After Good Earth and Nicobar, creative entrepreneur Simran Lal focuses on luxury brand Paro

Simran Lal comes from a family of entrepreneurs, but she never saw herself as one.

After completing a course in product development and merchandising from New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology, she put in a brief stint at ABC Carpet and Home before she joined her family business, Good Earth.

“I guess I would say I stumbled into entrepreneurship and, since 2002, have tried to learn and grow through the process and in this journey. Today, I do see myself as a creative entrepreneur,” she says.

Simran launched Nicobar three years back, and has been actively engaged with local artisans and the design community to build a contemporary product line across fashion, home, and travel accessories.

Emphasis on the self

She recently launched Paro, focusing on well-being and personal care. It is a single standalone space at Chanakya Mall in New Delhi, and a concept-led brand with emphasis on the self.

Simran explains, “As long as I can remember I have been in awe of nature and deeply connected with it. I believe that it is this way of being, which has shaped my view of beauty, vitality, and vibrancy.”

She says one of the most valuable gifts of Indian wisdom is the idea of an integrative way of living and being.

“What I mean by that is a deeply and fundamentally holistic approach to life, earlier recognised as Svasthi. This is a state where our body and mind are in harmony with each other and with the rhythms of prakriti, or nature. This quest is where Paro, as a brand, originates from.”

To this end, the entrepreneur believes Paro celebrates the luxury of both sukhya (comfort) and shringar (beauty), through nuances of purity, textures, and beauty that delights the senses.

Its offerings include apparel, jewellery, deep sleep (GOTs-certified organic cotton range of bath and bed linen), home accents and Paro Botanica.

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Elements that make the brand

Paro focuses on three major things: being artisanal, environmentally conscious, and knowledge sharing.

Paro Botanica, for instance, is made in very small batches to avoid the use of heavy preservatives. It uses muslin bags, brass boxes, and aluminium containers as packaging.

Paro also wants to share traditional wisdom and knowledge from India’s heritage through workshops organised every month.

“One of the things that has motivated us to launch these brands is a need we have personally felt, a lack of things that we have found missing. So Good Earth organically came from our search for beautiful things for the home. Our search for beautiful craftsmanship, superb quality, made in India, and available in India was one of the key impulses behind Good Earth,” Simran says.

With Nicobar, “we found a huge gap between what was available and what we would have liked to find. Paro is also the result of a personal search and need gaps”, she adds.

Simran says each of these brands has its own business strategy because each is different and addresses a different need.

“With Good Earth, growth came about very organically. Later, ecommerce led to international growth. Nicobar was about democratising design; we opened with a store at Kala Ghoda and online on the same day, so it was physical and digital equally. Paro is a unique, experiential brand. Here the strategy is to share our traditional wisdom and knowledge,” Simran says.

Simran feels blessed that she has not faced any special entrepreneurial challenges because of her gender.

However, she says that creating a consumer base is a very big challenge. And so are the "lack of good spaces and finding the right people".

“The satisfaction one gets when customers express their joy and delight in the brands; who come back and say that this brand is my go-to for something, that walking into your store makes me feel happy, or that I learned so much because of what you brand did or made...these are what we count as our biggest successes,” Simran says.

(Edited by Teja Lele Desai)