DISTINCTION: In 1976, with a single store and 15 products, Roddick launched The Body Shop line of homemade hair and body care products made from natural ingredients. Today, her socially responsible cosmetics are sold in Body Shops around the world. Her net worth is estimated at more than $200 million, making her one of England's wealthiest women.
Q: Why skin care?
A: Well, skin care because it's storytelling. Every group I have spent time with, women will always corral around a well and tell stories about the body, the rich ones of the body, birth, marriages and death. Men don't do that. Men only have conversations or memories about their first shave, but women will always use the body as a canvas � a playground of eroticism, play, delight.
Stories sell if they are authentic. Every pre-industrial group I have ever traveled with and been with, storytelling is the base of their education. It is about the myths and legends. It's about what makes you divine, what separates you. And the Celts had a brilliant definition. They said, "All teachers should be poets because knowledge, unless it goes through the heart, is dangerous."
And when you tell stories that are heartfelt, you know � thousands of your staff working in Kosovo and Albania, or Romania working in orphanages or mental institutions or rebuilding schools � that's what keeps the passion alive. It is not, "Oh, my God, we have achieved our budget." |
