Actor became the latest celebrity to foray into the beauty and personal care industry. He co-founded the skincare brand UNHYPE. On Thursday, UNHYPE achieved a major milestone by completely selling out its initial launch edition of 10,000 units of its ‘VD Signature Routines’ (comprising 30,000 total products) within two weeks, as per the company’s press note.
Built around a simple, effective three-step approach, the routine features a face wash, moisturiser, and sunscreen, touted to be designed for everyday Indian skin. The kit, signed by Deverakonda himself, was offered in two variants– Acne Safe and brightening versions. Both were a part of a pre-booked collection that generated ₹1.3 crore in revenue ahead of regular sales opening on October 3.
Talking to LiveMint, Vijay Deverakonda opened up about his brand.
When asked, “With regular sales beginning on October 3 and generating ₹1.3 crore in revenue from pre-booking, what are your expectations from the brand?”, Vijay Deverakonda said, “India has shown immense love and trust, but as a founder, I don’t have expectations. I have responsibilities for the brand. As a young kid growing up, I didn’t have much access to knowledge or access to products. But success in my journey, my personal journey, has given me great exposure to a lot of habits that have helped me, into lots of things that have helped me and if I am able to use my position that I have and the access that I have to create products that can provide utility and can help people in their own journeys, for me that’s a huge success.”
Deverakonda said that he is committed to keeping his brand ‘straightforward ‘ and ‘affordable’ for the Indian masses. Even the official tagline in their website reads ‘No BS. Only what works.’
The 37-year-old actor shared that the brand aims to build healthy daily habits rather than promising miracle cures for Indian skin and hair issues.
“I expect the brand to continue the responsibility of making no bulls**t products that work. We strip it of all hype and nonsense and make top-of-the-line products and make them accessible to the country at prices that are really affordable. That’s a big goal of ours — to make top-of-the-line products and also make them affordable. We are all most conscious about our looks. We get certain confidence when our skin or hair feels good. When something goes wrong, it annoys us. It bothers you throughout the day,” explained the actor.
“There is a responsibility for the brand to continue developing top-of-the-line products across areas that most Indians are concerned with, that affect a lot of us and help create systems for them, and also keep it simple,” he said, emphasising the simplicity of the products.
Deverakonda said that he personally tests and uses all the products daily. He argued that its is the best in the country.
“The people have shown immense trust and love in the two weeks since the announcement, and our main responsibility is to fulfil the obligation of that trust and love. I am sure we will because these are all products that I have tested and I use; they are part of my routine every day. I think the sunscreen from UNHYPE is probably the best in the country, and once you use it, you can’t use anything else; it’s hard to use anything else. I want to continue building multiple products that feel that way and that replace every product on my shelf.”
He confirmed that UNHYPE will continue to expand into new product categories only when he sees a genuine need.
The brand is co-founded and co-built by the actor.
