India’s startup boom has an innovation problem

Earlier this month, Phitku, a direct-to-consumer personal care brand, sold a majority stake to Ananta Capital for Rs 100 crore. The story behind the one-year-old startup goes like this: an expectant mother finds that pregnancy has changed her body odour, and deodorants can’t mask it for long. So she finds an age-old remedy. Alum. Phitkiri in Hindi. The crystalline block that generations of men have rubbed on their faces after shaving. Many still do.

With her co-founders, she turned the humble alum into a roll-on and called it Phitku. Her story touched a nerve. She gained millions of followers on social media within a month. The brand took the market by storm. Phitku sold 200,000 units within a year and earned a revenue of Rs 14 crore. The humble alum, which sells for Rs 50-100 for a 100-gram block, now retails at Rs 999 a bottle. It has become aspirational. Phitku fundamentally changed how and what people think about alum.