How The World’s Largest B Corp Natura (Owner Of Body Shop, Avon And Aesop) Uses Purpose To Drive Performance And WellBeing

After an injury interrupted her dreams of being a classical ballet dancer Andrea Álvares went on to a stellar career in business and marketing that lead to General Manager, Marketing and Strategy roles at Pepsico and P&G, and from there to her current position as Chief Brand, Innovation, International and Sustainability Officer and member of the Executive Committee for Natura, the world’s largest B Corp.

Natura & Co is a Brazilian global personal care cosmetics group headquartered in São Paulo which currently includes Natura Cosméticos, Aesop, The Body Shop and Avon. With 35,000 employees in 100+ countries and revenues of $7.9 billion in 2021, the company is a global powerhouse of progressive brands. I’ve long been fascinated by Natura and how progressive the company is on issues like sustainability and women’s empowerment, so it was a delight to catch up and hear from this passionate, insightful and wise leader about their philosophy and business model.

Her journey to Natura came about as part of her own search for meaning - and soul. “I had been sitting in too many meetings in my previous job, just not interested in the problems that were laid out in front of me, because I saw no meaning in what was being presented. I didn't feel any soul. I didn't feel the true meaning. And I thought, well, the problem is you because if you're not interested in the problems, then maybe you should go look to do something else. So I did, and I don't think it's a coincidence at the same time, this discussion with Natura began to arise and it came to fruition beautifully. I met the three founders and I was completely mesmerized by the three of them; their vision and their ethics and their behavior and their view on what businesses should do. And I was swept away and I have been here for six years now.”

Natura’s Purpose is framed as “To nurture beauty and relationships for a better way of living and doing business” and it's backed by their Aspiration (Vision) which states “We will dare to innovate to promote positive economic, social, and environmental impact – and become the best beauty company FOR the world.”

Natura was the first public company to become a B Corp - and is now the world’s largest. Indeed the B Corp community has provided much inspiration for how the company frames its own Aspiration. “The overarching proposition is to become the best beauty company or group FOR the world. And we have openly stolen that from the B movement because, and we got their agreement to do it. So, it's a group of companies and we want to make sure that each brand has its individual idea and its manifestation, but there are things that bind us together. There's obviously a business reason why these companies were chosen, but there is also a purpose reason that joined us together,” she shared.

I asked her about some of the core foundational beliefs at Natura. “One of the first ones is the comprehension that everything is interdependent, that nothing exists by itself. And therefore we are responsible for our impact in the world, that our actions have impact, and that we should be responsible for them and understand them. And then translating that into a business model where you are measuring different indicators that are evidence of your impact; not just financial, but environmental, social, and how you gather that into your triple bottom line evaluation of value generation,” she said.

She talked about another core belief around the idea of wellbeing. “Natura, since its conception, has always been driven by this idea of using cosmetics and relationships as a tool to promote the idea of ‘wellbeing and being well’: the fact that you develop more harmonious relationship with yourself will enable you to develop more harmonious relationships with others, and with the whole of what we are part which is nature,” she explained. “That starts with an individual journey of consciousness, that can be spurred by the rituals of cosmetics that are not promoting just beauty but promoting a more integral idea of wellbeing with natural products, with better choices in terms of the materials we use, with a value chain that corresponds to the distribution of value, not just the accumulation of value.”

Natura’s environmental credentials run deep. “We’ve been carbon neutral since 2007. We did a carbon calculator in 2003. We went to the Amazon region in 1998 and launched a brand based on the ecosystem of the Amazon sourcing from communities there, offering access, benefit, sharing, compliant with the Nagoya protocol,” she said. The company was one of the first to start offering refills to customers to cut down on packaging waste. After unveiling its 2030 sustainability vision, Commitment to Life, the Natura brand avoided 32% in emissions, which is equivalent to 162,000 tons of CO₂ emissions of greenhouse gas. All four brands launched their plans to become Net Zero by 2030 on Scopes 1, 2 and 3.

Natura’s social purpose also manifests itself through the focus they have on their employees - especially women. She said, “We go directly to the consumer through a massive network of 2 million majority women,who make their livelihoods with this business and because they're able to access economic value, but not just economic value. We measure what we call their Human Development Index, so they can prosper, and they can impact their communities, their families. So interdependence is at the heart of this idea too.”

Finally, I ask her about what advice she has for other leaders in the space about how to practice Purpose-driven business authentically. She responded, “Be genuine. Do not be opportunistic, do not greenwash, really do it. This can't be about discourse or communication, gimmicks, or campaigns. This has to be about the heart and soul of the business. So if you can't translate, if you're not yet operating at the level that you want, don't talk about it. You can talk about your ambition of getting there, but don't talk about what you don't do yet. Strive to do what you want to do and to transform your model and your business into something that is more regenerative, more circular, that respects others, that respects human rights, that distributes value, that offers dignified wages, that reduces emissions drastically over time. And really make it a business strategy that is materialized in your actions - not your words.”