How This Gurugram-based Startup is Nurturing the Beauty of People

Timeless Aesthetics is a group of master Aestheticians led by internationally certified & one of the pioneers of aesthetics, Dr. Shikha Baghi Bhandari. Practicing & teaching new Aesthetic techniques, this clinic also provides free treatments to the needy. The company offers services and products related to a recondite approach towards aesthetic beautification in the form of Micropigmentation, the technical term for Permanent Make Up procedures (PMU). Timeless Aesthetics’ area of operations ranges from providing expert services, to retailing PMU products in the mass market and even starting certification and training programs for those looking to learn and contribute to this new industry in India.

About the founders.
Dr. Shikha Baghi Bhandari

• BDS, MDS
• Founder & CEO, Timeless aesthetics
• Owner, Dream smiles, India
• Director, IAAT, Sweden
• Director, Genesis Academy of Continuing Dental Education
• Master trainer and internationally certified expert in Permanent

Born in 1983, Dr. Shikha has been one of the most gifted minds to rise from her hometown of Firozpur (bordering Pakistan). Born to enterprising doctor parents, she grew up in a sheltered environment. After graduating from Amritsar, she pursued Post Graduation in MDS from Pune. Her spouse, Dr. Rajat Bhandari, is also a specialist dentist and a Facial Aesthetics specialist. Juggling both family and career with an enviable air of apparent ease, Dr. Shikha is a proud mother to two adorable children, and a pet parent to 4 dogs.

Shikha has spent over a decade in the field of Endodontics, and later as an able Professor. After attaining her Post Graduation in 2009, she went on to join her father’s group of dental and nursing institutes as a trustee and served there till 2014, doing justice to her role as a teaching faculty in her time. The next step for her was establishing a multi-specialty dental health centre, named “Dream Smiles”, in partnership with her husband. This was the beginning for the supplementary services that were offered, which would grow to become ‘Timeless Aesthetics’. She subsequently brought Internationally approved facial aesthetic and PMU procedures to India. Besides being the first in the national retail and services sector for this industry, Timeless Aesthetics is also the first enterprise to offer credible certification and training programs.

Timeless Aesthetics was registered in 2019 as India’s first retailer and service provider of PMU procedures, machinery, products etc. Dr. Shikha has a growing list of protégés that are learning and gaining accreditation from her world class training and mentorship programs in PMU. One of her major goals was to separate the wheat from the chaff in this industry, as far as the Indian market is concerned. A lot of soi-disant “experts” in this field tend to be gravely under-educated and are more often than not using unsafe and outdated products and procedures. Sometimes, their claims and services are outright scams. It has been her point of focus to not only provide her clientele with the best assortment of services as well as products, but to also spread awareness and educate the clients about the differences between true quality checked products and cheaper scams. Her aim has been to spread awareness all along.

Dr. Shikha has undergone extensive professional training from Europe and Scandinavia while her most recent training was with a German trainer. All of her self- styled learning endeavors have been aimed at the acquisition of proper skills so that she, in turn, can provide the best to her clients.

She aims to work with those affected by a multitude of ailments including Alopecia, Cancer and Vitiligo leading to some form of physio-cosmetic anomalies that are a direct result of their afflictions. Her work is focused on transforming the lives of her clients through the transformation of their faces.

We are publishig an interview with Dr. Shikha Baghi Bhandari, Founder & MD, Timeless Aesthetics:

Q.: What is the problem you are trying to solve? Please share with us any insights that led you to believe that this is a big enough problem?
Ans: We have come up with a permanent solution to the problem faced by a lot of people across genders and age groups. We are the only company in India focusing exclusively on Permanent make up. Most people opt for the tattoo solution or drawing their brows everyday with an eyebrow pencil but that takes time, money and a steady hand but microblading can give you the best brows suited for your facial structure. These brows are there for years to come because the technique uses organic pigment which works similar to ink of a tattoo machine but instead of needles that go deep in the skin, we use micro blades that only apply pigment to the very top layer of the skin (epidermis).

There are various eyebrow styles available to micropigmentation such as Ombre, Powder, Soft shading, Micro-shading etc. which can be chosen at our clinic per your request and our expert opinion.

Q.: List all the names of the core Team Members, along with their Designated Roles – How you see them evolving over time. What would be each of their Skill Sets?
Ans: Sure.
:: Dr. Shikha Baghi Bhandari, Founder & CEO, Timeless Aesthetics
:: Mr. Ashish Thapar, Founding Member of Timeless Aesthetics and Managing Director, T and T Realty Services, a real estate consultancy firm based in Gurugram, Haryana. He brings with him a successful business experience of more than 20 years in varied industries like Exports, Financial Funding, and Infrastructure Development. He looks after the Business Development, Sales, Acquisitions, Customer Experience, Liasoning and expansion for Timeless Aesthetics as well.

Q.: Tell us about the Product / Solution. How did you get your first customer? Explain how you went about the Product-Market Fit Process.
Ans: We provide services across all genders and age groups. Our services are unique as in the current market, no other service provider focuses and specializes in permanent make up services. Our expertise lies in our experience in dealing with a lot of clients and providing personalized service depending on the client needs.

Q.: What is your USP?
Ans: Timeless Aesthetics offers services and products related to a recondite approach towards aesthetic beautification in the form of Micropigmentation, the technical term for Permanent Make Up procedures (PMU). Dr. Shikha, early on in her clinical practice, discerned that the rationales behind a lot of her patients’ requests were in essence cosmetic. As she scoured for procedures she could offer, she came across Micropigmentation, a cosmetic technique that was non-existent in India at the time. From there, it has been an arduous road of extensive learning, acquiring skills, implementation and execution for Timeless Aesthetics as a whole. Timeless Aesthetics has been the pioneer in the PMU space in India and has built a vast customer base.

Timeless Aesthetics’ area of operations ranges from providing expert services, to retailing PMU products in the mass market and even starting certification and training programs for those looking to learn and contribute to this new industry in India. The company offers a multitude of procedures for numerous body parts; all the while making sure they only use the safest of products, stratagem and machinery while delivering world class quality. That’s one of the things that sets them apart from their soi-distant peers. They bring professionalism and accountability to the table. They provide value, quality and transparency in a space that has no official benchmark or eligibility bar. They also focus on and invest heavily in mentoring and training those who aspire to enter this space with their intensive training programs.

Besides this a lot of their focus is on social impact and the difference PMU can make at a humane level in society. Timeless Promise, the social outreach arm of Timeless Aesthetics offers free consultation and ad-hoc procedures to acid burn victims. They also offer 50% off across the board for cancer survivors, vitiligo patients or anyone else who needs this service a la carte but cannot afford it.

Q.: What were your assumptions when you entered the market, learning that you have? Who in your mind is your ideal customer? Do you have at least one of them signed up?
Ans: We serve customers all across the genders and age groups. Be it a housewife, a working professional or a to be bride, services fit all profiles and anybody can benefit from permanent make up. We also provide solutions to problems faced by people like cancer patients, patients who have lost brows due to alopecia or chemotherapy, burn victims, acid attack survivors. We create a look for them which is very natural and which enhances their self-confidence. We are committed to providing our services to at least 2 such clients per month as per our CSR initiative Timeless Promise.

Q.: What has been your biggest failure as an entrepreneur and what did you learn from it?
Ans: We don’t believe in failures. All steps are stepping stones to success and we are a dynamic company that is learning and growing everyday so there is no scope of failure.

Q.: How are you pricing the Product? What is the logic behind it? What is the model you are following – Free / Fermium / Premium etc.? Explain your thought process.
Ans: We are a premium category service provider. We have fixed our prices taking into account the expertise, level of skill required, time taken for each service and the premium quality of pigments and other consumables used per client.

Q.: Please tell us about the investors (if any)
Ans: No investors yet.

Q.: Is there any interesting success story of your startup? If yes, please write about it.
Ans: We are a company that started in Amritsar in 2019 and started expanded to Gurugram in peak COVID situation. We have got a tremendous response in Gurugram, which encouraged us to start our exclusive clinics in Noida and Delhi as well. And very soon we are starting in Ludhiana and Jalandhar. I feel the lockdown gave people an opportunity to connect with themselves and they realized the need for permanent solutions to their day to day make up hassles. They became more open to spending on themselves and enhancing their natural look without the need of touch ups every now and then. People can fell the power of waking up with makeup.

Q.: What is the big picture of your startup? Is this Product/service leading to something bigger? If so, how?
Ans: Our Vision is to be present in every tier city in India in the coming 5 years. We want to expand in such a way that we provide the best value to our clients with our unique solutions.

Q.: What would be your goal to accomplish in the next six months? Any other information you would like to share?
Ans: Timeless Aesthetics is on an expansion mode with 6 clinics being readied for launch in the next 2 months, and additional 8-10 branches by the end of 2021. These clinics will be spread across the country including Amritsar, Delhi, NCR and Hyderabad.

Q.: What message do you want to convey to fellow entrepreneurs?
Ans: Follow your dreams and follow your passion without looking at the hurdles. Obstacles are nothing but stepping stones to success.

Thanks. All the best.