Exploiting idealism - Jon Entine on how The Body Shop betrayed its customers.

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University Degree Business and Administrative studies

EXPLOITING IDEALISM
Jon Entine on how The Body Shop betrayed its customers

by Jon Entine

Imagine for a moment that science developed a new technology that could magically sort truth from hyperbole. When someone tells a really big lie, a truth bubble, visible only to those with this special power, suddenly appears and reveals the real story. This unique tool would be welcomed by parents, and no one would ever again have to fear used car salesmen or shifty politicians.

Or the tidal wave of green marketers exploiting idealistic consumers. If responsible business leaders were smart, they would use the truth bubble to root out hypocrisy in their own backyard before it’s used against them.

Consumers used to feel pretty confident when companies-that-share-our-values such as The Body Shop or Ben & Jerry’s promoted its latest plan to save the rainforest and empower its workforce. But the phenomenal growth of many New Age businesses has sparked a green boomlet. Now, everyone from Mobil to Monsanto to Waste Management is making noise about protecting the environment.

This dramatic increase in "cause-related marketing" raises concerns whether green practices are being replaced by green washing. But green marketing cannot be explained away as soul-less multinational capitalists using progressive buzz words and ruining it for the good guys. The circle-the-wagons mentality in the wake of the Body Shop fiasco suggests a more troubling explanation: green washing is a by-product of the arrogance of the progressive business community itself.

Few people, least of all the leaders of the social responsibility movement, asked the tough questions when Anita Roddick claimed her Body Shop was the "most honest cosmetic company in the world." The media, desperate for a feminist superstar, helped her craft an inspiring rags-to-riches-to-Robin Hood success story. Hungry for recognition, progressives seemed all too willing to encourage Roddick’s self-promoting, hyperbolic attacks. Unfortunately, enthusiasm and charisma are no substitute for integrity.

A truth bubble would have stopped the deception cold. Roddick fabricated stories about how she started the Body Shop and sourced ingredients from bare-breasted natives. Over the years, as white lies about the company’s progressive practices grew darker, the Roddicks defended their myth-making with vitriolic personal attacks and legal threats. In light of the facts, the honesty gap is startling.

Gordon and Anita Roddick may have believed their propaganda, but good intentions (if that is the case here) are not enough. In the capitalist world of caveat emptor, honest information is our only defense. Social vision means nothing unless companies tell the truth. Anita Roddick and the Body Shop may have exposed other beauty companies for exploiting women; consciously or not, she exploited the innocence and idealism of her customers.

Even today, the movement is reluctant to acknowledge its own culpability. The atmosphere at a mid-October meeting of progressive business leaders could be likened to a family gathering a few days after everyone’s favorite uncle was found molesting a neighbor’s child. The scandal was on everyone’s mind, few would openly talk about it, and most hoped that by ignoring it, the story would soon fade away. It won’t.

Here’s a wake up call: this fiasco will get worse unless progressives look into their cracked mirrors, decide what values they really stand for, and speak out loudly and decisively. Socially responsible business is not about having a good heart or striving for perfection. It’s about recognizing the original sin of capitalism, preaching only what is practiced, and turning out a fair-priced, quality product.

Baby boom businesses must guard against becoming seduced by their growing wealth and notoriety, or losing touch with the impact of grand visions on real people: women who scrape together family assets to buy a franchise, twenty-something clerks getting by on near-minimum wage, Mexican Indians turning out scrub mitts for pennies an hour, teenagers who buy shampoo or ice cream thinking they are preserving the rainforest. Recklessly executed and misleadingly promoted corporate visions undermine the credibility of those who play it straight.

Journalists love to create heroes and unmask hypocrites. With Anita Roddick, they hit the Daily Double. Over simplifying complex moral issues and exaggerating positive corporate behavior breeds cynicism. Good guys take note: green washing invites the press to caricature even the most well intentioned businesses.

The social responsibility community is justifiably concerned that the Body Shop firestorm will consume the entire movement. It could. Already, less socially conscious marketers, sensing the honesty gap, co-opt green symbols to sell everything from detergent to gasoline to cigarettes. Consumers hate to be taken for granted. Once their trust is abused, it’s gone forever.

This is a plea for less hubris and more transparency. If progressive business leaders rediscover their moral center, in a few years, the shattering of the Body Shop myth will seem like a distant memory. But if the movement doesn’t stand for openness and honesty from members of the "club," it stands for nothing at all. It’s time to use the truth bubble.

I. Identification

1. The Issue

The Body Shop started as a drugstore scale cosmetic shop in a small British town--Brighton in 1976. Today, only 24 years later, it has grown into a global-spanning cosmetic empire. Secrets? The Body Shop claimed that it always puts the needs of customers and society in the first place and then gains sales for good conducts. If that's the case, the whole history of business ethics should be rewritten. Still, the Body Shop has been facing many critiques, and some of them are even fatal to its very existence--which if proved to be ture, will reverse all The BSL's eloquent "statements".
The Body Shop always labels itself as a "green" entity that uses "natual"ingredients. However, it was charged of using "primarily synthetic materials but purport to be natural".(Christine Malcolm, "Drug and Cosmetic Industry" magazine, May 1995).
The Body Shop also stands out as an animal, labour and human rights protector. But what happened according to its critics?The Body shop was said to have used animal parts directly or indirectly in their products and its own employees are not receiving justified treatments although the Body Shop has been active in various human rights activities.
Despite all those charges challenging the morality of the cosmetic shop or even the founder-Anita Roddick herself, no one today, would question the "sensation" that the Body Shop created ever since its humble birth.Anita could undoubtedly be "The Mother Teresa of capitalism"even if it's only by this sense. Could a company keep doing social good while making huge profits? Or what Anita claimed earlier, " I'd rather promote human rights,environmental concerns, indigenous rights, than promote a bubble bath" , is nothing more than a successful converted gimmick? This case study involves more than just trade issues. It tries to explore the interaction of modern commercial activities with cultures, natural and social environment.

2. Description

Even the pickiest critics could not put a question mark in the Body Shop's Mission Statement:
"To dedicate our business to the pursuit of social and environmental changes.
To creatively balance the financial and human needs of stakeholders: employees, customers, franchisees, suppliers and shareholders.
To courageously ensure our business is ecologically sustainable: meeting the needs of the present without compromising the future.
To meaningfully contribute to local, national and international communities in which we trade, by adopting a dose of conduct which ensures care, honesty, fairness and respect.
To passionately campaign for the protection the environment, human and civil rights, and against animal testing within the cosmetic and toiletries industry.
To tirelessly work to narrow the gap between principle and practice, whilst making fun, passion and care part of our daily lives."<2> But will the Body Shop do what they mean? Or what it claims in the Mission Statement is just a flowery word puzzle and never takes effct by itself? Look back at the BSL's past, we may find somthing. We may find out what it was trying to acheive, which in turn, may show off its latent intention. Here, I named the history collection as "Dim Sum" because I wouldn't couldn't cover up the whole history of the company and those events and issues in the collection all have important meaning to its development.

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HITSTORY DIM SUM[3]

  • 1976
    First branch of The Body Shop opens in Brighton, England. The second shop opens six months later.
  • 1978
    First international franchise opens in a kiosk in Brussels.
  • 1984
    The Body Shop goes public.
  • 1986
    The Body Shop launches its first campaign, Save the Whales, with Greenpeace.
    The Body Shop Charter is published, written by staff for staff.
  • 1990
    Romanian Relief Drive begins (now Children on the Edge), renovating orphanages in post-Communist Romania.
    The Body Shop Foundation is founded-effectively taking risks in human rights, the environment and animal welfare.
    Child Development Centre opens at head office, ...

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Exploiting idealism - Jon Entine on how The Body Shop betrayed its customers.
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  • Level
    University Degree
  • Subject
    Business and Administrative studies
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