Lush is a beauty company with campaigning at its heart and its latest initiative involves 900 bars of soap and a political message. The cosmetics business has come out in support of Māori leadership and others who oppose the Treaty Principles Bill, which aims to define the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi, also known as the Te Tiriti o Waitangi, and put them to a nationwide referendum for confirmation. The bill has sparked criticism in New Zealand from those who believe it will
will diminish Māori rights.
In the lead-up to Waitangi Day on February 6, Lush stores across Aotearoa (the Māori-language name for New Zealand) will amplify the message and retail the limited-run Together for Te Tiriti soap, which is a Lush giving product.
The campaign intends to create space for meaningful conversations surrounding the bill to occur and achieve over 300,000 signatures on the rangatahi-led Ngāti Whakaue petition.
Actioning activism
Lush has partnered with ActionStation Aotearoa, the community campaign platform on which the petition resides.
As part of the campaign, 100 per cent of profits made from the sale of the Together for Te Tiriti soap will be donated to ActionStation’s Te Tiriti Justice programme to fund ongoing campaigning.
The soap will be sold in-store and online in Aotearoa, and online in the Australian market. It is expected that the amount raised will total over NZ$8,000.
Jessielee Pearce (Ngāpuhi, Ngāruahine, Ngāti Hine), Lush Cosmetics’ advocacy and activism executive, told Inside Retail, “Lush has been actively campaigning for social justice since our inception in 1995. We believe we have a responsibility to provide a platform for the people and groups on the ground fighting for what is right and in amplifying their voices, to leave the world Lusher than we found it.”
The in-store collateral for the campaign is “big, physical petition signage and that really in your face campaign in Aotearoa only, but we have released it online in Australia, too,” Pearce said.
Extending the campaign and product to the Australian market was under the knowledge that, “We have a lot of Maori whānau who live in Australia. So we wanted to be able to extend the opportunity for them, to get involved and support the campaign,” she added.
Pearce has worked at Lush for over 11 years. She took on the role of activism executive about two years ago when the business combined various roles across its giving streams and its campaigns.
At the forefront of decisions within the business is the question, “How is my action in this department going to have an impact on animals, humans and the environment?” Pearce said.
Picking partnerships
Lush’s Giving Products are its way of supporting grassroots organisations and amplifying their mission. As a global brand, Lush has a variety of Giving Products available in different markets, with exclusive products only available in some countries.
“This is the first time in 10 years that we’ve had an Aotearoa-specific giving products within an advocacy campaign. Our other advocacy campaigns have supported Australia, Aotearoa and globally; where this is the first time it’s Aotearoa only,” Pearce said.
Creating the soap with the message, ‘Together for Te Tiriti’, and supporting that with an omnichannel campaign felt most appropriate for Lush to be able to amplify ActionStation’s call to action and their messaging, Pearce explained.
The Treaty of Waitangi, or Te Tiriti, has three main principles: participation, protection and partnership. Including the number three in the price of the soap, which sells for NZ$13, was important to Pearce despite the accounts team suggesting a higher price given the value of the ingredients.
This speaks to the importance of having someone on the ground who understands the social and the political issues that are happening, Pearce said.
“My role is to find those relative causes with the safety checks to ensure we are always aligning with something meaningful that is going to have a great outcome, or it’s worth advocating for, but we always do a risk assessment,” she explained
“There is some messaging that we can’t put in our stores as we do have customer-facing staff, as we’re an omnichannel retailer.
“Online businesses can say spicier things when they’re purely online, but for us, we’ve got to make sure that our staff in-stores are safe.”
Pearce emphasised the importance of an open channel of communication between herself, retail staff and the customer care team when deploying Lush’s social and environmental impact campaigns.
“They face those emails and calls, so I always like to check in with them after the first couple of days,” Pearce said.
When campaigns like the Together for Te Tiriti go live, Lush ensures in-store staff members are educated about the topic and campaign; feeling supported and safe.
“Our staff deliver these campaigns in-store, and their safety is our number one priority,” Pearce said.
“There are going to be people out there who are maybe a little bit unhappy that we’re talking about politics in our store,” she acknowledged
“Our staff can opt out of speaking on a cause if they feel like it’s a bit unsafe for them. As an example, we have advocated for trans rights as human rights, and it’s not an expectation that every staff member will speak on that, especially our trans staff. We don’t want them to be put in harm’s way.”
Education for empowerment
A few years ago, Lush created internal working groups to ensure it was well-informed about First Nations issues in Australia and Māori issues in Aotearoa.
“So we have them as a sounding and advisory board. They tell us the causes most important for their community and any current calls to action that need amplification. It also means that it’s not just us speaking on behalf of the community,” Pearce said.
This approach also meant that when the Treaty Principles Bill was put forward, Lush was in a position to take a stand.
“We believe that if all businesses in Aotearoa were to provide baseline education for their staff around Te Tiriti o Waitangi, we wouldn’t be facing issues like we are right now. We urge businesses just to participate in the community,” Pearce said.
“What we don’t do is a flash-in-the-pan call to action. We’ll carry on talking about it until we don’t need to talk about it anymore.
“It’s quite similar to our fighting animal testing. We were founded based on none of our ingredients being tested on animals, and that has been all the way through, it’s a core thing, not a flash in the pan, you don’t pick it up, drop it off around KPIs.”
The business hasn’t set any specific KPIs around the campaign, but has empowered the stores to set their own.
“Of course, you want the maximum donation to go to ActionStation, that’s one thing. But we’ll keep the soap until it sells out,” Pearce said.
“We want to amplify their petition, raise the funds, and the education to combat the disinformation.”
The customer response from the campaign has been incredibly positive, with the window display drawing people in store– applauding the business for speaking out publicly on a political matter, “sadly, we’re not seeing a lot of other businesses publicly show up like this,” Pearce said.
“It’s driving people into our store to hold those conversations, which is great,” she added.
In the end, Pearce said that the most impactful social justice campaigns require “doing the due diligence, starting small and backing the causes that matter,” she said.