Chumbak’s Festive Bet on Gifts That Feel Personal

A gift can be perfectly acceptable and still feel entirely forgettable. The familiar box of sweets, the safe home accessory or the present chosen at the last minute may serve its purpose, but rarely says much about the person giving it or the person receiving it. It is this gap between buying a gift and finding one that feels personal that Chumbak wants to address this festive season.

The lifestyle brand’s new campaign, Your Kinda Gifts, for Your Kinda People, asks consumers to look beyond predictable choices and select presents that reflect the tastes and personalities of the people they know. Running from Diwali through the wedding season until December, the campaign brings together a brand film, a new festive collection, a print advertising push and in-store activations.

The proposition is straightforward: a gift should communicate how well the giver knows the recipient. But there is a business consideration behind the sentiment. In a season when brands across categories compete for consumer spending, the ability to make a product feel more personal can help distinguish it from alternatives that serve a similar purpose.

For Chumbak, the opportunity is to make that distinction without relying on price or utility alone. Its campaign seeks to sell not just an object, but the thought behind choosing it.

“Gifting is an opportunity to show someone how well you know them and how much you care,” says Rishi Vasudev, CEO of Chumbak and founder of G.O.A.T Brand Labs. He argues that consumers often fall back on predictable choices or take the easy route instead of thinking about what the recipient would genuinely appreciate. The campaign, he says, is intended to encourage more considered choices.

That is a familiar premise in advertising, but its execution matters. Thoughtfulness is an emotional idea; retail needs to translate it into products people can discover, afford and buy. The strength of the proposition will therefore depend on whether the festive collection gives shoppers enough variety and personality to make the promise tangible.

Chumbak’s campaign is designed to reach consumers across several points of contact. A print campaign in The Times of India will run across Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Kolkata and Chennai for approximately four weeks. The brand is also planning a week-long launch programme, collection drops and sustained communication through the season.

In its stores, “Your Kinda Gifting Hours”, scheduled from 10.30 am to 2.30 pm, will offer rewards to shoppers for every thoughtful gift they pick. The initiative gives the campaign a retail dimension: instead of leaving the message in an advertisement, Chumbak is attempting to bring it into the shopping experience.

The wider festive window is important here. Diwali is only one occasion in a period that also includes family gatherings, celebrations and weddings, each creating reasons to buy gifts. By extending the campaign through December, the brand is seeking to maintain relevance beyond a single shopping peak. Whether that translates into incremental sales will depend on execution and consumer response, neither of which the campaign announcement quantifies.

The business context adds another layer to the campaign. G.O.A.T Brand Labs acquired a majority stake in Chumbak in January 2023, as part of a wider strategy of buying and scaling direct-to-consumer brands. At the time, the company said it wanted to grow Chumbak into a ₹500-crore brand by 2025, using brand-building, digital marketing, online and offline expansion, and international growth. That was a stated ambition, not a confirmed achievement; the campaign announcement does not provide an update on that target.

For a brand acquired with ambitions of scale, gifting offers a way to connect product discovery with occasions that recur throughout the year. It can also bring multiple product categories into a single shopping mission. A customer looking for a present may consider home décor, accessories or other lifestyle products together, provided the assortment offers enough relevant choices. The campaign does not disclose category-level sales or the share of gifting in Chumbak’s revenue, so the commercial contribution of this strategy remains an open question.

There is also a distinction between generating festive attention and building a lasting consumer habit. Advertising and seasonal offers can bring shoppers into stores, but repeat purchases depend on the product, price, availability and overall experience. G.O.A.T Brand Labs’ acquisition strategy has emphasised brand-building capabilities and operational support, including digital marketing. For Chumbak, a campaign built around personal choice could complement that approach, but the test will be whether it produces sustained demand rather than a short-lived seasonal bump.

The print campaign across seven cities gives the brand broad visibility, while the in-store activation creates an opportunity to turn the message into a purchase. The two serve different purposes: advertising introduces the idea, and the retail experience must help shoppers act on it. The rewards attached to “Your Kinda Gifting Hours” may provide an additional incentive to visit, although the company has not specified the reward structure or shared targets for footfall and conversion.

The festive season is a natural time to make this pitch. Yet thoughtful gifting is not exclusive to any one brand, and consumers can find presents across department stores, online marketplaces, specialist gift shops and smaller lifestyle labels. Chumbak’s task is to make its own design language and assortment distinctive enough for shoppers to associate the brand with a particular kind of gift. That requires more than a seasonal slogan; the products have to deliver on the promise.

For now, Your Kinda Gifts, for Your Kinda People is an attempt to make that promise central to the shopping experience. Its success will depend on whether consumers find products that genuinely match the people they are buying for, and whether enough of them choose Chumbak to do so. In a business where festive campaigns compete for attention, the brand is betting that a little more thought can give its products a clearer reason to be chosen.