Where did the body shop go wrong?

[Foxes157]

I remember them in the 90s, and remember there stance of being ethical and so many things being relevant to modern society.

Reusable plastics and shopping bags as well as cruelty free cosmetics.

Why did it sell out and become an unethical mlm.

It’s far too expensive for what it is. There are more sophisticated brands in their price bracket.

I still quite like some of the products, but someone has clearly decreed that the shop assistants upsell more. It's like being constantly hawked at, very unpleasant. I still buy the odd bit online but I largely avoid it now.

Dewberry for me!

I have their coconut shimmer body butter for my legs for the summer. Reminds me of summer smells. On my third year will I ever use it up?? and it stills smells and goes on perfectly. I know you're supposed to throw them away after they've been open 12 months but at that price I'm using it till it's gone!

When they got rid of Fuzzy Peach and Dewberry. They also had a facial scrub that was a peach gel with crushed up peach stone in and something with Pineapple I think. If they did a retro range, I bet people my age would go for it. I also miss the animal soaps, the play soaps and the fruity lip balms. A friend of mine did Body Shop at Home but packed it in very quickly. Hate that aspect of it.

Bastards discontinued their gradual tan body lotion.

I’d go back if they reintroduced some retro stuff. Dewberry, fuzzy peach, morello cherry lip balm, kiwi lip balm, animal soap, Japanese grains. I’d buy it all for nostalgia value! My friends and I absolutely loved this place in the 1980s/1990s but I can’t imagine teenage girls/students making a beeline for it now.

Fuzzy peach and passion fruit face wash. Given the amount of posts about these on here alone, I’m amazed they haven’t just mass produced the bloody stuff! Where’s that poster who claimed to work at head office gone?!

Overpriced average goods, they’re the ones failing.

Either the super rich buy super expensive, or people want as cheap as possible. The pretends to be cheap but is dear for what it is are falling by the wayside.

They sold out to L’Oreal who are one of the worst offenders for testing on animals. Anyone who bought into their cruelty free ethos started to boycott them. The brand has now been sold to a Brazilian company but imo it’s too late, their reputation has been irreversibly tarnished.

Because back then, ethical products were rare. So Body Shop had the market.

Now, it's rarer for products NOT to be ethical.
So you can buy the same ethically level stuff for £2 in a supermarket.

And the MLM shite side of it hasn't exactly helped them.

Not testing on animals is not the same as being an ethical company

I think Lush has pinched their customers.

It's so pricey and the products stink! I had a gift card someone got me as a maternity leave gift and I used it at Christmas for my mum & MIL. There seemed to be good deals. One was spend £20 and get £10 off but one set which was £30 you couldn't use it on and had to buy the set separate which would have been £40ish. It was a bloody rip off and just got hand creams in the end!

Too expensive for me to justify it

I am amazed they are still in business

I think it was of it’s time. There wasn’t any products around like they sold in the 80’s

Now you can buy products everywhere that are not tested on animals and there is far more choice that are not as costly

I think when they dumped the favourite products and relauched with new ones put them on a slow downward spiral, it used to be a real treat to go to the Bodyshop back in the day and I miss the old products even now, Japanese washing grains, Banana shampoo, Passion fruit cleansing gel, Carrot mosituriser and that little book with the pages you ripped out and blotted your face with? Can't remember what it was called, it had a picture of a Georgian lady on the front if I remember correctly.

They did not move with the times

All us teen girls in the 80s, growing up with it, grew out of it and moved on to high end stuff, or proper natural stuff, or cheap and cheerful stuff

They did not hold on to their old customers

When it completely stopped selling bubble bath and only sold shower gel
Circa 2009.
It’s not the same thing fgs.

I'd buy the Passion fruit cleansing gel now, it was so refreshing.

Papier poudre! I still have one somewhere.

The reason that Lush stuff is reminiscent of the old Body Shop stuff is that the guy who set up Lush was one of the original Body Shop people. He invented some of the old favourites like Peppermint Foot Lotion and (I think) the Ice Blue Shampoo.

He left Body Shop and set up Cosmetics To Go, which then went bust, before starting again with Lush.

They still have some good products but they need to bring back the refilling service which they were total pioneers of. And/or bring back the large container sizes - they used to do huge pump bottles of the coconut oil shower gel stuff but now you have to buy several small bottles to get the same amount, creating far more waste.

And bring back the animal soaps, I'm sure they'd make a killing.

I still prefer them to Lush...

that little book with the pages you ripped out and blotted your face with

Think it was called Papier Poudre?!

I’d love just to sniff a bottle of fuzzy peach or some morello cherry lipbalm, the smell would take me right back to 1990

and yeah, ditch the obsession with Body Butters.