From driving social change to making luxury affordable — Lessons from The Body Shop India
Updated
January 30, 2026 11:43 AM
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The Body Shop's storefront. PHOTO: ADOBE STOCK
The Body Shop, known worldwide for its ethical values and cruelty-free beauty products, has had very different results in two of its major markets. In the United States, challenges such as shifting retail trends and tougher competition led to the closure of most physical stores in early 2024. Meanwhile, in India, The Body Shop has risen to become one of its top five global markets. After reaching customers in more than 1,500 Indian cities through its omnichannel network, the company now plans to double its 200-store footprint over the next three to five years.
So what did The Body Shop do in India that proved harder to pull off in the U.S.? Below, we break down why The Body Shop struggled in the U.S., what’s driving The Body Shop India’s growth and what startup founders can learn from the contrast.
In March 2024, The Body Shop’s U.S. unit filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and stopped operating its roughly 50 stores. That move effectively ended its brick-and-mortar presence in the country.
A big part of the story is that the U.S. beauty market moved faster than The Body Shop did. Prestige beauty kept growing, and shoppers increasingly gravitated to retailers and brands that feel current and have a strong online presence. Paul Dodd, Chief Innovation Officer at e-commerce fulfilment partner Huboo, have pointed to The Body Shop’s slow approach to digital growth as a major factor behind its decline. With U.S. prestige beauty sales reaching about US$33.9 billion in 2024 and growing at 7% year over year, the demand is clearly there. The brands that stand out and get rewarded were the ones that matched how people now discover products and buy them.
The company also leaned too heavily on stores at a time when stores were getting harder to run. When foot traffic drops and rents rise, the pressure shows up quickly. Shoppers also had more places to go, including Sephora, Ulta, Amazon and direct-to-consumer sites. A similar pattern played out in Canada, where restructuring included store closures and halted e-commerce. It was another sign that North America had become an operational headache, not just a marketing challenge.
Then there’s the branding issue: its “ethical pioneer” position simply stopped being a moat in the U.S. market. Today, cruelty-free and vegan claims are now table stakes across many newer brands, and “clean beauty” messaging is everywhere. “Initially, the purpose-driven brand was revolutionary, so much so that competitors like Drunk Elephant have adopted a similar ethos,” says Dan Hocking, Chief Operating Officer at advertising agency TroubleMaker. “It was a concept that rightly earned success in the 80s and 90s, but The Body Shop didn’t adapt to changing consumer habits and preferences”. Meanwhile, competitors like Lush have kept people talking through stronger creator/influencer marketing, faster product cycles and more immersive in-store experiences.
Internal disruption likely made the turnaround even harder. Reporting on the U.S. bankruptcy points to instability, including the U.S. unit saying it did not have advance notice of decisions tied to the U.K. parent’s restructuring. When leadership decisions land without warning, it becomes harder to plan inventory, fund marketing and commit to a clear digital roadmap.
1. Expansion into tier 2 and 3 cities
For years, India’s beauty industry focused mainly on metropolitan cities. Today, however, increasing internet penetration, rising disposable incomes, exposure to global beauty trends and an appetite for ethical, sustainable brands have fuelled demand in smaller towns. That tailwind matters because India’s beauty and personal care market is expected to reach a gross merchandise value (GMV) of US$30 billion by 2027 and is projected to grow at roughly an 10% CAGR. There’s plenty of room for both premium and “affordable luxury” players that can meet consumer where they are.
The Body Shop has leaned into this shift. Harmeet Singh, Chief Brand Officer of The Body Shop Asia South, has said the brand is expanding into Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities with a focus on central and Northeast India. Reports also point to a clear advantage here: more than 200 stores across dozens of cities, plus online reach into over 1,500 cities. That foundation makes non-metro expansion feel like the next move, not a risky leap.
2. Omni-channel retail strategy for beauty shoppers
Unlike its U.S. front, The Body Shop India has put effort into digital and distribution. Besides its own online store, customers can find the brand on big beauty and retail platforms like Nykaa, Amazon, Flipkart, Tatacliq and Myntra. It has also built more direct routes to purchase through WhatsApp, social commerce, expert chats and live video consultations. For even faster access, it’s on quick-commerce apps like Blinkit and Swiggy.
This strategy is already showing up in the numbers. Nearly 30% of The Body Shop India’s business came from digital channels as of June 2025. Rahul Shanker, Chief Executive of The Body Shop India, has said the brand wants to lift online revenue to 45–50% of total sales by 2030.
This approach lines up with what’s happening in the market. NielsenIQ data found beauty e-commerce and quick-commerce sales in India rose 39% in value between June and November 2024, with offline growth over the same period being just 3%. The logic is simple: if the market is moving online, you want to be easy to buy online.
3. Inclusivity, accessibility and social impact
The Body Shop’s people-first approach shows up not just in its marketing, but in how it runs the business day to day. Inside the company, it has pushed gender sensitivity across teams. Out of 600 employees, it has 10 staff members who are part of the LGBTQA+ spectrum.
In stores, the brand has worked on improving accessibility. In 2024, The Body Shop India launched a Braille initiative for visually impaired customers. The programme introduced Braille category callouts in select locations so shoppers can navigate more independently.
On the sustainability side, the brand ties its message to its supply chain. An example is its long-term partnership with Plastics for Change, a Bengaluru-based social enterprise, to source “Community Fair Trade” recycled plastic for packaging. The collaboration has resulted in more predictable income, safer work and better access to social services and housing and education projects for the waste picker communities, which often include marginalized groups and women.
The same intent can also be seen in its physical retail. The Body Shop India has been converting stores into its “Activist Workshop” format, where everything is made from recycled materials, including store fixtures and interiors. By mid-2024, it had around 20 Activist Workshop stores in India.
4. Pricing that fits the Indian beauty market
In April 2025, The Body Shop India launched its “More Love for Less” campaign to make products more accessible. Through the campaign, the company lowered the prices of more than 60 best-sellers by 28–30%. The goal was to remove a clear barrier for many shoppers while maintaining the same quality.
The company has also positioned this as a pricing reset, not a short-term discount push. It’s meant to widen the funnel, especially among younger consumers aged 18–25, where price has been a major hurdle. That matters even more as the brand expands deeper into Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, where value is often front and centre.
5. Local marketing that feels made for India
The Body Shop India has leaned into localized marketing in a way that feels specific, not generic. In late 2024, it launched “The India Edit”, a collection inspired by native ingredients like lotus, hibiscus, pomegranate and black grape. The tagline, “Only in India, for You,” makes the intent clear: India is not a copy-paste market. This approach matters because India is one of the most competitive beauty battlegrounds right now, with ongoing entry from global beauty brands. When everyone is fighting for attention, local storytelling helps The Body Shop stand out and feel closer to the customer.
The Body Shop’s story in the U.S. and India shows how differently a global beauty brand can perform depending on local strategy. In the U.S., it ran into a tough mix of fast-changing consumer habits, heavy competition and a liquidation process that left little room to rebuild. In India, the brand is riding big tailwinds in beauty retail growth, plus the shift to e-commerce and quick commerce. It has also put real effort into localization, pricing and omnichannel distribution.
If you’re trying to scale a consumer brand, there’s a clear takeaway here. Understand how your market shops, build strong digital distribution and make the brand feel local. The Body Shop India’s playbook is a useful example of how to do it.
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The Canberra biotech startup is helping processors detect spoilage risks before milk reaches the shelf.
Updated
August 13, 2026 1:01 AM
CYBERTONGUE® Food Testing System, developed by PPB Technology. IMAGE: PPB Technology
Anyone who has opened a carton of milk before its expiry date only to find that it smells off or tastes bitter has experienced the problem firsthand. For dairy processors, the same issue can play out across thousands of litres. Milk may pass routine quality checks, make it through production and still spoil before reaching the end of its expected shelf life.
CYBERTONGUE®, a biosensing platform, is designed to give dairy processors an earlier warning.
Developed by Canberra-based biotech startup PPB Technology, the compact food testing system allows processors to analyse milk on-site and receive results within minutes. Its first commercial application detects protease, an enzyme linked to spoilage, shorter shelf life and production losses across dairy products.
Dairy companies already test milk for fat, protein, bacteria, antibiotics and other indicators. Samples from individual farms may be sent to central laboratories, while tanker loads are tested again when they reach processing plants. These checks provide useful information, but they do not always show whether milk will remain stable in a UHT carton, meet a supermarket’s shelf-life requirements or produce the expected amount of cheese.
Even after heat treatment, protease can continue affecting milk. For processors making UHT milk, fresh milk or mature cheese, that creates a costly blind spot.
“Right now, dairy processors are working blind on this,” PPB Technology founder Stephen Trowell told Ventureport. “It’s becoming more of a problem as customers expect longer shelf lives and higher quality.”
CYBERTONGUE® uses engineered biosensing proteins that emit blue and green light. The balance between the two colours changes when the protein reacts with a target substance. The reader measures that shift and calculates how much of the target is present.
Trowell describes himself as a protein engineer at heart. He spent around three decades at CSIRO, Australia's national science and technology agency, and close to four decades in research before becoming a startup founder. The technology behind CYBERTONGUE® grew out of years of biological research, including earlier experiments involving wine aromas and explosives detection.
PPB initially developed its technology to measure plasmin, an enzyme derived from cows. After feedback from the dairy industry, the company shifted its focus to bacterial proteases, which were identified as a more pressing spoilage problem. The platform can make some existing tests faster, but PPB chose to focus first on a measurement previously unavailable to processors.
“Where we’ve chosen to lead is with a measurement nobody else can do at all,” he said. “The blue ocean, if you like.”
That focused entry point shapes PPB’s wider strategy. CYBERTONGUE® could eventually test for lactose, allergens, microbial toxins and other targets. Yet launching everything at once would stretch a six-person company too far. Protease gives it a clear route into dairy, where the financial value is easier to demonstrate.
A processor that detects high protease activity may redirect a batch of milk away from long-life products and use it for yoghurt, curd or another product where the enzyme causes less damage. PPB also says its tests can help trace problems in the milk supply and detect biofilms on processing equipment, allowing factories to take corrective cleaning measures.
Fresh milk presents another sizeable opportunity, with the global market estimated at around US$81 billion in 2026 and projected to grow at 6.83% annually through 2035. At that scale, even small gains in shelf-life consistency could prevent substantial losses. Supermarkets often require milk to have a minimum amount of shelf life remaining on delivery. Products that fall short may be rejected, discounted or discarded at the processor’s expense. While Australian processors typically aim for a shelf life of 19 to 21 days, they do not always achieve it. CYBERTONGUE® could help them reach that target more consistently.
Cheese producers face a related issue. Protease can create bitter flavours in hard cheeses and reduce production yield. Cheesemakers add another enzyme, chymosin, during production, often without knowing how much protease activity is already present in the milk. Better information could help them adjust the process and get more value from the same raw material.
PPB sells the reader as laboratory equipment, but its long-term business model centres on repeat testing. Customers buy the machine, then purchase a PPB reagent cartridge each time they run an assay. Future tests are intended to work on the same reader, making the system more useful as the catalogue expands.
CYBERTONGUE®’s compact design reflects PPB’s focus on practical onsite testing. The device is small enough to fit into two cupped hands and comes with a tablet running PPB’s software.
At the time of the interview, 13 to 15 systems had been installed with paying customers. PPB had made sales in 11 countries across five continents, with Europe as its largest market.
Trowell describes PPB as “born global”. While Australia and New Zealand have sophisticated dairy industries, Trowell thinks CYBERTONGUE® may offer even more value in regions where milk quality is less consistent, transport routes are longer or refrigeration is harder to maintain.
Trowell also believes PPB has a strong competitive moat, with the combination of manufacturing both the hardware and consumable reagents. Patents form one layer, but he does not consider legal protection sufficient on its own. A competitor would need expertise in protein engineering, reagent production, optical hardware, software and dairy processing.
Calibration adds another barrier. For each new box of reagents, PPB securely uploads the required calibration data to the customer’s machine. A third party could not simply manufacture a cartridge with the same dimensions and expect it to work correctly.
“We own the whole stack,” Trowell said, referring to everything from the sensing molecule to the hardware, software and cloud platform.
That said, he accepts that no technology is impossible to copy. His view is that PPB’s mix of scientific knowledge, integrated system and experience in dairy gives it enough of a head start to build a meaningful position before competitors catch up.
The technology could eventually reach beyond food. Trowell sees possible uses in environmental testing, veterinary care and medical diagnostics, including the analysis of blood, serum or saliva. PPB has already discussed potential applications with organisations outside the food industry.
For now, however, moving directly into clinical diagnostics would create more risk than opportunity. Medical products can require years of trials, extensive regulatory work and large development budgets. PPB would also need to build new sales channels and choose between many possible clinical uses without knowing which one would attract the strongest demand.
For these reasons, food testing offers PPB a clearer path. The regulatory barriers are generally lower, customers have immediate operational problems, and PPB has already built relationships in dairy. Once the platform has proved itself commercially, the company could enter other sectors through partnerships or licensing.
Trowell has held that view for years. The immediate goal is to build a successful food testing company rather than chase the prestige often attached to medical biotechnology.
The opportunity may also expand as food production becomes more complex. Dairy factories increasingly process oat, soy and other alternatives on equipment that also handles cow’s milk. This creates cross-contamination and allergen risks, offering another potential use for CYBERTONGUE®.
PPB still has plenty to prove. It must secure repeat reagent orders, convert early trials into wider deployments and expand its test catalogue without compromising accuracy. Scaling an integrated biotech hardware business across international markets will not be simple.
Still, its approach offers a useful lesson for other deep-tech startups. Instead of beginning with every possible application, PPB picked a specific problem that costs customers money today. It built a product around that pain point, then used the same technology as the foundation for a broader platform.
As Trowell put it, customers “need it fast, and they need it right.” CYBERTONGUE® is betting that food testing can deliver both.