Bhoomika Singh
Sargam Dhawan Bhayana founded Tressmart Marketing, a beauty appliances distribution company at the age of 22, when most of us are still attending classes. In just four years, Bhayana has brought her company from an initial investment of Rs 1 lakh to a turnover of Rs 20 crores, with three international brands in her kitty.
Not only that, Bhayana now 26, already has a bag full of prestigious awards under her belt, such as the Cosmopolitan Beauty Award, the Nykaa Femina Beauty Award, the Garhwal Post Young Turk Award, the “Shepreneur” award by both the Outlook India and the India Today magazines. Last year, she was awarded the Times Power Women 2020 award, in spite of the difficulties that she had to face during the pandemic. In 2021, she was given the Indian Achiever’s Award for the Emerging Company award.
In a conversation with SME Futures, Bhayana tells us that since she belongs to a family full of entrepreneurs, working for herself automatically came to her. Even after winning various awards at this young age, she says, “This is just the beginning, a lot more still needs to be done.” And in that context, Dhawan and her team are looking at launching their own line of hair and skin care products with their own branding. Let’s take a peek into her professional life and learn how she runs Tressmart at such a young age.
Edited excerpts:
What inspired you to become an entrepreneur at such a young age?
I belong to a family of entrepreneurs and have closely seen all members of my family do their own thing in different fields. Since I was a little girl, I have always known I wanted to do something of my own.
Growing up in a house where every dinner time conversation is based on problem-solving for each other’s businesses, there seemed like there was no better choice than to be an entrepreneur when I grew up and honestly, I love what I do so it’s been a win-win.
What difficulties have you faced as a woman entrepreneur up to this point?
A lot of people think that women entrepreneurs are not serious about their work, and they treat our work as a hobby rather than as a full-fledged career.
Fortunately, this attitude is changing, especially with women doing very well in the boardrooms. I have personally not faced this, but a lot of women entrepreneurs find it very difficult to get loans from conventional sources as people don’t take them seriously enough. Hopefully, things will get better as time goes by.
How did you handle working with co-workers who had far more experience than you did?
The only way to deal with more experienced co-workers is to listen and learn from their experiences. The reason they have been hired by Tressmart is because of their fabulous and enriching work experiences, so giving their ideas full consideration is the only way forward.
If I don’t agree with something, I give them my point of view and I value their opinions about my ideas too – our end goal is the same, we want Tressmart to grow as a company, so playing the devil’s advocate and discussing ideas is a role every person at Tressmart is used to playing.
How does it feel to run a business and win so many awards for that at such a young age?
It feels wonderful. I am humbled and filled with gratitude that I have been able to run a business successfully up till now. But this is just the beginning, there is a lot more that still needs to be done. I can’t sit on my laurels just yet, there are miles to go before I sleep!
Do you believe that the Indian start-up culture is free from gender bias? What have your own experiences been like?
No culture is free from gender bias- be it politics, sports or start-ups! We have a long way to go before our roles are fully recognised in society. It has been 75 years since Independence, and we are still waiting for the Women’s Bill to be passed in the Indian Parliament- that in itself tells us enough about gender bias. Most women do not have a property in their names to use as collateral, so getting loans for their businesses is extremely difficult for most women entrepreneurs. Personally, I have been lucky, I have not faced any bias, but I have enough colleagues who have told me their experiences and all I can say is, we are far from being considered equal today.
What distinguishes Tressmart from the other established marketing brands? Tell us about Tressmart’s relaunch in 2020.
Tressmart is the only online store that exclusively markets hair care products and the only online store that sells professional hair care products. Along with this, we are very focused on innovative products. Everybody is busy launching products that are run of the mill, but we study our products and launch only the ones that have some sort of x-factor. This is the biggest reason for our success as we promote products that are actually, insanely amazing!
In 2020, when COVID-19 hit, we launched Glow by Tressmart, our portal for skincare and makeup. COVID brought many setbacks the world over, but we changed our strategy, focussed on customer service, did extensive market research and came up with creative marketing solutions and saw a growth of 138%. The MakeUp Eraser, is the world’s first reusable makeup remover and possibly the most sustainable product to be introduced in the market, and we launched that in India, as our first product at Glow. We have only gone from strength to strength since then with our various launches.
Tell us about Hair Story Box. How does it differ from the other brands that market similar (all in one) products?
Hair story box is a unique concept by us, where we curate this limited-edition box, with regular sized products with the support of all the luxury to premium brands that are on-board with us.
We actually had a much better response than we anticipated to our Hair Story Box. The sales that we did are proof of its success. What makes it so fabulous is the fact that it has been curated by my team of experts and myself and we did a lot of research before we launched it.
We kept demographics, pricing and innovation as our main criteria and that is what sets the Hair Story Box apart from the many other options available in the market. Most beauty and hair boxes focus on selling only one particular brand’s products, but we chose what was amazing from different brands to give our customers a truly beneficial hair care regimen.
What is your roadmap down the line, are you considering expanding your business beyond hair products?
We are looking at launching our own line of hair and skin care products with our own branding. We are working with a team of experts from around the world and are doing the R&D to launch some very special products in the near future.
We have already launched Glow by Tressmart as our skincare and wellness section and are looking at launching Glow Baby, a one-stop shop for everything related to mother and baby care and Glow Pet, a one-stop-shop for everything related to pet care.
What advice would you give to all the business-minded women out there?
Please believe in yourself even when no one else does. There is no shortcut to success. The one thing that you have to do is work very hard and even when you fail you have to get up and try again harder this time!
