Anita Roddick - Rest in Peace

Dame Anita Perella Roddick,

(23 October 1942 – 10 September 2007) was the founder of The Body Shop, a cosmetics company dedicated to producing and retailing ethical beauty products.

She was born to an Italian Jewish immigrant family.Her mother ran a café, and was in the habit of recycling. She went to school at St Joseph’s Convent, and then at Maude Allen Secondary Modern.[2] After leaving school, Roddick trained as a teacher at Bath College of Higher Education (now called Bath Spa University), and travelled widely before her mother introduced her to Gordon Roddick, whom she married in 1970.

The couple opened a restaurant, followed by a hotel. By the time they married, they already had one child and were expecting another.

Roddick worked for the United Nations where she travelled extensively and met people from a number of different cultures. Originally from Littlehampton, Sussex, Roddick founded The Body Shop in Brighton, in 1976. The first The Body Shop was basic and at first sold only 15 lines. The Body Shop's full range now has over 300 products.

In 1990 Roddick founded Children On The Edge, a charitable organization which helps disadvantaged children in Eastern Europe and Asia.She helped a number of other charities including The Big Issue, Greenpeace. After she revealed, in February 2007, that she had long standing Hepatitis C, she promoted the work of the Hepatitis C Trust, and campaigned to increase awareness of the disease.

In 2003, Queen Elizabeth II appointed Roddick a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, and she was officially styled Dame Anita Roddick DBE.

I was lucky enough to go on a lunch cruise with this wonderful lady. There is a link to her site on the right of my page called 'the important stuff'.