HUL to drop ‘fair’ from ‘Fair & Lovely’

HUL to drop ‘fair’ from ‘Fair & Lovely’

Namrata.Singh@timesgroup.com

Mumbai: 26.06.2020

‘Fair & Lovely’, India’s popular skin complexion cream, is rebranding itself. Even as parent Unilever’s presence in the skin lightening space came under intense pressure, Hindustan Unilever (HUL) on Thursday said it would stop using the word ‘Fair’ in the 40-year-old brand name.

The move marks the culmination of HUL’s effort to move the brand’s proposition from ‘fairness’ to ‘radiance’. It puts to rest a controversial chapter, as the brand that was seen to propagate a stereotypical viewpoint of beauty. Fair & Lovely has annual sales of over Rs 2,000 crore and is one of HUL’s top 5 brands, apart from being India’s top face cream brand.

Rivals may be looking at similar move

HUL’s move may force other players to fall in line, say industry experts. While Emami, the maker of Fair and Handsome, said it was deciding its next course of action, CavinKare, which makes ‘Fairever’ fairness creams, said that it was evaluating the situation. P 15

Move not a knee-jerk reaction, says HUL

As against what Fair & Lovely’s advertisements communicated a few decades back—equating fair skin with beauty—it was only last year that HUL removed the cameo with two faces as well as the shade guides from the packaging of Fair & Lovely as the brand communication progressed from fairness to glow. While the new brand name—which has not been revealed—awaits regulatory approvals, the company said the brand is committed to celebrate all skin tones. The move thus removes the last reference to “fairness” in Fair & Lovely as a description for skin tone.

The move was lauded by many, with actor Nandita Das, who has actively spoken out against discrimination based on colour, tweeting: “Words impact notions & they, the mindset. I want to believe that the campaign Dark is Beautiful & India’s Got Colour played a tiny role. Many of you have too. Long way to go before things are truly ‘fair’, but we are on our way!”

The old proposition, however, is responsible for propelling Fair & Lovely to deliver good growths over the years. It became the leading face cream brand in the country with sales now exceeding Rs 2,000 crore. Sanjiv Mehta, CMD of HUL, told TOI: “Seven out of ten Indian women use Fair & Lovely. The move to drop ‘fair’ from the brand name is not a knee-jerk reaction. We changed the communication to ‘HD Glow’. The formulation of brand has evolved. We believe it’s more to do with the migration of consumers. We have conducted research on the new brand name and indications are that consumers would welcome these changes.”