MAM
Industry remembers Shunu Sen
NEW DELHI/MUMBAI: An irreparable loss was the common refrain among marketing and media professionals today to the passing away of industry doyen Shunu Sen.
Said Suhel Seth, chief executive of Equus Red Cell, a Delhi-based ad firm, “Shunu was such a superb personality that it is difficult to envisage a future without him, without his wisecracks and, of course, without his penetrative understanding of the market and its mechanics.”
The flamboyant Seth, who has also tried his hand at TV when he hosted `Aap Jo Kahen Haan To Haan.’ on Zee TV, added, “I always looked forward to meet Shunu because every meeting was an education in itself.”
And Seth should know because he has worked closely with Shunu in recent years. Sen was also the non-executive chairman of Equus Red Cell. “There are many instances, including our board meetings, when he has guided us with his vast experience which will be brutally missed.”
Another person who had worked quite closely with Sen on various accounts is Subrato Chakraborty, the Delhi head of RMG David, an advertising firm that is managed in India by O&M.
“Sen will be missed because of the incisive logic which he used to bring into play. His logic to any situation could not be ignored. You may agree or disagree with him, but you just could not overlook the power of his logic and reasoning,” Chakraborty opined, adding that he had worked with Sen on at least three accounts.
Moreover, according to Chakraborty, Sen always was firmly rooted into reality which surfaced in seminars, etc. “In seminars there are times when speakers do go overboard, but if Sen was there, then he would always bring them back to reality by his prudence,” he added.
Though some did find Sen arrogant, but his brilliance always overshadowed his other idiosyncrasies. “When you get through the (working) style to see the content, you will always say that Sen was brilliant,” Chakraborty gushed.
Former vice-president of TBWA Anthem, Viren Razdan, who collaborated with Sen on the Reebok account, also thinks that Sen’s experience in marketing will be sorely missed. “More so because it was not confined to a sector, but cut across all sectors.”
Sony Entertainment Television senior V-P – sales Abraham Thomas, who had the good fortune to interact with Shunu very early in his career, had this to say about the man. “His ability to simplify the most complex of scenarios into a very basic theoretical framework, was simply amazing.”
Recounting an encounter with the great man at the start of his career (which was in retailing), Abraham said Shunu had once walked into a supermarket he was managing at the time and designed a very succesful in-store promotion for the 1 kg pack of Surf detergent based on three minutes of questioning. The first question was what was the fastest moving Levers’ product in the store. The answer: Surf 1 kg pack. Shunu’s next question: what was the fastest moving non-branded item? Abraham told Shunu it was sugar. There and then he worked out a promotion wherein 1 kg Surf buyers also got a packet of sugar with their purchase. And such was Shunnu’s hands on approach that he returned after two weeks to check for himself how the promo was doing, Abraham said.
CII president Ashok Soota had this to say about the marketing guru par excellence: “Besides being a legend in the field of marketing in India, Mr Sen was one of India’s ablest marketing professionals, Mr. Sen was a very warm person, a man of high values, very accessible and sensitive to the needs of his associates. He was a visionary who
introduced many innovative ideas in the Indian market place and was instrumental in highlighting the importance and essence of branding in the country.”
“Mr Sen was also the chairman of the CII marketing committee. His guidance and contribution to CII had been immense and invaluable . Under his able leadership, CII saw two very successful marketing summits. He also undertook the training of CII staff in marketing strategies,” adds Soota, while stating that “Sen’s demise was an irreparable loss to CII. Last but not the least, Mr Sen was a very courageous person, who never treated his disability (in his later years Shunu was confined to a wheelchair) as a handicap and served as a role model for many others.”
Brands
Estée Lauder to shed 10,000 jobs as new boss bets on digital shift
The cosmetics giant raises its profit outlook but stays silent on a possible merger with Spain’s Puig, as job cuts deepen and a three-year sales slump weighs on the turnaround
NEW YORK: Stéphane de La Faverie is not done cutting. Estée Lauder announced on Friday that it plans to eliminate as many as 3,000 additional jobs, taking its total redundancy programme to as many as 10,000 roles, up from a previous target of 7,000 announced a year ago. The company, which owns La Mer, The Ordinary, Tom Ford, and Aveda, employs roughly 57,000 people worldwide. The mathematics of what is now being contemplated is stark.
The fresh round of cuts is expected to generate a further $200 million in savings, bringing the total annual savings from the programme to as much as $1.2 billion before taxes. That money, De La Faverie has made clear, will be ploughed back into the turnaround.
A CEO in a hurry
De La Faverie, who took the helm in January 2025, inherited a company that had endured three consecutive years of annual sales declines. His response has been to move fast and cut deep. A significant portion of the latest redundancies reflects his push to reduce headcount at US department stores, long a cornerstone of Estée Lauder’s distribution model but now a channel in structural decline. In their place, he is accelerating the shift toward faster-growing online platforms, including Amazon.com and TikTok Shop, a pivot that is reshaping not just where Estée Lauder sells but how it thinks about its customers.
The numbers are moving in the right direction
Despite the pain, there are signs the medicine is working. Estée Lauder raised its profit outlook for the remainder of the fiscal year, guiding for adjusted earnings per share in the range of $2.35 to $2.45, above analyst estimates and a notable step up from the $2.05 to $2.25 range it had guided for in February. Organic net sales growth is expected to come in at 3 per cent, the company said, at the high end of the range it set out in February.
The share price tells a mixed story. After De La Faverie took charge, the stock surged nearly 60 per cent, buoyed by investor optimism that a longtime company insider could finally arrest the decline. But 2026 has been rougher: the shares have fallen 27 per cent this year, weighed down by disappointing February results and the overhang of unresolved merger talks with Spanish beauty giant Puig Brands SA. The company gave no additional details about those discussions on Friday, leaving the market to guess.
Silence on Puig
The proposed tie-up with Puig remains the most consequential unknown hanging over Estée Lauder. A deal with the Barcelona-based group, which owns brands including Carolina Herrera and Rabanne, would reshape the global luxury beauty landscape. But with nothing new to say and a turnaround still very much in progress, De La Faverie is asking investors to trust the process.
Three years of sales declines, 10,000 job cuts, and a merger that may or may not happen. At Estée Lauder, the overhaul has barely started.
