India Today – August 13, 2018

24

DESIGN

toilet seat is often a place to ponder over life’s big and
small dilemmas, but you know that you are sitting on
one at a special place when you inadvertently look up
and find a slab of glass that’s open to sky, allowing
the thick foliage and shimmery sun to peek into this
private space. We are at a farm in Delhi’s Chattar-
pur area that luxury retail brand Good Earth calls its
office space and glass silos let in ample light as young,
energetic teams work hard on creating the next
successful collection under the watchful eye of found-
er Anita Lal,, 70, Creative Director, and her daugh-
ter Simran Lal,47, who has been the brand’s CEO
since 2012.
The luxury home decor and lifestyle brand,
which was founded in 1996 by Anita Lal has, in
the last 23 years, grown to represent the changing
idea of India and its historic past that makes it what
it is today. In a cluttered market where you need to
scream to be heard, Good Earth’s way is to be slow,
even languorous. While the brand has captured the
high end of the market and over the years inspired a
number of copycat brands, it is in no hurry to expand
at breakneck speed. With revenues of about ` 150
crore in 2017, the company is set to take things to the
next level, both in terms of the influence it wields and
the people it reaches out to. The brand today has ten
stores across seven cities and ships to 90 countries.
While Good Earth is essentially a luxury home
decor brand, over the last few years their business
has grown to include apparel under the label Sus-
tain. They also have a crockery range, linen, bedding,
a children’s range, and wellness oils. More recently
they also launched a historic colouring book for

adults and have commissioned stories for children

that are rooted in India.

In fact, Sustain, their clothes brand launched in

2010 has been a big money spinner, overtaking the

home decor segment soon after its launch. Many have

tried replicating the success of the dynamic brand but

Anita Lal had something that none of them do: first

mover advantage. When she set up her then fledgling

business there was no one else who had the same

vision that was so deeply rooted in India (FabIndia

was catering to a different demographic) and so Lal

tapped into a space that the brand has come to oc-

cupy since, on the high end of the luxury home decor

COVER STORY I BRAND

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INDIA TODAY SPICE 14 AUGUST 2018