Industry & Economy - Personal Products

Light segment nourishes Rs 5,770-cr hair oil market

Perfumed oils post 23.8% growth in value; 14% in volume in 2009.

Purvita Chatterjee

Mumbai, April 21

Conversion from unbranded to branded products and growth in the light hair oil category is what
is driving the Rs 5,770-crore hair oil market. Perfumed oil (Rs 2,930 crore) and coconut oil (Rs
2,110 crore) comprise the two main segments of the hair oil market.

Volume growth for the hair oil category is currently pegged at 12.8 per cent and value growth at
17.7 per cent.

However, it is the light hair oil segment within perfumed oil that is the fastest growing segment
recording a value growth of 23.8 per cent and a volume growth of 14.1 per cent in 2009,
according to The Nielsen Company.

Hair oils have primarily been the forte of Indian companies such as Dabur, Emami and Bajaj
Corp (previously Bajaj Sevashram).

Even a big MNC such as Hindustan Unilever had to sell its hair oil brand Nihar to a domestic
FMCG company Marico.
Coconut oil

In fact, it was Marico that started branding in the coconut oil category with its Parachute brand in
the early 1990s. This led to the growth in the overall category that had been stagnating earlier.

Parachute currently dominates the branded coconut oil segment which continues to grow at 10
per cent.

The hair oil segment with perfumed oil (includes heavy amla oils, cooling oils and light hair oils)
and coconut oil accounts for more than 55 per cent of the larger hair care industry (Rs 9, 150
crore) which includes shampoos (Rs 2,840 crore), conditioners (Rs 80 crore) and dyes (Rs 1,190
crore).

Today, players such as Bajaj Corp are making a steady effort to move coconut hair oil users to
light oils.

Bajaj Corp has decided to extend the franchise of its Almond Drops brand to drive the light hair
oil category further.

According to Mr Kushagra Nayan Bajaj, Chairman, Bajaj Corp, “Almond hair oil is what is
driving the category of light hair oils and we intend to extend the Bajaj Almond hair oil brand
into other categories.”

Light hair oils

The light hair oil category is dominated by Bajaj Almond Drops with a share of 46.8 per cent
volume share followed by Dey Chemical's Keo Karpin at 21.5 per cent and Marico's Hair & Care
at 15.2 per cent.

In other categories such as heavy amla oil, where growth has been flat, it is Dabur Amla which
dominates the segment with a volume share of 69.5 per cent followed by Marico's Shanti Amla
Badam at 8.3 per cent and Dabur Sarson Amla at 5.8 per cent and Bajaj Brahmi Amla with a 3.4
per cent share.

Cooling oils

The cooling oils segment also recorded robust growth at 21 per cent last year due to Emami's
Navratna hair oil brand spending heavily on advertising the brand.

Today Emami's Navratna leads in the cooling hair oil category with a 44 per cent volume share
followed by brands such as Him Gange (from GK Burman Labs) with a 29 per cent shar