With its endless ongoing campaigns to create more awareness on subjects such as child sex trafficking, AIDS and environmental awareness, The Body Shop is in a firm position to make a difference.

With stores in every state within the peninsula except Perlis, Rampai Niaga Sdn Bhd managing director Datin Mina Cheah-Foong believes that The Body Shop can be used as a platform for that.

“We want to address these issues because few businesses can do that. We want the shops to become weapons of mass instruction,” Foong said.

Rampai Niaga is the franchise holder for The Body Shop in Peninsular Malaysia.Being a non-listed entity, it has the advantage of pursuing such causes, says Foong.

But the company wasn’t always privately owned.
In 2003, property developer Kejora Harta Bhd acquired Rampai Niaga but disposed its stake in the company in 2006 to Foong and her partner/husband, Datuk Simon Foong.

“If we were listed, to do the campaigns we want to do, we would first need board approval. And the things we want to pursue would be difficult if we were listed.

“We took the company private because it would allow us to take it where we want,” says Foong. As a supporter of the movement to gazette the Belum-Temengor Forest Complex in Perak, the cosmetics franchise has been working hand-in-hand with the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS) since 2006 to raise awareness as well as funds for the cause.

Older than both the Amazon and Congo basins, the 130 million-year-old Belum-Temengor forest is one of the most biodiversity-rich areas in the world.

“Saving it will help in the battle against climate change,” says Foong. Besides containing over 3,000 species of flowering plants, the forest also houses 10 hornbill species and over 100 species of mammals.

Another effort is the Kick the Bag Habit initiative, where Body Shop customers are given a chance to decline bags for their purchases, or donate 50 sen to MNS towards the Belum-Temengor cause if they require a bag. Furthermore, for every customer who declines to take a bag, The Body Shop puts in 50 sen too.

The campaign was started in 2007.This year, the initiative was held from July to November and managed to raise RM200,000 while saving 300,000 bags.

“The campaign allowed us to both raise money and reducing consumption,” says Foong.

Last month, Rampai Niaga opened a store at the Sunway Giza lifestyle mall in Kota Damansara and one in Jusco Melaka, bringing its total to 54 stores locally.

In the same month, it also opened its maiden store in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.Foong says she is optimistic about the foray abroad.

“Vietnam has a population of 86 million people, compared with Malaysia’s population of 28 million. So the prospects are great,” she says.

Foong expects The Body Shop’s total sales to grow 8% year-on-year for 2009, with the newly opened stores to contribute nearly 4%.“This year (2009) has been a little bit disappointing. We set a target of growing by 9% for 2009 but we expect growth of between 7.9% and 8%.

“However, looking at the economic climate, with the global financial meltdown and threat of the Influenza A(H1NI), we’re lucky that’s it’s not much worse,” she says.

Since starting The Body Shop franchise 25 years ago, Rampai Niaga has been achieving double-digit growth in sales, except for when the Asian financial crisis hit in 1997, where it still grew by 9%, Foong says.

In terms of business outlook for 2010, Foong says the company expects to“go back to double-digit growth” in light of the better economic outlook.

“Despite the global economic downturn, most people say they weren’t affected. They still did the same things but voluntarily tightened up due to economic conditions.

“For 2010, there should be a pent-up demand or frugal fatigue.I think people will want to splash money on themselves now that they realise that things aren’t so bad,” she says.

Despite the current economic downturn, The Body Shop stores registered an average of 100,000 buyers (based on purchase receipts) and 500,000 walk-ins (based on in-store traffic counters) per month for 2009, according to Foong.

“Our landlords say that we are one of the best performing tenants in their malls,” she says.

Its best performing stores are those located within Suria KLCC, Mid Valley Megamall, Pavilion and 1 Utama.

According to market intelligence company Euromonitor International, The Body Shop has a 4.2% share of the local cosmetics and toiletries market as at June 2009 versus 3.5% a year ago.

The Christmas season is usually The Body Shop’s biggest sales period of the year, contributing about 15% to annual sales.

About 85% of total customers are women.

“A lot of people think we only sell women’s products, but we offer a lot of unisex items. But we are seeing more male customers,” she says, adding that there is also a misconception that its products are expensive.

“I don’t know where people get this idea that we’re expensive. Our cheapest product is under RM10 while our most expensive is around RM118. We are very affordable,” she says.

Source: Eugene Mahalingham