DTC Podcast Ep 568: How Kulfi Beauty Grew from a $5K Launch to 720 Sephora Stores with Zero Paid Ads
Dec 15, 2025
Priyanka Ganjoo, the founder of Kulfi Beauty, turned her vision of a culturally inclusive beauty brand into reality, addressing the underrepresentation of South Asian skin tones in the market. She discusses the power of community-building over paid ads and how her grassroots approach propelled Kulfi into 720 Sephora stores. Priyanka highlights the importance of retail velocity, shares insights from their first product launch, and details how organic creator partnerships drive their marketing success. Her story is a testament to the impact of authenticity and cultural storytelling in business.
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Scale Retail Incrementally
- Take retail rollouts step-by-step and avoid over-investing in big fixtures too early.
- Test product-market fit and messaging before committing to expensive in-store programs.
Treat Velocity As Your North Star
- Make velocity the primary retail metric: fast sell-through beats large initial purchase orders.
- Prioritize repeat purchase and shelf movement to avoid chargebacks and RTVs.
D2C Halo Helps Retail Velocity
- D2C content and community created a halo that drove in-store discovery and conversions.
- Sampling and events helped, but community awareness unlocked most early retail traffic.