Soap firm not afraid to get its hands dirty

The luxury toiletries store, created in Poole but now with branches all over the world, is known for its green, animal-friendly ethos.

Yet behind the scenes a more belligerent force is at work.

As well as aiming to please their customers and promote their products, Lush staff constantly campaign for better rights for animals and a greener world for us all.

While such campaigns have always been a major part of Lush, things have become rather more militant of late.

The company's campaigns manager spent 12 hours in a cell in Brussels following protests over new legislation which looks set to re-introduce animal testing to Europe.

Activists attempted to dump four tonnes of manure outside the European Parliament building in Strasbourg in December as MPs voted to pass the Registration, Evaluation and Authorisation of Chemicals programme.

"It started off as a public health measure," explained Mark Constantine, Lush founder and director.

"It was to try and eliminate dangerous chemicals, so they wanted to scan all of these chemicals to see if they were dangerous.

"You can see why people came up with it and, in principle, everyone would support it.

"The problem was that it then caused a scientific debate about what tests they would use, so they got into a whole plethora of animal tests.

"It would appear that we, as importers of henna - which has been used for 5,000 years - would have to do some animal testing."

Despite Lush's efforts the legislation was passed, meaning as many as 45 million animals could now be used in toxicity tests.

"In my career we've managed to campaign to stop animal testing," sighed Mark, 54.

"But this suddenly reintroduced it.

"We're becoming a little more belligerent. But you get frustrated, arguing 30 years about the same thing.

"I thought we'd got it banned and here it is, back again.

"We are getting more activist - it seems to be the only way to get through.

"We've tried all the democratic means so, more than just writing a letter to the Echo, I'm funding activist groups and employing activists to work in the company to do something about it because it's just so frustrating."

Animal rights campaigns are what Lush is probably best-known for, but the company is also behind a host of green initiatives.

However, while Lush quietly goes about its fair trading, energy saving and anti-road protesting - a cause into which it has just invested £20,000 - Mark said he was irritated by bigger companies trying to promote themselves as green.

"If you look at some big companies 10 years ago, they were getting most of their products in Britain.

"Then they made the decision to move all of that to South East Asia.

"But now we're supposed to buy from them just because they use organic cotton?

"It's like Fair Trade - from my point of view I believe that everyone we buy from we are treating fairly.

"We're as careful as possible when buying raw materials.

"Although we have a big business in Japan, we have a factory there, so the products are still made locally.

"We already use less power in our stores - we use half the power that other stores use, but we want to drop that.

"It's just being economical.

"We have lights in the windows in the evenings, but they're on timers, so they go out at night."

Listening to Mark talk about Lush - one of Poole's largest employers - and its beliefs, it's obvious that looking after the planet is a passion.

But rather than forcing his views onto other people, Mark says his main aim is to please his customers.

"It was something I believed in passionately when I was younger and it had a big impact.

"But a lot of it felt slightly superficial.

"What I like to do is supply people with products they really like.

"I want people to behave themselves without them realising - 70 per cent of our product doesn't have packaging or a bottle, but nobody really notices."

Lush's latest project is a Charity Pot, filled with hand and body lotion, which will be on sale shortly for just under £10.

At first glance, it may not seem anything special to customers, but every penny - except VAT - from sales of Charity Pots will go to a range of good causes.

The project is still very much in the planning stages, but Mark hopes it will boost donations to such causes immensely.

"We've committed to £200,000 anyway ourselves to spend on good causes," he said.

"But we're hoping this will increase that to £1m."