Dolce & Gabbana Beauty entered India’s luxury beauty market in June, opening a boutique at Mall of India in Noida. The move came against the backdrop of a broader India expansion strategy. CEO Gianluca Toniolo announced plans to open 15 units across India within three years and establish a local subsidiary in January this year. “We took the strategic decision to control our presence directly because we have high expectations,” he told WWD.Toniolo has very good reason to hold high expectations. India’s luxury beauty market, valued at around $800 million in 2023, is projected to reach $4 billion by 2035, according to consultancy Kearney and luxury distributor LUXASIA. More tellingly, luxury beauty currently accounts for just 4% of India’s $21 billion beauty and personal care market, leaving considerable room for brands to grow.Dolce & Gabbana, an Italian beauty house, entered with a relatively low-key approach. A couple of months after its opening, Tashu, senior beauty advisor and second-in-charge at the store, says the response has been good so far. The bigger challenge, however, has been awareness. “People are still not aware that it is a beauty store and not an apparel store,” she says, adding that the brand has not been particularly aggressive with its social media marketing.That perhaps makes the choice of the first location even more interesting. Noida’s sprawling mall offered expansive floor space, which, according to Tashu, was an important consideration for the brand. She says Dolce & Gabbana Beauty wanted room to display its portfolio without compromise, something she believes would have been harder to achieve in Gurugram.“Here they got the best space, best location,” she says, adding, “They needed a vast space to understand how consumers would respond to Dolce & Gabbana Beauty in India.”The D&G store currently stocks hero products including the My LipStylo hydrating lipsticks, Everlast Foundation and Ever Icon Eye Palette, alongside the brand’s fragrance portfolio, including the Velvet Collection. Tashu says the next stores are planned for Gurugram, followed by Bengaluru and Mumbai.The move comes as international beauty companies increasingly look to India for growth at a time when more mature markets are proving harder to crack. Reuters reported that Estée Lauder, L’Oréal, Shiseido and Amorepacific are among the global players stepping up their India strategies. India’s young, affluent and digitally savvy consumers are a significant part of the attraction.“India is the last bastion of growth for premium beauty,” Sameer Jindal, managing director for investment bank Houlihan Lokey’s corporate finance business in India, told Reuters last year. “The Indian consumer is willing to experiment and try out new things.”
