Anita roddick et the body shop
1197 mots
5 pages
Anita Roddick’s biography Anita Roddick was born Oct. 23, 1942 from Italian immigrant parents in Littlehampton in the south of England. Her family was very much working class. She became a school-teacher but she got bored and started traveling. Eventually, she found a job at the United Nations in Geneva where she worked in the women’s right division of the International Labor Organization. Then, she went back home and her mother introduced her to Gordon Roddick. He was a poet and children’s story writer and a fan of international travel. They married in 1970 and had two daughters. The Roddicks opened a restaurant and later a hotel. In 1976, Gordon decided to fulfill his dream: to travel on horseback from Buenos Aires to New York City. That’s when she got the idea of The Body Shop … The Body Shop Its beginnings To support herself and her daughters, Roddick decided to open a small shop where she could sell some of the back-to-nature cosmetic knowledge she picked up during her travels. She obtained a $6,500 loan, contracted with a local herbalist to create her all-natural cosmetics, found a site in Brighton, and opened her first Body Shop in 1976. She had a very low budget so she painted the shop green because it hid everything; 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. The success story Within a year, Roddick’s business had grown so large that she opened a second store. When Gordon returned in the spring of 1977, The Body Shop had become so popular that the Roddicks began selling franchises. At the end of 1982, new Body Shop stores were opening at the rate of two per month. The Roddicks took The Body Shop public in