LUSH: EVERYTHING YOU EVER WANTED TO KNOW BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK

Date: 2005: High Street beauty retailer Lush celebrates 10 phenomenally successful years in business, The Lush approach to cosmetics retailing can at best be described as “unorthodox”. Self-appointed cosmetics grocers, Lush is far more a food retailer than a traditional cosmetics company (think hand-made, natural and fresh merchandise, butchers’ blocks, prices by weight, greaseproof paper wrapping and best-by dates).

In Lush’s “beauty delis”, soaps are piled high on Provençal-style wooden tables like strange exotic cheeses, whilst a myriad of orbs (fizzing bath ballistics) are presented in-store like perfectly round apples.

“I’ve always loved the way fruit and vegetables are displayed in a grocery store,” says Mark Constantine, Lush’s managing director who set up the company in 1995 with a close-knit team with whom he has worked for some 20 years. The inspiration behind the store design was he says, “cheese shops and German veggie restaurants – and any fresh fish counter.”

As befits its grocery heritage, customers are encouraged to choose their cosmetics personally – from the pic’n’mix skin care at the cleansing bar; from chunks of solid shampoo, or bubble slices, or perhaps from the Bio Fresh – products carrying use-by dates and displayed on the chilled fish counter-style cabinet.

“The plan was to make cosmetics that were as natural as possible and to avoid using synthetic preservatives,” says Constantine. Thus every Lush product is crammed with the highest quality – and importantly, organic wherever possible – ingredients: herbs, fruit, flowers and essential oils.

As well as pioneering the freshest ever cosmetics, Lush has an ecological message. The majority of products have little or no packaging, with the creative team constantly rising to the challenge of making innovative products in solid formulations that don’t require bottling.

Ingredients are quantitatively marked on labels – and have been since the company’s launch. Items suitable for both vegetarians and vegans are clearly marked. Nothing is tested on animals, and Lush also guarantees none of its suppliers tests any of their raw materials (including those not bought directly by Lush) on animals either.

Lush emerged from the demise of Constantine’s previous venture, Cosmetics To Go, which collapsed through a combination of over-trading and flooding. Three months later, the same team had created an inspired new venture, which was without a name until a Mrs. Bennett from Glasgow responded to a plea for suggestions.

“Lush is such an evocative word,” says Constantine. “It can mean green, make you think of the rain forest or a passage of poetry, a piece of music, or a woman who has had too much to drink. It has wonderfully addictive feel about it.”

The first shop opened in Poole in April 1995 and the business has been profitable since day one. Lush’s expansion, whilst rapid, has been controlled. Today, ten years since its inception, there are 70 shops in the UK, with up to 20 new sites being planned for 2005/6. Lush is scheduled to open in Middlesbrough, Inverness and Wimbledon before June 2005. The rights to Lush world-wide are wholly owned by the Poole based parent company, Lush Ltd., which also owns Lush Retail Ltd. in the U.K. and shares in all Lush retail operations.

With over one thousand new business enquiries, mostly international, being received every six months, careful consideration is imperative. Already overseas growth has been impressive – currently there are 306 shops worldwide - and the company is looking to open up 30 more stores in Europe alone. Lush has wholly-owned shops in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, the Republic of Ireland and Holland. The team has set up successful joint ventures in Canada, Croatia, Germany, Slovenia, Brasil, Sweden, Italy, Taiwan, Malta, Hungary, The Philippines, Iceland, Russia, Romania, Chile, India, Sri Lanka, Switzerland, the Gulf States, Morocco, Hong Kong, South Korea, Indonesia, Spain and the Czech Republic. The first U.S. shop debuted in San Francisco in December 2002, Boston and Washington were open by end 2003 and LA and New York followed soon after. Other U.S. stores include Orlando, Chicago, Portland and New Orleans. As part of its 10th anniversary celebrations, Lush is hugely excited to have launched its first French location in the trendy district of St. Germain in Paris, which opened its doors in January 2005 . Ultimately, Lush hopes to open 1,000 sites worldwide.

As well as the global business that Lush has become, the team of co-founders also launched a sister company – B Never Too Busy To Be Beautiful, a colour cosmetics and fragrance emporium that is an Aladdin’s Cave of girlie decadence. The first shop opened in trendy Carnaby Street in September 2003, followed quickly by Poole High Street. On 23rd May 2005 – Lush’s official birth date -, B’s third shop will open in Covent Garden.

Throughout this expansion, Constantine has remained true to the team’s original aims.

“The whole point of Lush is that it should be fun for our customers and fun for us, while at the same time offering original products that work and give value for money. ”

THE LUSH MISSION STATEMENT

*We believe in making effective products out of fresh fruit and vegetables, the finest essential oils and safe synthetics, without animal ingredients and in listing the quantitative ingredients on the outside.

*We believe in buying only from companies that test for safety without the involvement of animals and in testing our products on humans.

*We believe in making our own fresh products by hand, printing our own labels and making our own fragrances.

*We believe in long candlelit baths, massage, filling the house with fragrance and in the right to make mistakes, lose everything and start again.

*We believe that our products must be good value, we should make a profit and that the customer is always right.

*We believe also that words like “fresh” and “organic” have honest meaning beyond marketing.

For shop details and mail order enquiries, call 01202 668 545. Or, order on-line at www.lush.com.

For further information, please contact:

Mary Linehan/Karen Huxley/Gina Rolfe

Lush Press Office

32 Carnaby Street.

LONDON W1F 7DN

Tel: 020 7434 3948 Fax: 020 7434 3950

e-mail: first name @lush.co.uk