After building a ₹1,000-crore FMCG business on ghee over four decades, GRB Dairy Foods Pvt. Ltd. is moving beyond its flagship product as rising competition and the shift to value-added dairy reshape the market.
The Bengaluru-based company plans to enter categories such as paneer and other adjacent dairy products by the end of this year, even as it continues to expand its presence in snacks, sweets and spices.
The shift underscores a broader challenge for legacy food brands built around a single product: how to stretch beyond a strong core identity without diluting brand recall. For GRB, which was founded in 1984 and whose name is synonymous with ghee, that transition has meant launching new categories under entirely different brands.
The plan to diversify its product range comes at a time when dairy staples such as milk, khoya, cheese and ghee have emerged among the most counterfeited products in India’s fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector, with reported incidents rising 2.5 times since 2018, according to an Aspa-Crisil report. At the same time, competition is intensifying as value-added dairy players scale up.
Founded in the same year as GRB, Coimbatore-based Milky Mist Dairy Food Ltd has taken a different route, pivoting early to value-added products such as paneer, cheese and yoghurt and has since grown into a ₹2,350-crore company in FY25, more than twice GRB’s roughly ₹1,011 crore revenue. Now preparing for an initial public offering (IPO), Milky Mist’s rise underscores how early bets on diversification and premiumisation are reshaping the competitive landscape, forcing legacy players like GRB to rethink both growth and brand strategy in a fragmented market.
New brands, new bets
“We want consumers to think of our brand beyond just ghee,” said G.R. Balasubramanian, chairman, in an interview with Mint.
But breaking that association hasn’t been easy. “When consumers hear GRB, they think of ghee. We were not able to achieve the scale and traction we needed in other categories under the same name,” he said.
The company’s early attempt to sell masalas under the GRB brand failed to gain traction, prompting a shift to a separate label, Raakal. That experience has shaped its latest strategy, with upcoming dairy products also set to be launched under new brands, similar to its snacks business, which operates under Town Bus.
GRB’s push into value-added dairy also marks a return to a segment it struggled with earlier. The company had entered ice cream over a decade ago but failed to scale the business. “Ice cream is a cold-chain product and we did not have the right infrastructure then. We tried for 10–12 years but couldn’t get it right, plus its a seasonal demand product and it did not work out for us, so we stopped during the covid,” Balasubramanian said.
With milk procurement now underway and supply chains improving, the company is attempting a second innings. “Now that procurement has started, we are getting into other dairy products like paneer,” he said. The launches are planned before the end of this year.
Balancing diversification
While several dairy companies moved early into categories such as paneer, cheese and yoghurt, GRB took a different route, diversifying into sweets, snacks and masalas instead of doubling down on milk-based products. The contrast highlights two distinct approaches to growth in a category where cold-chain infrastructure and scale are critical.
Balasubramanian does not see the company as late to the shift. Instead, he said GRB has taken a more measured approach, prioritising the backend supply chain before entering the dairy market. “We wanted to be mindful in how we scale, build the cold chain first, and then launch one dairy product after another,” he said.
The non-ghee portfolio, which includes sweets, snacks and masalas, now contributes about 10% to the company’s overall revenues. “Snacking, sweets and masala present a huge opportunity and can become a second growth engine in the coming years,” he said.
The company is also navigating persistent concerns around product authenticity in the ghee market. Balasubramanian said adulteration is a broader industry issue. “Any food product has this threat and it is part of the business. Coffee, rice and other food products vary in taste, texture and aroma. Just because something tastes different doesn’t mean it is unsafe,” he said.
He said that testing capabilities have improved significantly over the years. “Technology has advanced. We use imported Japanese and German machinery to test both butter and the final product,” he said, adding that traditional methods still matter. “Even today, by smell and touch, we can identify if ghee is adulterated.” Educating consumers is the only way to sustain trust in the market, he said.
