45 YEARS OF PUTTING THE EARTH FIRST
TOGETHER WE MAKE AN IMPACT
For over four decades we’ve championed a responsible, sustainable approach to skincare and wellbeing – from seed to bottle. Thanks to your continued support, here’s what we’ve achieved, together.
LEADING THE WAY
We partnered with the Soil Association in 1991 as the first beauty and wellbeing brand to certify as organic, at a time when only food goods were undertaking this certification.
Our third-party certification isn’t just a label, it’s a promise. A promise to you and a promise to the planet that each of our organic products includes the highest quality of ingredients, and highest level of sustainable formulation.
Today, we continue to set the gold standard for organic beauty and wellbeing across the globe, pushing the boundaries of organic skincare and modern science to create high-performance formulas without compromise.
PROTECTING OUR POLLINATORS
Since 2011, we’ve raised over £360,000 for bee-friendly causes. With over half of UK bee species declining and 97% of wildflower meadows lost, it’s been a key mission of ours to protect the humble bee for future generations. Through partnerships with Bumblebee Conservation Trust and Bees for Development, we’re actively protecting these critical pollinators.
Our owner and CEO, Anabel Kindersley, has been a leading advocate for the protection of our vital pollinator populations. In 2013, she helped secure an EU-wide ban on a toxic bee-killing pesticide following a petition that gathered 117,000 signatures in support.
Anabel later spearheaded the Stand By Bees campaign, lobbying with 105 businesses and NGOs to achieve a significant environmental breakthrough. The UK government finally rejected the emergency application for banned, bee-killing neonicotinoid pesticides on British land – a testament to the power of persistent and principled advocacy.
SUPPORTING OUR FORESTS
Through our partnership with international conservation charity World Land Trust™, we've transformed packaging into a tool for conservation. Since 2012, we've offset over 650 tonnes of CO₂ and helped protect more than 5 million m² of endangered forest.
TRUSTED AND TRANSPARENT
We are privileged to be able to sow, grow and bottle some of our organic ingredients at our eco-factory and organic gardens in Peacemarsh, Dorset. Where we do source ingredients further afield, our growers and farmers have come to trust our integrity and commitment to growing ingredients from seed, with yields agreed upon a year in advance.
The frankincense we use in our skincare and wellbeing products is sourced from Kenya and Oman and is certified to the highest organic standards – meaning the supplier has to comply with the strict ethical standards set out by our certification partners. We’ve maintained a 100/100 ethics score from the Ethical Company Organisation every year, since first being awarded in 2014.
OUR COMMITMENT TO CARBONNEUTRAL®
Treading lighter on our planet is ingrained in our ethos, and we’re always working on ways to make our footprint as gentle as possible. In 2008, we became the first UK high street retailer to be certified CarbonNeutral® and offset our greenhouse gas emissions every year since.
PUTTING RENEWABLE ENERGY FIRST
We’re proud to prioritise diversifying our energy supplies and focusing on maximising our renewable energy sources, helping to reduce air pollution and carbon emissions drastically. Our Dorset eco-factory was designed with renewable energy front of mind and installed 700m² of solar panels. We generate up to 18% of our electricity there, which is topped up by a 100% UK sourced renewable tariff, and we use 100% renewable electricity and gas across all our stores.
We recycle over 20% of our water and have a water recycling system at our eco-factory that recycles up to 1 million litres of water every year. Over the years, we’ve continued to fund freshwater availability projects, such as rainwater collection tanks for our tea tree oil suppliers in Kenya.
OUR AWARDS AND CERTIFICATIONS
