Brand Makers
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Lenskart's Peyush Bansal on the campaign featuring Karan Johar & celebrity entrepreneurship
Peyush Bansal, co-founder and CEO, Lenskart talks about why he doesn't consider himself a celebrity founder/entrepreneur and how the brief to the creative agency was never to cast him in the ads alongside Karan Johar.
I'm not a celebrity entrepreneur and I don't have aspirations to be one. Therefore, initially I was hesitant. They tried to convince me to be a part of the ad and after consulting a friend – the director of Shark Tank, I considered the risks and decided to do it. I saw the film for the first time when I was on vacation in New York with my family. I was sitting with a few people, and I played the ad. Everyone there unanimously rated me 11 out of 10. So then I thought ‘okay we can air this now’.
Lenskart’s co-founder Peyush Bansal is among the few new-generation business founders and CEOs who have appeared in their own brands' commercials as themselves. In a short series of ad films, Bansal, who is also chief executive and people officer at Lenskart, features with Bollywood producer and fashion icon Karan Johar. Casting Johar, who has an enviable collection of eye-wear and is known to even travel with a bag full of glasses, was a strategic decision, Bansal says in a conversation with Storyboard18’s editor Delshad Irani. In the exclusive interaction, the founder and Shark Tank India judge tells us more about the campaign's genesis, how and why he ended up featuring in it with Johar and why he doesn't consider himself a celebrity founder.
SPOTLIGHT
The Storyboard18 Digital Entertainment Summit (DES) unpacked India's strategy for leading the digital entertainment economy, with top policymakers where they putlined how talent, technology, and governance would fuel future-ready growth.
Read MoreIn Photos: At DES 2025, India charts ambitious course for digital entertainment leadership
At the Storyboard18 Digital Entertainment Summit in New Delhi, policymakers and industry leaders outlined how talent, technology, and governance will drive India’s push to dominate the global entertainment economy.