Musings From Deepak @ DSG Consumer Partners #83

All things consumer & insurgent brands. What I am currently reading, thinking about, and reflecting upon. You can follow me on Twitter at @dishahdadpuri or follow DSGCP at @dsgcp.

After Raw Pressery resurgence, Wingreens doubles down on acquisitions — the-captable.com

How CPG start-up Wingreens is using an M&A-led playbook to become a leading CPG player. Wingreens acquired DSG Consumer Partners portfolio co RAW Pressery in 2021. This is a very interesting model in the current environment in India. Hundreds of CPG start-ups were founded with many being funded by angels and VCs like ourselves. Some will break out, scale, and become market leaders like Sula and Veeba. Others will too, it is a question of time and unlike SAAS or other tech plays, you cannot short-circuit the growth curve of a CPG product.

However many start-ups will fail. This is normal, to be expected and celebrated. Start-ups are hard and entrepreneurship is physically and mentally draining.

There will be some brands, maybe many, that never scale independently and may find a good fir in a larger CPG platform who have the skill set, resources and distribution to help a nascent brand. The CPG giants including Unilever, Nestlé, Kellogg Company, L'Oréal, and others, have been using M&A for decades.

Can a start-up like Wingreens be successful? DSGCP became shareholders in Wingreens when they acquired RAW Pressery. I wish Anju & Arjun Srivastava all the best as they adopt this playbook and make it work for them leveraging their core strengths, and I am so excited to see them execute.

#india #insurgentbrands

Point-of-sale terminal is not going away in credit-starved India, says Mswipe Technologies CEO Ketan Patel — startup.outlookindia.com

Outlook India's Vinita Bhatia speaks to Ketan Patel, CEO of DSGCP portfolio co Mswipe Technologies, about how Mswipe views the opportunity in the payments space, building the network of POS terminals, and plans to leverage the demand for credit.

India's Fireside Ventures raises $225M for third fund — www.channelnewsasia.com

Great to see global LPs believing in the India CPG opportunity. Fireside co-founder Kanwal Singh and I had talked about the Indian consumer and the opportunity for insurgent brands when we were at Helion and BIPEF. This is great news for founders looking to build the next generation of Indian consumer brands.

Vibrators, supplements, and ‘Big Os’: How the market for sexual wellness is growing in India? — www.financialexpress.com

It is heartening to see that in a conservative market like India, consumers have started exploring sexual wellness being embraced.

However, there continues to be a need for more education about the topic and removing the taboo stigma. DSGCP invested in SmileMakers, an Asian sexual wellness brand headquartered in Singapore, in 2016, and they were the first product in their category to be sold at Singapore's pharmacy chains Watson's and Guardian.

D2C startup Good Health Company raises $10M in Series A round led by Left Lane Capital — yourstory.com

I have been watching the Mars (by GHC) brand and have been impressed with their product offering, the content and their communication position - taking ownership of the issue vs shame. The broader opportunity in the wellness space is just starting.