Dive Temporary:
- Unilever is buying males’s private care model Dr. Squatch from personal fairness agency Summit Companions, based on a press launch. Monetary phrases of the transaction weren’t disclosed.
- The deal is a part of the CPG large’s efforts to align its portfolio round premium and high-growth verticals. Unilever praised Dr. Squatch’s “built-in-culture” model, which has been established via viral social media advertising and marketing and partnerships with influencers and celebrities like Sydney Sweeney.
- Unilever is broadly ramping up its spending on social media and influencers to achieve completely different world markets and shopper teams. Snapping up Dr. Squatch additionally sees the corporate return to direct-to-consumer (DTC) acquisitions, a technique that has not all the time panned out.
Dive Perception:
Unilever is dipping again into the DTC properly with the acquisition of a model that has efficiently captured the eye of a fascinating cohort of Gen Z males (and beforehand been cited by the Dove and Hellmann’s proprietor as a rising aggressive risk). Based in 2013, Dr. Squatch sells a line of grooming merchandise, together with soaps, lotions and shampoos, that boast pure components and can be found via e-commerce, nationwide retailers like Walmart and subscription bundles.
The DTC facet of the enterprise provides Unilever extra first-party knowledge to work with at a time when refining personalization and concentrating on are of urgent significance for entrepreneurs. Dr. Squatch has additionally proved savvy with social media-first advertising and marketing, one other precedence for Unilever. The corporate’s new CEO Fernando Fernandez plans to allocate half of Unilever’s promoting spend to social whereas considerably increasing its manufacturers’ work with influencers.
Dr. Squatch has grow to be well-known for a very bro-friendly bent, with adverts filled with sexual innuendo and recognizable stars. A viral marketing campaign launched final 12 months options Sydney Sweeney as a “Physique Wash Genie” who responds to males’s needs (for pure grooming merchandise, in fact). The 2 just lately partnered to promote limited-edition cleaning soap containing a few of the “Euphoria” actor’s bathwater in a stunt indicative of Dr. Squatch’s go-for-broke method.
In an announcement across the acquisition, Unilever private care president Fabian Garcia known as out the upstart’s “intelligent digital engagement methods” and teed up an growth past its dwelling market.
“Constructing on its success within the U.S., we’re excited to scale the model internationally and complement our providing within the fast-growing males’s private care phase,” mentioned Garcia.
Unilever has been busy restructuring, with the aim of shedding low-performing items and reorienting round premium verticals. It has beforehand used acquisitions as a approach to modernize, with blended outcomes.
In 2016, the corporate bought Greenback Shave Membership, an innovator in subscription-based shaving, for $1 billion, one of many largest bets legacy CPGs had made on the DTC mannequin at that time. Unilever bought a majority stake within the razor model in 2023 to personal fairness.
