Meet Shark Tank India judge who lived in 'matchbox house', ran marathon when pregnant

Vineeta Singh is the founder and CEO of Sugar Cosmetics. (Image credit: Photo Instagrammed by vineetasng)

Everyone who has made it big in Mumbai has a ‘Bombay story’ to tell, and so does Vineeta Singh, founder and CEO of Sugar Cosmetics. She’s among the

Singh’s turning point came when she was 17, when her teacher told her she should be an entrepreneur.

In the years that followed, she cracked the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) entrance exam and got a seat at IIT-Madras. Following a B. Tech in electrical engineering, she earned an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) in Ahmedabad.

“At 23, I moved to Bombay. I lived in a matchbox house which would flood during monsoon,” Vineeta Singh told Humans of Bombay.

She moved to Mumbai following degrees from two of the most elite institutes in India and after turning down an attractive job offer. Unsurprisingly, her parents and others questioned her decision.
“My savings were diminishing; I’d hardly ever go out because I was on a strict budget. But I pushed on. I even started a venture, but it didn’t work as planned.”

It was during this phase of self-doubt that she took to running and eventually, participating in marathons.

“After a year, I felt brave enough to give entrepreneurship another shot with Fab Bag, a beauty subscription company. But after research, I realised the need for quality cosmetics for Indian women–that’s how Sugar Cosmetics was born,” she told Humans of Bombay.

But her challenges as a woman entrepreneur did not end there. Singh spoke of difficulties she faced while meeting investors.

“Once, an investor refused to hold a meeting just with me. He wanted to have the business talk with a ‘man’. But I decided to let my work do the talking,” she said.

All this while, Singh stuck with her other passion: running. This kept her going even when she ran out of funds for her venture.

A new mother by then, Singh described how she would juggle work and motherhood, from pumping breast milk, working out and handling office calls.

Today, Sugar Cosmetics has a community of five million beauty enthusiasts across all platforms. 75 per cent of its 1,500-plus workforce is women.

Singh is one of the judges or “sharks” on Shark Tank India, the Indian adaptation of the global startup reality show.

Read: 'They lost huge opportunity': Shark Tank India judge on 'some startup ecosystem members'

The other six judges on Shark Tank India are Ashneer Grover of BharatPe, Namita Thapar of Emcure Pharma, Anupam Mittal of Shaadi.com, Ghazal Alagh of Mamaearth, Peyush Bansal of Lenskart and Aman Gupta of Boat.