Body & beauty

Main interview

Co-founder of Lush, Rowena Bird puts her success down to getting rid of five-year plans and saying yes to everything that comes her way

Rowena Bird has some feelings about the current state of the beauty industry. For a long-time, Lush has led the way with sustainability, with their ‘naked’ approach to packaging and vegan-friendly products. Fuelled by a desire to prove that beauty doesn’t have to mean wrapped in paper and then put in a box, Rowena’s love of cosmetics has always been more than just the product. Now, she wants the industry to think about how they can make regenerative, sustainable items that are affordable. Because, as she tells us, “Sometimes customers walk into the shop with only enough money to buy one product, but that one product can help someone feel pretty bloody marvellous.”

My Aunt Penny was very much a glamour puss and she had a huge influence on me. She had a towering blonde beehive, false nails and false eyelashes, and she absolutely loved beauty. I would spend time with her and use my pocket money to buy make-up in Woolworths. What I was buying at the time was actually designed by Stan Krysztal (who worked on ranges for Nivea and Mary Quant cosmetics). Funnily enough, he was the person who taught me how to produce make-up later on in my career.

Our first goal was to open shops within the M25 and make those successful and then we had people calling to say that they wanted to take Lush to Croatia and Australia. By all means, make a plan, but don’t stick a time constraint on it. We used to have five-year and three-year plans and then we just thought, why should we wait? Let’s just get on with it! We hit our five-year goals within two, because the thing is, that by making a plan, you’re sort of limiting yourself.

Right from the beginning, we wanted the experience of Lush to almost be a spectacle. You’re certainly not going to die if you have no make-up on and haven’t washed your hair, but we do want you to have the best time while you’re in our store. A great point of inspiration for me has always been Selfridge, who opened post-war when there wasn’t much money around. Walking into a Selfridges store was an experience. That’s what we wanted to create. We have lots of stories where people who find it difficult to come out and interact with people actually come into Lush and feel safe, and that means everything. Regenerative is the biggest word for us at Lush.

Regenerating the soil, regenerating the planet, regenerating people’s incomes. Sustainability isn’t enough. I’d like to see better use of raw materials so that when someone buys a beauty product it profits more than just the middle-man. We need to give the growers a much more stable income. If the cosmetic industry starts buying more thoughtfully and mindfully, then everybody’s state of being is advanced.

The cosmetic industry puts a lot of the recycling responsibility on the customer and that’s not where it should be. My biggest bugbear is sachets, but in some countries, a sachet means that someone can wash their hair. Therefore, it’s the big companies who should be thinking about what they can do for the people who can only afford single-use sachets. They need to club together and give these customers who are reliant on them great products, at a good price.

As a customer, if you refuse to buy something that is overpackaged and isn’t easily recyclable, then it will make a difference to the longevity of that product. Think about growing something in your old moisturiser tub, don’t just put it in the bin! My quest for make-up that was free of plastic packaging was born because I wanted to make a difference on a bigger scale. Something that would hopefully spark change in industries and the mindset of individuals.

It’s about time that the cosmetics industry paid attention to what the customer wants. I’m a firm believer that people shop with their feet, which is why we discontinue something if we can tell that it’s no longer interesting. We’ll find them a new product that they’ll love instead. They’re the people calling for change at the end of the day, and they want better quality and fair trade products and better work practises; so they’re asking for all the right things!

If I didn’t work in the beauty industry, I’d love a boutique hotel in Botswana. I’d love to live on the edge of a game reserve and fly people in a hot air balloon so they can do safari watching from the air. I just love hospitality, so if I didn’t have Lush, then I’d still be involved in that in some sort of way. For me, it’s all about how lovely I can make something for you.