Sunscreen spat: Mamaearth parent moves court seeking removal of HUL ad questioning efficacy of digital-first brands

Honasa Consumer, the parent company of beauty and personal care brand Mamaearth, has moved the Delhi High Court seeking removal of Hindustan Unilever’s ad campaign questioning the efficacy of digital-first sunscreen brands, sources in the know told ET.The episode between the two companies came to the fore on Monday, when Honasa Consumer cofounder Ghazal Alagh posted a picture of HUL's advertising billboard, which downplays the efficacy claims of sunscreen products launched by new-age, online first brands, on social media.Alagh congratulated HUL's Lakme for adopting an SPF testing standard already followed by Honasa's brand The Derma Co.

SPF or sun protection factor measures how effectively a sunscreen shields the skin from harmful UVB rays.Later on Tuesday, in another social media post she alleged that HUL copied Honasa's products across categories such as shampoos, sunscreens and face wash. However, she deleted that post.



Now, Honasa has moved the Delhi High Court alleging that HUL's ad campaign amounts to disparagement and is seeking the court's intervention in getting the campaign removed or modified, people in the know said.The matter will be first heard on April 16.On Tuesday, HUL's executive director of beauty and wellbeing Harman Dhillon had told ET that when the company started doing in-vivo testing on various brands, it found some of them didn't live up to their claims.

She added that Lakme has been doing in-vivo testing — the globally recognised gold standard to test the efficacy of a sunscreen — since 2015..