Mumbai: What began as a diversification strategy into adjacent lines of business is now stagnating for Asian Paints. Its home decor brands, including sanitaryware brand Ess Ess, kitchen brand Sleek, and decorative lighting brand The White Teak Company, have either shrunk in size or stagnated over the last four fiscal years, data from the company’s latest annual report show.
Asian Paints first bought a stake in The White Teak Company and Weatherseal – that sells doors and windows – in 2022. The other acquisitions are much older – Ess Ess was acquired in 2014 and Sleek Kitchens in 2013.
Between FY22 and FY26, revenues of Ess Ess and Sleek have stagnated at around ₹350 crore and ₹400 crore, respectively. Meanwhile, The White Teak Company reported total revenues of ₹99 crores in FY26, lower than its topline from FY23, its first year of operations under Asian Paints.
Weatherseal has grown steadily from ₹25 crore revenue in FY23 to ₹75 crore in FY26, but it remains a sliver of the over ₹35,000 crore company that dominates India’s decorative paints sector.
“Our transition into India’s integrated home décor partner remains a relevant, long-term goal,” the company management said in the annual report. “While the broader home décor industry navigated near-term retail headwinds, our underlying infrastructure proved its resilience.”
Profitability up, scale elusive
As of Q4FY26, Sleek reported a loss before tax of ₹1 crore, down from ₹16 crore the previous year on quarterly revenues of ₹99 crores, per Asian Paints’ quarterly filings from May this year. Meanwhile, Ess Ess reported a profit before tax of ₹4 crore, reversing a loss from the year ago period, on quarterly revenues of ₹95 crore. The company did not dsiclose margins for Weatherseal and The White Teak Company.
“Our strategy in home décor is clear…We are building a differentiated ecosystem that brings together products, services, design assistance, fulfilment capability and technology-enabled consumer experience,” the report said. “Our focus remains on scaling this opportunity with discipline, improving execution and steadily strengthening the path to profitability.”
Asian Paints did not respond to an email seeking comments.
Crowded market challenge
Architects, designers, and analysts tracking the company say Asian Paints needs to differentiate its brands to stand out in an extremely cluttered market with established competitors.
“As an architect, you will rarely find Asian Paints’ options for kitchens in the market,” says Sanjana Mathur, co-founder of Delhi-NCR based architecture firm Studio Bipolar and director of architecture and urban design firm Fountainhead Design Services. “Asian Paints’ brand [Sleek] does not inspire the same confidence as bigger, better brands. In the same price band [as Sleek], I can get a brand with a much longer history and in better materials, such as steel, which is termite- and damage-resistant.”
“Steel is a USP for Godrej Kitchens, for example. But Asian Paints is just using the same old modular kitchens with laminate finish and ply, which so many people in the market are doing for cheaper,” Mathur said.
Similarly, there are plenty of better-known brands in the bathroom fittings and sanitaryware business competing with Asian Paints’ Ess Ess, including homegrown heavyweights Jaquar and Cera and international names, including Kohler and Grohe, Mathur added.
In FY26, listed bathroom fittings company Cera Sanitaryware reported a 7% growth in revenues to ₹2,050 crores, while other listed rival Hindware reported flat revenues of ₹2,193 crores. Apart from bathroom fittings, Hindware also sells kitchen chimneys and hobs.
Mixed analyst views
“Asian Paints’ home decor business would be about 4% of its total sales and the company intends to scale this up to 10% of the total topline,” says Amnish Aggarwal, head of research at PL Capital.
“At the company’s current growth rate, this portfolio would grow to over ₹5,000 crore in the next few years, which is not an insignificant amount. But for a company of Asian Paints’ size, it does not appear to move the needle for now.”
“The idea of the company is to bring the home decor products together under their ‘Beautiful Homes’ network of stores, which also includes wallpaper and furnishings too. It is an innovative concept, although a little niche,” Aggarwal said.
Kitchen, wardrobe, bathroom fittings and other such products are usually sold through dealers specific to each category, rather than in a single store, although there are exceptions such as the Swedish furniture and fittings retailer Ikea.
“Although Asian Paints has built unmatched expertise in paints over decades, replicating that success in adjacent categories will take considerable time and sustained investment,” Amit Purohit, senior vice president at brokerage firm Elara Securities said. “The fact that these businesses are yet to achieve meaningful scale underscores the complexity and execution challenges involved in building a strong presence beyond paints.”
However, some analysts are confident that these home decor brands will see a turnaround.
“Asian Paints’ home décor segment progressing towards a profitable home décor ecosystem,” analysts at brokerage firm Axis Direct wrote in a note on 1 June. “The kitchen and bath businesses saw revenue improvement of 16.5% and 4%, [for the quarter] respectively. White Teak posted a sharp 16.8% YoY [year-on-year] increase in sales, and Weatherseal delivered a robust 25% growth, supported by a broader product portfolio, improved distribution, and synergies with the Beautiful Homes network.”