Lush wants you to shop ‘naked’ and it’s not nearly as dirty as it sounds. In an attempt to cull the rampant plastic pollution in the cosmetics industry, Lush is opening its first packaging-free store in the UK.
'Reducing packaging is something Lush has been working on for many, many years. From the very first day over 20 years ago, our products were naked, but now we see a bigger movement against plastic and against waste. Alongside that, now we are able to fill up a whole shop with skincare, bodycare, hair care and bath bombs, while still providing that five star experience,' explains product inventor Alessandro Commisso.
Solid shampoo, bars of soap and chunks of toner are just some of the innovative ways Lush plans to eradicate wasteful packaging. Customers may be surprised to find that ditching the boxing means their purchases, like a deodorant square or glow stick highlighter, won’t be presented in a disposable bag - paper, plastic or otherwise. In keeping with the store’s ethos, cotton reusable wraps will be for sale.
’I think visitors to the naked shop will hopefully realise how easy it is just to either bring their own bags with them when they’re shopping or to make a better choice about how they’re taking products away,’ one Lush designer told explains.
There is a second tier to Lush’s new transparency play. Without the back of a box to print out a list of ingredients, an app called #LushLabs has been launched for customers to see exactly what went into the making of their product. All they have to do is scan the item with a feature called ‘Lush Lens’ and a full ingredient list pops ups.
The new shop will be situated in Manchester at 10 Market Street and open on the 18th of January. It will follow the same steps to success as seen at Milan and Berlin, which were the first to get ’naked’ concept stores last year.