added, in late 2019, he began researching the perfume business in India and discovered that very few brands had conquered the inexpensive and value-driven perfume market, with most brands focusing on Deos or designer branded perfumes that were available. A large cheap category was being ignored, leaving opportunities for businesses to enter the space. The co-founder had to delay the launch plans owing to production and distribution challenges, but that all changed in 2022 when he finally debuted Perfume Lounge. 

When asked about the uniqueness the Perfume Lounge offers, Shivam Sood said, “We currently offer 4 collections of 100ml EDPs, 2 each for men and women. Our unique offering is our value driven perfumes which use international and trendy fragrances, are affordable, smell great, have top quality packaging and are long lasting. 

Goals, Future Plans and Fundings

 In an exclusive interview with Startup Story Media, Co-founder and CEO of Perfume Lounge, Shivam Sood was asked about how far the startup has come till now to which he proudly said, “We launched digitally in August 2022 on marketplaces such as Amazon and Nykaa. The growth has been phenomenal since launch. We have been growing 100% MoM since launch.” 

Close competitors for Perfume Lounge include well-known brands such as Villian, Bella Vita, Yardley, and Carlton London. Their products provide exceptional value in terms of design, fragrance quality, and cost, which others find difficult to match. Because of their excellent supply chain and backend infrastructure, they can launch new items faster than their competitors and incorporate customer feedback into new product revisions faster than most competitors. Their future plans include offline distribution to both modern and general retailers, as well as the establishment of our own retail outlets in malls around India. 

CEO and Co-founder of Perfume Lounge in an exclusive interview with Startup Story Media said, “We raised a Seed fund of USD 250,000 in June 2022 from Parvesh and Deepak in who serve both as co-founders and investors in the company. They are also both avid angel investors having invested in various startups and businesses. We are currently in the process of raising our next round of funding and will announce the same soon.

Team-efforts paying off

Shivam Sood, CEO and Co-founder of Perfume Lounge in an exclusive interview with Startup Story Media said that before moving back to India in 2008, he completed his studies in economics at Michigan State University and spent six months working at a hedge fund in London. Since then, he has worked with numerous startups. In the beginning of 2011, he co-founded heavenandhome.com, a rocket internet project and a division of Jabong. He managed a digital agency for eight years after that exit before launching Perfume Lounge with Deepak and Parvesh. He has a background in both digital marketing and technology. Parvesh and Deepak are the co-founders of the company, who bring a wealth of experience and knowledge to the table and each have more than 20 years of combined experience in the perfume industry. The head of brand is Abhiroop, who holds an MBA from a prestigious university and has experience growing multiple brands. He collaborates closely with Rubina, who is in charge of performance marketing, and our design team is led by Lark, a former interaction design professor at the Pearl Academy of Design who has worked as an art director for several Fortune 500 companies. He oversees a fantastic creative team that includes Adya, who is in charge of content, Lavi, Varsha, who are in charge of design, and Chhavi, who is in charge of content for social media. Vinayak, who oversees finance and operations, works with Vikas to head our operations staff. 

With the appreciation towards team, Shivam Sood told us about the customer experiences and challenges the team faced as, “Customer experience has been very positive so far and a lot of our customers have loved our products and our packaging. Our reviews on marketplaces average more than 4.1/5 for all of our collections which has been really great customer feedback for us. Some of the challenges early on have been related to onboarding and getting visibility on these over crowded marketplaces in addition to figuring out our inventory cycles and management of the same. We feel we have been successful on getting a

footprint on these marketplaces and our visibility has increased considerably. It took a lot of learning and posturing to navigate our way on these online marketplaces but we have finally cracked the code. Our teams dedication and hard-work definitely paid off.”

Sood said, “I believe in creating a positive work culture at Perfume Lounge and strongly support a collaborative work space that includes working in teams and having constant communication across these teams. Our strong workplace culture encourages supporting one another, taking ownership of tasks and roles, facilitates learning and growth and prioritises ones mental health and well being. We have further introduced a Learning series format at work which has speakers from across industries coming in to our office once a month to give a talk/seminar in their respective fields so our team can continue to challenge themselves intellectually,” when asked about creating a healthy work environment. 

COVID Outbreak turned Boon for Perfume Lounge

Sood told us that COVID merely delayed their launch date, but it was positive in many ways since it allowed brands like theirs to explore internet sales as a distribution channel. Scents are typically a product sector that flourishes offline, and buyers prefer to try before purchasing offline. However, COVID changed all of that, and customers felt more comfortable trying out new perfumes online. This gave them even more confidence to go digital first.

Words of Advise from the Co-founder

Shivam Sood gave a realistic and inspirational message to young entrepreneurs saying, “A simple message or advice would be that in entrepreneurship there are no shortcuts. We live in a world today where funding and accusation news makes majority of us believe that fortunes can be built overnight without building a fundamentally strong business. A smart entrepreneur will focus on building strong business mechanics and eventually will be in a good position to achieve a high valuation. So, focus on the product, network professionally and good things will happen.”

Author Name:- Amit Kumar Sharma

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