EssilorLuxottica has named Ashwin Uppal as Head of Marketing for Greater India. Uppal joins the regional leadership team led by Venu Ambati, President – Greater India, and steps into the role with more than 24 years of marketing and business leadership experience.
Before joining EssilorLuxottica, Uppal was Global Chief Marketing Officer at RMZ, where he led the group’s global marketing agenda across real estate, consumer, sports, retail, hospitality, logistics, AI and data centres.
A career built across categories
Uppal’s resume spans FMCG, retail, technology, entertainment and alternative assets. He has held senior leadership roles at Reckitt, Godrej Consumer Products, L’Oréal, Jio and Baskin-Robbins. Earlier, he was associated with Nestlé and Lowe Lintas, working on campaigns for brands including Nescafé, Maggi, Lifebuoy, Idea and Britannia.
According to the announcement, his experience covers more than 200 brands across 100-plus countries.
- FMCG and consumer brands: Reckitt, Godrej Consumer Products, L’Oréal, Nestlé
- Digital and telecom: Jio
- Retail and food services: Baskin-Robbins
- Real estate and new-age assets: RMZ
Why this move matters
For marketing leaders, this appointment is a signal that eyewear and vision care are becoming brand-led, omnichannel categories. The traditional purchase journey is changing: consumers now discover frames online, evaluate styles through social content, and complete purchases in stores or through direct-to-consumer channels.
A marketer with FMCG discipline, digital scale-up experience and premium retail exposure fits a market where brand building, distribution visibility and customer education must work together.
One useful way to read this is through the full-funnel lens. Eyewear marketing requires distinct jobs at each stage: awareness for lifestyle brands, consideration through education on prescription and lens technology, conversion at retail and e-commerce, and advocacy through after-sales care. Leaders who have managed both premium and mass brands often prioritise consistency across these stages.
What to watch next
Expect sharper portfolio storytelling, stronger retail and digital integration, and a bigger push on vision-care education in the Greater India market. Agency and martech partners may also see renewed focus on measurement and consumer data as the new leadership sets its agenda.
For working marketers, the larger takeaway is portability. Uppal’s path from agency and FMCG roles to telecom, real estate and now eyewear shows how versatile a modern marketing leader’s toolkit needs to be.
Source: Indian Advertising Media & Marketing News – exchange4media
