The Body Shop to close

[Lilith7]

Dammit...


https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/5396...n-business



https://www.theguardian.com/business/202...ngredients

[Zurdo]

One of my daughters worked for The Body Shop for many years. A graduate from Marama Davidson's retail course, and companies would line up to pick them. It suited her as a youngster - working all sorts of shifts in branches all over Auckland...and ear market for promotion through the ranks...and then backstabbed by those who she jumped ahead of. Time off as a solo Mum, then back to The Body Shop...maybe she never even left, dunno. She used to manage the Queen St store on weekends. With her daughter getting older she wanted to pick up more shifts, and if someone left, she would hope to pick up their shifts, but no, they would rather take on 2 young girls on contracts with no benefits. They were always wanting her to sign a new contract, but no, her old contract gave her holidays, time and a half for working public holidays, days in lew, sick leave etc. It started out great, but many ownership and management changes changes and it turned into typical exploitation of workers. The final straw was Covid, the Queen St store was hit hard, and she was squeezed out...until she left.

[Lilith7]

One of my daughters worked for The Body Shop for many years.  A graduate from Marama Davidson's retail course, and companies would line up to pick them. It suited her as a youngster - working all sorts of shifts in branches all over Auckland...and ear market for promotion through the ranks...and then backstabbed by those who she jumped ahead of. Time off as a solo Mum, then back to The Body Shop...maybe she never even left, dunno.  She used to manage the Queen St store on weekends.  With her daughter getting older she wanted to pick up more shifts, and if someone left, she would hope to pick up their shifts, but no, they would rather take on 2 young girls on contracts with no benefits.  They were always wanting her to sign a new contract, but no, her old contract gave her holidays, time and a half for working public holidays, days in lew, sick leave etc.  It started out great, but many ownership and management changes changes and it turned into typical exploitation of workers. The final straw was Covid, the Queen St store was hit hard, and she was squeezed out...until she left.

Yep, it started very well. I read Anita Roddick's book, Business as unusual & it was really interesting. A pity those ideas didn't continue & spread more widely. because their products were excellent.

[harm_less]

You can have as good a business model as you like but if the customers don't have disposable funds to spend you're just pushing shit up hill in trying to stimulate sales. The average Kiwi is on the bones of their arse financially and the Body Shop closure is just further confirmation of the state of our economy presently.

[nzoomed]

I had almost forgotten that they existed, they were fairly popular in the early 2000s but with more competition and high prices they sort of lost relevance, IMHO they might have had a better chance of survival if they operated online stores only.
I would hate to see how much their rent is for a shop in our shopping mall, you need an extremely high turnover to keep a store running in these places.

[Oh_hunnihunni]

Original business philosophies rarely survive business buyouts, sadly. Look at TM. Only a matter of time. Temu will probably eat them alive.

[nzoomed]

Nothing can compete against temu, but I feel their days are numbered, its unsustainable and they are ripping off their own retailers selling products below cost who have had enough.
Most sellers there are just using it to get rid of surplus stock that they cant move on.

[zqwerty]

I remember when The Body Shop started here in Chch in Cashel Street, I think we bought some green soap.

[Oh_hunnihunni]

I wouldn't buy fromTemu if they paid me. Too dodgy, morally, ethically, environmentally, politically, and all the rest.

But I love my Body Shop body brush.

[harm_less]

I wouldn't buy fromTemu if they paid me. Too dodgy, morally, ethically, environmentally, politically, and all the rest.

But I love my Body Shop body brush.

We recently made our first Temu purchase as an experiment. OH wanted a couple of angled brushes to clean the ali window drainage channels. That grew to two stainless steel cat bowls and a bamboo toothbrush in order to reach the $15 minimum purchase amount.

The order arrived in about a week which actually beat a couple of TM purchases made around the same time. The cat bowls I had been searching for previously but pet supplies sites wanted $10-$15 each for them. Temu about $2 each. Basic items so no real risk but I wouldn't dream of buying tech items through Temu.

The real problem is that stores in NZ (both online and B&M) are passing on excessive overheads, and profits, and essentially taking the piss with their pricing. If they're losing sales because of this then it is a case of 'lesson learnt' but if not wave goodbye to their business model.

[Lilith7]

Was over at The body shop this morning to get gifts for granddaugheters & DIL's, quite a few doing the same so I don't suppose it'll be open for long & they're to close once all stock is gone, hope the staff all find jobs.

I've never bought from Temu but do use Ali X, which is good with regard to quality & prompt arrival.

[nzoomed]

I wouldn't buy fromTemu if they paid me. Too dodgy, morally, ethically, environmentally, politically, and all the rest.

But I love my Body Shop body brush.

I use Aliexpress here, good for electronics and various components for my projects.