Many organizations build excellence and achieve great success in the short-term. But later in their life cycle, they fall prey to competition and accept this as a matter of fate and a natural process. Only a few organizations believe that destiny is what they choose to be, and that competition can be identified much before it can become a major threat. Recognizing and tackling competition, which is direct and obvious, is easy. But it is very difficult to identify a competitor who is not posing any obvious threats. Here, we study the example of Hindustan Unilever Ltd., which is adept at recognizing and successfully responding to the non-obvious kind of competition, thereby chalking out its own destiny. "Destiny is what you choose, not a matter of chance.

If we talk about the history of business in India, we just cannot afford to ignore Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL). The HUL, a subsidiary of Unilever in India, is undoubtedly the largest Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) player in the country. HUL's was established in 1885 when the Lever Brothers set up `William Hesketh Lever' in England and entered India soon after in 1888 by exporting the `Sunlight' laundry soap.

Today, HUL's products are manufactured and distributed across the country through a network of about 7,000 redistribution stockists covering around one million retail outlets. HUL's products touch the lives of two out of every three Indians, thus, setting a tough benchmark for other FMCG companies in India.

The organized retailers depend heavily on footfalls. Once they got the desired footfalls, they would introduce their private brands or labels and promote them aggressively. These brands are similar to the established national brands with the major difference being that the retailer enjoys a much larger profit on the sale of private brands. Kishore Biyani's Future Group has been aggressively promoting private labels, and offers a variety of private brands across food, apparel and electronics.

Hindustan Unilever Limited, Fast Moving Consumer Goods, FMCG, Local entrepreneurs, Wal-Mart, Carrefour, Financial strength, Managerial capability, Power Brands, Counter future threats, Cosmetics brand, Lakme, Indian cosmetics markets.