We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Surbhee Grover. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Surbhee below.

Surbhee, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Naming anything – including a business – is so hard. Right? What’s the story behind how you came up with the name of your brand?

This was an answer that came to me after a lot of soul-searching as well as developing a deep understanding of not just the market and a sense for the category and trends, but also truly understanding who we were, and what we wanted to be. The Indus is one of the world’s most storied rivers. As the Nile was to ancient Egypt, the Indus was to the 5,000-year-old Indus Valley Civilization. The river also gave name to the land (the Indian sub-continent), country (India), people (Indians) and religion (Hinduism). While we had also explored “Love, India” – I wanted to acknowledge that the inspiration was not restricted to a particular country – hence we dug deeper into history and decided the name would, instead, give a nod to the original civilization that gave birth to several of the current countries in South Asia. It drops a pin in place and (historical) times and transports us to the origin of the cultures in that part of the world.
This sense of place pervades everything about Love, Indus – from the packaging that incorporates art and calligraphy from the regions that inspired the products to the evocative storytelling on Instagram.

Our story is one of confluence and contrast – of ancient wisdom and practices enhanced with cutting edge technology and processes. Think of our story as a letter penned by us to you that explores our two homes – India and New York – to bring you the best of both. The brand name is a sign-off of that love letter.

Relatedly, the color in which we write the word “Indus” in our logo – (Ink) Indigo, got its name from the ancient Greek term meaning “from India” and shows how representative the shade was of the region. This deep, dark shade of blue is the oldest natural dye known to man, and for much of human history, this luxurious color has been elusive and hard to replicate. The color also invokes the written word, taking you back to the brand’s sign-off. It is a celebration of ink-stained fingertips, and the personal discoveries and rediscoveries, the sentiments and stories that underscore our journey.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I grew up in India — spent my early childhood in Kolkata, in India’s east; summers were spent with my grandparents in Ajmer in the west; high school and college were in Delhi while my first job took me to Mumbai. My parents were from 2 different States (Punjab and Rajasthan) and while many might read about India being a diverse country, I lived and breathed that fact growing up. I started my career working on new product launches for India’s largest haircare brand (a coconut oil treatment). I subsequently joined L’Oréal as a brand manager and part of the core team that launched the brand in India. From pure, virgin coconut oil treatments to hair color, from selling to consumers in remote villages to collaborating with professional / luxury spas and salons – these early years taught me a lot about how consumers engage with beauty, skincare and personal products and what truly matters to them.
The next stage of my life brought me to New York (which is now home) and after a master’s from NYU Stern, I joined Booz & Co (now part of PWC), a global consulting firm where I worked on strategy and innovation for clients in the consumer space. Over the years, I worked with some of the leading luxury goods brands in Europe and North America – which complemented my earlier exposure.
With my base in New York – a city that heralds many trends – I was able to observe how increasing consumer consciousness led to the now-ubiquitous clean beauty category, and how several Indian concepts, such as yoga, or Indian kitchen staples such as turmeric and coconut oil started finding their way into the daily life and lattes of Western consumers. There was no “aha!” moment that led to the birth of Love, Indus. It was more a gradual realization that the skincare and wellness concepts from the Indian subcontinent that had achieved some recognition globally, barely scratched the surface of all the regional riches that I had grown up experiencing. In addition, my strategy consulting work and global career taught me that technology and innovation, used effectively, can significantly enhance and compliment natural elements – because breakthroughs come from reimagining possibilities.
The key, then was to bring it all together – these rare riches from various parts of the Indian subcontinent, lab-designed clean chemistry and the latest in skincare tech and innovations — into powerful, sensorial offerings that focused on unmet consumer needs.

In terms of the main things that I’d want potential clients/followers/fans to know and what differentiates us:
1. Love, Indus was inspired by my personal journey. I grew up in various parts of India and have had intimate, first-hand, experience of the richness of local and regional customs, minerals and ways of life. While the Love, Indus formulations are clean and consciously created, I believe that is now table stakes. What makes us unique is we have taken these incredibly wonderful, sometimes lost or forgotten ingredients from specific regions of the Indian subcontinent that might have been used for millennia but just haven’t made their way outside their regional bastions, enhanced their efficacy with new-age technologies and combined them with clean, safe lab-designed synthetics. There are only a handful of brands that holistically leverage the customs, techniques, minerals, and botanicals from the Indian subcontinent – and most that do, have primarily relied on the traditional or Ayurveda aspects. Ours is born of the confluence of both worlds to craft potent offerings.

2. We aim to fulfill unmet needs, where consumers have few efficacious options – for e.g., our Velvet :08 Broadway Bright detox mask is an 8 min polish that leaves your skin smoother and glowing, but it also reduces the regrowth of “peach fuzz” (fine facial hair) over time. We crafted this product because we heard time and time again from consumers that there are few gentle yet effective options for dealing with this, especially if one wanted to reduce the frequency of waxing/ dermaplaning and other mechanical treatments.

3. Innovation is core to our brand – we’re bringing relevant solutions to market – some that have never-before been seen in skincare. For e.g., ancient skin-restoring ingredients – silk cocoons, and copper – have been used for centuries in many ways to renew and heal our skin. But they haven’t been used together… until now. We’ve introduced a remarkable new way of exfoliating with our copper-crusted silk cocoons.

4. Even our packaging breaks category norms – they are triangles in a square world. Our brand logo is a silver heart in movement that is made up of 14 unique triangles. Our packaging shape represents a “piece” of our heart. It helps the product stand out at retail while each panel highlights the art, culture, ingredients, and language of the region that inspired the product.

5. The brand is conscious about the environment and our communities. Reflected in several decisions – use of glass and sustainable packaging wherever possible, in doing strong diligence to ensure we are working with ethical suppliers, being a brand that gives back (strong association with Amrit Clinics that provides basic healthcare to tribal communities in rural India)

6. Love, Indus is also a brand that is full of layers and surprises – every element of the packaging, the unboxing, the lingering (natural) fragrance on application…these are elements you discover as you experience the brand. It was created to be a gift to yourself.

Alright – let’s talk about marketing or sales – do you have any fun stories about a risk you’ve taken or something else exciting on the sales and marketing side?

My first job was with one of India’s leading CPG companies selling haircare products. I had fought my way onto the sales team at a time when the company didn’t have any saleswomen – it was considered unsafe as we were often on the road (a somewhat generous term for the dirt-tracks to remote villages we often found ourselves on) after collecting cash from mom & pop shops in far-flung rural areas. Succeeding in this role was critical – not just for myself – but also to showcase that women could succeed in this role, despite the environmental/ cultural challenges and help extend the option of a Sales career path to future batches of women.

It was a foundational experience that taught me so much. We spent a lot of time traveling to villages selling our coconut oil-based haircare products. Our consumers were often quite poor and one of our best sellers was a one rupee (about 5 cents) single-use packet. Talking to our consumers taught me so much and helped me understand their relationship with beauty, wellness and their emotional bond with products that made them feel good. That year, the territory ranked in the top regions (for sales/ turnover), but the win, for me, went beyond that.

(Many) years later, as a strategy consultant to multi-billion-dollar luxury companies in the US and Europe, I was struck by how valuable that early part of my career was, and I constantly found myself leveraging insights gleaned back in the villages of India when dealing with luxury shoppers in the west. Having had experience across a range of geographies, target customer income levels and cultures allowed me to make linkages and imagine new possibilities – and I never would have thought that selling a $0.05 pack of coconut hair oil would help me craft a sales strategy for a champagne brand or launch an opulent skincare brand.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

The most critical ingredient to being an entrepreneur is mental resilience. The pandemic and lockdowns hit just before our planned launch. We had to scramble to find alternate suppliers and routes to get our ingredients/supplies where they were needed all while regulations seemed to be changing daily, manufacturer/ producers were in lockdown, and our carefully thought-through channel strategy lost its relevance in the evolving retail environment. The only way we were able to make the business a reality and get to where we did was because of the tenacity to keep finding innovative new solves and opportunities every time we were challenged (which was often!) …and to have the resilience to rise – time and time again.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://loveindus.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/loveindus/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LoveIndusNY/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/love-indus/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCib30DTtrdGyTpTJo_O0Y7Q