page_title: The Body Shop
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: The Body Shop / History
caption_attribution_description: English: The Body Shop in the Prudential Center, Boston Massachusetts
context_page_description: The Body Shop International Limited, trading as The Body Shop, is a British cosmetics, skin care and perfume company.
  Founded in 1976 by Dame Anita Roddick, the company currently has a range of 1,000 products sold in about 3,000 stores, divided between those owned by the company and franchised outlets in more than 65 countries.
  Originally trading from Brighton, the company is now based in London Bridge and Littlehampton, West Sussex, and is owned by Brazilian cosmetics company Natura as a subsidiary of the Natura & Co group. The company had been owned by the French cosmetics company L'Oréal between 2006 and 2017. In June 2017, L'Oréal agreed to sell the company to Natura for £880 million. The deal was approved in September 2017.
context_section_description: Dame Anita Roddick opened her own health and beauty shop, also named The Body Shop, in her hometown of Brighton in 1976. She started a business with the motivation to simply "make a living for herself and her two daughters while her husband was away travelling." 
  The business' original vision was to sell products with ethically-sourced, cruelty-free and natural ingredients. None of Roddick's products were tested on animals, and the ingredients were sourced directly from producers.
  The shop began trading with just 25 products. Roddick had purchased urine sample bottles from a nearby hospital to sell her products in, but did not have enough of them, creating the business' refillable bottles policy. Labels were hand-written and Roddick did not advertise explicitly, preferring to rely on local press instead.
  In 1977, Roddick purchased another shop through selling 50% of the business to a local garage owner. Roddick's partner, Gordon, returned to Brighton from America in this time, and suggested the business foster growth through franchising. By 1984, the business had 138 stores, 87 of which were not located in the United Kingdom; by 1994, 89% of the business' locations would be franchises.
  The business went public in April of 1984, and was floated on London's Unlisted Securities Market, opening at a price of 95p, with the Roddicks keeping 27.6% shares in the company, and Anita continued as managing director so as to retain control of the company's direction. After it obtained a full listing on the London Stock Exchange, share prices in the company increased dramatically, with prices rising 10,944 percent in the first eight years. 
  Throughout the 1980s and 90s, the company joined a number of campaigns related to social responsibility and environmental issues. These included a "Trade Not Aid" campaign in 1987, wherein the company sourced some of its ingredients directly from the native communities they originated from. The company also made alliances with Greenpeace and Amnesty International. 
  In 1987, Roddick offered $3.5 million to the owners of the original Body Shop, Peggy Short and Jane Saunders, for the exclusive rights to the business' name. They agreed to the sale, and in 1992 changed their business' name to "Body Time". The business closed in 2018.
  The business began trading in the United States in 1988, with all new stores in the States being company-owned until 1990.
caption: The Body Shop in the Prudential Center in Boston
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