Client Name

L 'OREAL PAKISTAN (PVT.) LIMITED

Faculty Advisor

Syed Atif Murtaza Qaiser, Lecturer, Department of Marketing, Institute of Business Administration (IBA), Karachi

SBS Thought Leadership Areas

Behavioural Studies

SBS Thought Leadership Area Justification

This project mostly sits in the Behavioral Studies space, it’s all about how L’Oréal interacts with its retail partners and how we can shift retailer behavior across different formats. We looked at stuff like trust, visibility, and what gets retailers to push product, and we used hard data to figure out what’s working and what’s not.

There’s also a clear Entrepreneurship and Innovation angle. A big part of the work was building fresh solutions for trade marketing, not just tweaks, but real changes in how L’Oréal handles channels and spends its money.

On a bigger scale, this work feeds into Retail Strategy and Channel Management. It adds to the conversation around how big brands can clean up complex retail setups by using behavioral insights and offering the kind of incentives that actually matter on the ground.

Aligned SDGs

GOAL 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure

Aligned SDGs Justification

Our report focuses on three SDGs:

  • SDG 8 is about decent work and growth. That’s exactly what happens when smaller retailers get better margins and a fair shot at selling. If they earn more, they grow, and that adds up for the economy.
  • SDG 9 is about innovation and infrastructure. We’re not just fixing trade expenditure; we’re pushing L’Oréal to use tools, digital engagement, better data, incentives, things that make the whole retail system work better.
  • SDG 12? That’s about not wasting money or stock. Blanket discounts sound good, but they usually lead to overstocking, price games, and low trust. A tighter, cleaner system helps everyone play fair and makes consumption more balanced.

NDA

No

Abstract

We worked with L’Oréal Pakistan on our Experiential Learning Project (ELP) that dug into their trade spend strategy and how they deal with retailers in Pakistan’s cluttered FMCG space. L’Oréal’s a global beauty giant, but in Pakistan, they’re operating in a retail space that’s all over the place, too many channels, price swings, and retailers getting mixed experiences. Our job was to find what wasn’t working, mainly their overdependence on wholesalers, and suggest a smarter, tighter system that improves profits, keeps prices in check, and makes retailers happier.

To get there, we used a mix of numbers and real, world conversations. On the data side, we broke down their sales figures and discount schemes to see where the trade expenditure was going, how pricing varied, and how quickly cash was cycling through. From that, we built predictive models to show what better discounting could do for profits and sales. But we didn’t just sit behind spreadsheets. We went out, met retailers across Karachi, GTs, SSS, MMT, and got the real story. Those interviews helped us understand the pain points, the competition, and what L’Oréal needed to fix on the ground.

What we found was clear: L’Oréal’s whole trade game was leaning way too hard on wholesale discounts. Sure, it helped move volume, but it came at a cost, brand value took a hit, channels started clashing, and there wasn’t much in it for the better, performing retailers. We heard straight from retailers too, the pricing was all over the place, trade terms kept shifting, and visibility support was patchy at best. And when do we compare cash cycles? L’Oréal was slower than the competition. That made it harder for retailers to get their money back fast, so they weren’t exactly excited to push L’Oréal products.

There was also a major arbitrage problem. With pricing jumping across channels, smart players were flipping stock for easy margins, not great for trust, and even worse for control.

So, what did we pitch? First, step back from the heavy wholesale. Put more muscle behind General Trade and Ecommerce, both have way more growth upside and actual consumer pull. We built a smarter discounting model that rewards real performance, not just bulk orders.

And beyond pricing? We told them to invest where it counts: train the retail staff, run local activations that make noise, and double down on digital, first retail engagement. That’s how you build loyalty and move products.

Big picture? This whole thing gives L’Oréal a solid, baked roadmap to clean up its trade model. Less chasing volume, more building real partnerships. And it’s flexible enough to hold up as the market shifts, which it always does in Pakistan’s FMCG jungle.

Document Type

Restricted Access

Document Name for Citation

Experiential Learning Project

Notes

Supplementary content :

Excel:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cVs5bzu80jYJuLoxKswqvfZgJoGNXrKl/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=109280244525050405846&rtpof=true&sd=true


PPT:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1GY9rEbox5rp6SLwcP63TvWG9wMSCQ7BY/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=109280244525050405846&rtpof=true&sd=true

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