ANITA RODDICK
09:20
Anita Roddick was the founder of The Body Shop which
producing and retailing beauty products that shaped ethical
consumerism. She started a career by working as a teacher of English and
history in England. She
later found work in the Women's Rights Dept. of International Labor
Organization (ILO), based at UN in Geneva. Later on, she opened a
restaurant in association with her future husband Gordon Roddick. Gordon
decided to fulfill a long-standing personal goal: to ride a horse to
New York. Roddick admiring her husband wish so she agreed to sell their
restaurant to finance her husband trip.
After
that, to support herself and her two daughters while her husband was
away, Roddick decided to open a small shop where she could peddle some
of the back-to-nature cosmetic knowledge she picked up during her
travels. With Gordon's help, she obtained a $6,500 loan, contracted with
a local herbalist to create her all-natural cosmetics, found a site in
the seaside resort of Brighton, and opened her first Body Shop.
Everything was done on a shoestring budget with no concession to
aesthetics. She painted the shop green because it did everything, even
the damp spots on the walls.
She
offered discounted refills to customers who brought back their empty
containers and used minimal packaging to keep costs as low as possible.
Customers were allowed to choose from an array of perfume oils to scent
their purchases (which were fragrance-free) because it
was cheaper than adding expensive perfumes to every bottle of shampoo or
lotion. When Gordon returned, The Body Shop had become so popular that
the Roddick’s began selling franchises.
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