VEGAN AND VEGETARIAN BEAUTY

100% Vegan. We’re on our way there.

If you've ever said hello to a dog, seen a nature documentary or a picture of a baby goat, you’ll know that animals are pretty special. They're living breathing reminders that this planet wasn't made only for us. Some of these creatures have been around long before us, propping up vast ecosystems. Lots of them know how to play, they feel fear, they suffer. Many of us understand this intuitively, but somehow animal products keep turning up in our beauty.

Of course, you’ve been doing what you can. You’ve been trying to make the right choices but there are a lot of choices to make. Even with the best of intentions, there is still so much about the ethical impact of beauty that is swept under the carpet.

Good news for you is, we really care about what’s under the carpet. And this is not our first rodeo. We were born ready for this.

How it started

When Anita Roddick founded The Body Shop in 1976, she baked a radical love for the planet into our DNA. When she kicked off the ethical revolution, she wasn't messing about. She held her ground in the face of her critics and blazed the trail for a fairer, more beautiful world. She pioneered our very own Community Fair Trade programme and sustainable, cruelty-free beauty practises. She pushed for transparency from the industry and a way of doing business that was rooted in kindness. With this single-minded pragmatism she laid the foundations for our approach to beauty.

To this day we’ve been trying to keep her promises and forging ahead with her mission; from recently introducing recycled plastic packaging, to building a long-standing global Community Fair Trade programme. We’re always thinking about ways we can roll up our sleeves to make the world a better place.

Currently our product formulations are 100% vegetarian and 60% vegan. Now we’ve decided to step it up a notch. We’re delighted to let you know that by the end of 2023, our entire product formulations portfolio will be certified by The Vegan Society. *

Why it matters

The whole process of going vegan takes a bit of homework. The truth is there’s a lot of weird stuff the industry isn’t in a hurry to tell you.

Beauty ingredients can be baffling. You should be joyfully slathering yourself in our products, not puzzling over labels to check they align with your values. That’s our job. We know that you just want to feel your best, so we are pledging to take care of the rest.

For us this has never been a trend. It doesn’t need to be an expensive habit or an exclusive club. This is about an everyday, run-of -the mill respect for animal life and an unconditional love for living creatures.

Through the hard work, passion and commitment of our teams - we’re here to take the ethical problem out of your soft, nourished hands.

Our pinky promise

When we make promises we want to make sure we can keep them. Becoming Vegan certified isn’t a walk in the park for a company of our size, but we’ve really been cracking on with it behind the scenes. This stuff takes careful planning. The ecosystem is delicately balanced, it takes time to make sure some of the local communities who have supplied our animal-derived products are ready for us to go vegan. As we move into our vegan future, we want to make sure as many people as possible are ready for the change. You need to know what goes on behind the scenes. We’re very excited for you to meet more of the people who make our products happen.

We’re going to be filling you in on some of our progress here and sharing some stories from our journey so far.

In the meantime, we’re going to get our heads down and continue what Anita started. That way you can focus on feeling your most beautiful self, safe in the knowledge we’re on the case. We’ll take care of the details for you. Not because we want you to know how virtuous we are, because if you think about it, 100% vegan just feels right.

* By December 2023, we aim to have all our product formulas certified by The Vegan Society. It is possible that old formulations which have not been certified by The Vegan Society may still be present in the market at that point, as those products are being sold through.