Manya Nayar Built IBEAUTY Because No One Was Making Makeup For Men

Walk into any beauty aisle in India and you'll notice something. Almost everything on the shelf is built for one gender. That gap sat there for years, obvious once someone points it out, until Manya Nayar decided to actually do something about it.

Manya has spent close to eight years inside the beauty and D2C world, first as an intern who became a brand manager in two months, then as a consultant working across fashion, beauty and lifestyle brands, and now as the founder of IBEAUTY, a makeup line built on a simple ratio: 50% skincare, 50% makeup.

She's launched a hero product that sold out three times without burning a rupee on paid marketing, interned at Tory Burch to understand how international luxury actually works, and turned down the "just start" advice that dominates startup Twitter because she'd rather spend three years getting a formula right than rush something onto shelves that could break someone out.

This conversation is for anyone building in beauty, or in any category that feels crowded until you actually look closely enough to find the gap nobody else has bothered to fill.

Key Takeaways: Finding the Gap Nobody's Filling

Spotting the Opportunity:

• Manya noticed male beauty creators getting called out online for using products not made for them, and realized no brand was catering to makeup for men or any other gender
• IBEAUTY's entire product line runs on a 50% skincare, 50% makeup formula, FDA approved
• The brand commits to one product a year, not a rushed catalog

How She Actually Built It:

• Two months into an internship at Aurora Ayurveda, at 19, she was already the brand's manager
• Her father's dye, color and chemical business gave her manufacturer contacts, though she never used his formulas
• The hero product, Tinsum, took from 2020 to 2023 to research and launch, and has sold out three times purely on word of mouth

On Luxury and Patience:

• Her take on luxury: there is no such thing as "affordable luxury," it's for 2-3% of the population by definition
• She calls herself an extremist about failure, she'll cry about it, rant about it, and take a Wednesday to get over it
• Her advice to every new founder: take constructive criticism as a blessing, not an insult

Q: Tell our viewers a bit about yourself and how you got into beauty.

Manya Nayar: I have always called myself a child of creativity. Not because something that I have acquired over time but maybe an instinct I'm born with. I have been very creative since the very start. Ever since I was in my school, I had a flair for writing and I was a part of almost all of these extracurricular activities. My dad's into the business of dyes, colors, and chemicals, so I've literally grown up seeing colors all around me. I always knew I wanted to pursue journalism and mass communication. During COVID, I started taking up internships here and there in content writing because I wanted to explore my niche. From there, I got an opportunity to intern in Aurora Ayurveda, which is a luxury Ayurveda homegrown brand. Two months into my internship, at 19 I was already a brand manager of that brand. That was where my interest in beauty as an industry began exploding.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Most 19 year olds are still figuring out their major. Manya was already running a brand. Sometimes the fastest way to learn an industry is to get thrown into managing one.

Q: That Aurora Ayurveda internship basically landed in your lap. Was it luck?

Manya Nayar: Totally believe that. That was the only beauty brand that I applied to for an internship. And come to Ayurveda I had zero knowledge of what Ayurveda was. I'm Gen Z, I'm very fast-paced; Ayurveda on the other hand is very slow-paced. However, my interest began deepening into it and then from there on I started learning about beauty business.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: She applied to exactly one beauty brand and it happened to be one that taught her patience before she needed it most for her own product. Luck finds people who show up.

Q: How did the idea for IBEAUTY actually come together?

Manya Nayar: There was this project in my entrepreneurial subject where we had to design a business. I thought, I have a factory, I have obviously my dad. I didn't end up working with his formulas at all, but his contacts did help me find the right manufacturers. I also wanted to see how to stand out in a crowded market. I noticed male beauty creators were coming up and people were calling them out on the internet. I was like, who is happening? And that's exactly where I found the gap. There is no brand that's catering to makeup needs of men or any other gender per se. And that was when I was like, okay I got to make makeup that's 50% skincare and 50% makeup. My beauty brand line is based on the line of 50% skincare and 50% makeup; it's certified FDA approved. I was very clear in my head that one product a year should be the timeline. That has been the idea around it and that's how IBeauty started and the tagline says your beauty is your way.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: The internet was busy mocking men who wore makeup meant for someone else. Manya was busy taking notes. That's the difference between an audience and a founder.

Q: What's the biggest win for the brand so far?

Manya Nayar: We have sold out our tinsel massaging serum thrice. This has been such an achievement for me for a young brand like mine not actively burning money on marketing. It has been organic and the word of mouth has been doing a great show.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: No paid ads, three sellouts. That's not a marketing win, that's a product-market fit win, and it's a lot harder to fake.

Q: Beyond IBEAUTY, you also consult for other brands. What does that side of your work look like?

Manya Nayar: I'm a brand and marketing consultant. I proudly take care of more brands within the fashion, beauty, lifestyle segment. I see that as a strength because I bring eight years of experience on the table. I love working with Gen Z founders. They are very particular about what they want from you. They don't care if you have a business. They just want the task done.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Gen Z founders don't care about your pitch deck, they care about your output. Consultants who can't ship fast don't survive that generation.

Q: How do you feel about the traditional 9-to-5 office setup, working with founders like that?

Manya Nayar: Work in office is a concept for the bygones. For creative individuals like me, I believe that we should work wherever our brains function the best. If I want to sit on the roof I'll sit on the roof and work. I take ownership of my work.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Ownership doesn't need a desk. It needs someone who cares whether the work is actually good.

Q: You've also worked with brands like Thai Beauty and interned at Tory Burch. What did those experiences add?

Manya Nayar: There's a brand called Thai Beauty and Ana is the founder; she has been so supportive. She made work so easy for me. And then I was pursuing my internship at Tory Burch, which is an international luxury fashion house. I learned so much about international markets as well and that experience I bring to the table now.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: You can read about luxury markets, or you can intern inside one. Manya picked the version that actually changes how you build.

Q: Since you've seen luxury up close, how would you tell someone to actually build a luxury brand?

Manya Nayar: First things first, Indians relate luxury to pricing. There are a lot of brands who are saying these days it's affordable luxury and I always tell them this thing: luxury cannot be affordable. Luxury means it is something beyond your regular spend. When you set out you need to be very clear in your head that you are only making it for the two or 3% of the population. There is nothing called as affordable luxury. Secondly, be very specific about what you are getting into, who your TG is. Building a brand is not just about throwing an event or having a fancy packaging. It is much more than that. You cannot advertise your way to luxury. It's a very slow process to build a luxury brand.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: "Affordable luxury" is a marketing term for a brand that hasn't decided who it's for. Real luxury picks its 3% and doesn't apologize for the other 97%.

Q: You launched Tinsum after two years of research and it took even longer to actually ship. Startup advice online usually says just start. What's your take?

Manya Nayar: I really cannot put something out in the market that I'm not confident about. Tinsum launched after two years of me researching. I took about the entire 2020, 2021, 2022 and then 2023 we came out with Tinsum. I have wanted to be just so sure of the product that I am the one person who wears it again and again. No, there are MOQs involved. There is a lot of money involved. There's a lot of feedback that you need to take up because I do not want to invest into such large MOQs and then the product is not working for me. It's giving me breakouts. It's reacting with my skin. What will I do of the remaining product? My conscience won't allow me to sell it to anybody. A lot of R&D is required.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: "Move fast" is great advice until you're the one holding a warehouse of product that breaks people out. Minimum order quantities don't care about your launch timeline.

Q: How do you personally deal with failure, given how much you invest into getting a product right?

Manya Nayar: I'll tell you something about me, I'm a very extremist as a human. I take a failure as a failure for me and I'm very bad at it. I don't like losing. I will take that failure very personally. I will think through it. I will cry about it. I will rant about it and then maybe one Wednesday I'll get over it. I want to make sure everything is perfect.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Founders who claim failure doesn't touch them are usually lying. Manya just names the process out loud, cry, rant, get over it on a Wednesday, and moves on anyway.

Q: One beauty category you think is still wide open?

Manya Nayar: Lips. Big wide open.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Everyone's fighting over skincare serums. Manya's pointing at the one category people forgot to crowd.

Q: One word you'd love to never see in a brand's Instagram bio again?

Manya Nayar: Different. Give me an adjective, don't be like plain out there.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: "Different" is the laziest word in branding because it describes nothing. Show me the difference, don't caption it.

Q: A brand you personally admire for how it stands out?

Manya Nayar: Rafi Beauty; it's a UK based brand. And in India, Wild; hands down Deepak Kosla. Great product marketing and great community marketing.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Notice she didn't pick brands for their packaging. She picked them for marketing and community, the parts that are actually hard to copy.

Q: What would be one piece of advice you'd give your younger self?

Manya Nayar: Life's way better than you are thinking right now. Just be at it. You are doing something right.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Founders are usually harder on themselves than the market ever will be. Sometimes the advice isn't strategy, it's just permission to relax.

Q: One thing every new founder in beauty should do in the first few months?

Manya Nayar: Please be very open to constructive feedback. Do not justify. Do not justify if somebody's pointing something out at you. Be very patient, listen to what they have to say, take that as a feedback and work on it. For me, I poured myself into every product that I make, and that I think is my pitfall that I did not take feedback constructively. But yes, we are working on the rebranding. For anybody who's starting new, please take constructive criticism as a blessing.

🔥 ChaiNet's Hot Take: Manya named her own pitfall on record, unprompted. That kind of self-awareness is rarer than a good product, and it's usually what fixes the product.

Final Thoughts: Slow Is a Strategy, Not a Weakness

Manya's closing perspective: "I really cannot put something out in the market that I'm not confident about."

The bottom line: IBEAUTY isn't a brand chasing speed. It's a brand built on a gap Manya noticed while everyone else was scrolling past it, and on a founder willing to spend three years on a single product before she'd let anyone else touch it. In a category that rewards fast launches and faster content, that patience is the actual differentiator, not a tagline about being different.

For anyone building in beauty right now, the lesson isn't to copy her timeline. It's to copy her standard: would you wear this product again and again yourself, before you ever ask someone else to.

What's next for IBEAUTY looks like more of the same restraint, one product a year, a rebrand informed by the feedback she admits she once resisted, and a bet that lips are the next category worth building in. If the last few years are any indication, she'll take her time getting there, and it'll probably be worth the wait.

Q: How can people connect with you and learn more about IBEAUTY?

Manya Nayar: [Guest's response about where to find them - LinkedIn, Instagram, IBEAUTY's website, etc.]

Final words: Beauty doesn't need another brand shouting "different." It needs founders willing to notice the gap everyone else scrolled past, and patient enough to get it right before they ship it. That's the whole IBEAUTY story in one line.

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