Researching CSR & Sustainability at The Body Shop Company

This report investigates the role of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and sustainability in enhancing the business performance of The Body Shop. It begins by defining CSR and sustainability, highlighting their importance in modern business. The research aims to understand the impact of CSR and sustainability initiatives on The Body Shop, examining how these practices influence the company's performance. It also explores the challenges The Body Shop faces when implementing CSR and sustainability within its operations, including potential barriers and limitations. The report uses a literature review to provide context and background, drawing on existing studies and theories related to CSR and sustainability. Ultimately, the research seeks to provide insights into how companies like The Body Shop can effectively integrate CSR and sustainability into their business strategies to achieve improved performance and positive social and environmental outcomes. Desklib provides access to a wealth of similar assignments and study tools for students.

Research proposal
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
Overview of the topic..................................................................................................................3
Overview of the organisation......................................................................................................3
Research Aim and Objectives.....................................................................................................3
Research question........................................................................................................................4
Research rational.........................................................................................................................4
Significance of the research........................................................................................................5
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................6
Explain the basic understanding about corporate social responsibility and sustainability in a
organisation.................................................................................................................................6
Discuss the impact of CSR and sustainability on the performance of the business in Body
shop.............................................................................................................................................7
Examine the challenges that will be faced by the Body shop when they implement Corporate
social responsibility and sustainability within the operation......................................................8
RESERACH METHODOLOGY...................................................................................................10
REFERNCES.................................................................................................................................13
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INTRODUCTION
Overview of the topic
Sustainability and corporate social responsibility are the two important concept when
organisation think of starting their business operation. With the time these two are gaining more
importance and many rules and laws are being made so that these can be acquired by the
company in effective and efficient manner. Sustainability in simple terms is the ability of the
companies to protect and maintain the environment and culture of the country in which they
operate in more economical manner (Christensen, Hail and Leuz, 2018). Corporate social
responsibility means the organisation commitment to follow the rules and regulation that are
setup to protect the surrounding. These are made so that resources can be utilised in effective
way and future need can also be fulfilled by this. In recent time it is made compulsory for the
companies to have some notion of CSR with them. The amount of CSR and sustainability differ
from company and the size. In one of the study it is found that there are some organisation who
follow CSR because it help them to create a goodwill and image in the market. Both Corporate
social responsibility and CSR is a management approach which organisation follow so that they
can create and maximise there long term social, economical and environmental values (Cowan
and Guzman, 2020).
Overview of the organisation
In this report researcher has selected the body shop company as to analyse the impact and
challenges that are occur when they about the concept of CSR ans sustainability in their
organisation. Body shop is a British international cosmetic brand. The company manufacture so
many skin care products and perfume. It was established in 1976 and the founder of the brand is
Anita Roddick. The company headquarter is in London Bridge, United Kingdom. About 1000 of
goods are being produced by the company and sold at more than 3000 stores world wide. Earlier
the company was owned by the L'Oreal but in 2017 it was sell to a Brazilian company that is
Natura for £880 million.
Title: CSR AND SUSTAINABILITY
Research Aim and Objectives
Aim:
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"To identify the role of corporate social responsibility and sustainability in improving business
performance of an organisation": A study on Body shop
Objectives:
 To develop basic understanding regarding the corporate social responsibility and
sustainability
 To determine the impact of CSR and sustainability on business performance of Body
shop
 To examine the challenges that would be faced by Body shop while implementing CSR
and sustainability
Research question
 Explain the basic understanding about corporate social responsibility and sustainability
in a organisation?
 Discuss the impact of CSR and sustainability on the performance of the business in Body
shop?
 Examine the challenges that will be faced by the Body shop when they implement
Corporate social responsibility and sustainability within the operation?
Research rational
The topic is selected for carrying out the research on the impact of Corporate social
responsibility of an organisation. The main reason behind choosing the the research topic is to
full fill two objectives that is Personal and Professional. In respect to the personal aim it will
help in determining the activities that are effective in development the talent within the
candidates about the importance of CSR and sustainability. This will simultaneously aid in
knowing the tools and techniques about them so that they can be acquire by the individual in
their own skills and knowledge. The another personal benefit that can be gained by this research
is that knowing the impact of corporate social responsibility and sustainability, so that it cab be
used in future for effective solving the problem. In respect to the professional aim, the benefit of
this research is that it will help to utilise the skills and knowledge and find the right job in that
field. In further this would also help in developing a sound professional career along with
building the effective vocation personality that will assist in solving all the queries that will
occurs in the organisation in more affective and efficient manner (Ramboarisata and Gendron,
2019).
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Significance of the research
The study of corporate social responsibility and sustainability cab be a learning paradigm.
This research will be helpful for various stakeholder like organisation, scholars, investigator and
industry. The scholars will get to develop the knowledge and entrepreneurial skills about the
topic. This research will also help the student to improve their academic competence, skills and
also search for the job in that particular field. The organisation will also get to know the rules
and regulation that are being made by the government to protect the environment and society.
This will also get to know about the challenges that will be faced by them if they cannot follow
the CSR and sustainability activity while running the business. Next researchers will be benefited
as they will get the secondary data about the study which they can be used in their research
report and can find the gap between the present and past investigation in more effective way. At
last the industry will be benefited from the investigation is that they will get to know about the
importance of the CSR and sustainability and what laws are being made for their industry.. This
will also help them to know what all precaution that will be taken by the firm based on their size
and nature (Aggarwal and Singh, 2019).
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LITERATURE REVIEW
Literature review is that part of the research report that contain the past published data of
the selected topic. This section help the researcher to gain a detailed understanding about the
subject and find the gap between to past and present investigation. The information that is
published here is from various secondary source.
Explain the basic understanding about corporate social responsibility and sustainability in a
organisation
According to Kleine and Von Hauff (2019),Corporate Social responsibility is a
management concept by which the organisation integrated the society and environment activities
in to their operations so that they can easily interact with different stakeholders. Through these
company maintain a balance between the operations and environmental responsibility.
Sustainability means fulfilling the company needs by keeping in mind the wants of future
generation. There are three main pillars of sustainability that is Economic, Environmental and
Social and these pillar are refereed to as people, profit and planet. Both CSR and Sustainability
improves the quality of lives, protect the surrounding and reserves the natural resource so that
they can be used in the future. These will also help the company to create a long term value for
themselves in the society. In recent time the consumer of the company also uses those product
which are environmental free, so the business need to keep this in mind if they ant to gain more
market share (Visser, and et. al, 2019). Even a good relationship stability can be maintained with
many stakeholder of the enterprise. In recent times the companies shift there focus on CSR and
Sustainability. In one of the study it is also found that about thirty three percent of the
organisation are prioritizing there focus on sustainability as it will help them to create a
reputation in the market. This helps in reducing the cost and also helps in improving the
efficiency of operation. It is found that there are three pillars of the above two concept, let
discuss them:
Environmental pillar: This is one of the pillar which is more in talks. Gone are the days
were company focus on mass production without considering the environment. In this major
strategies are been developed so that companies can protect the surrounding as well as carbon
footprints can be reduce. Some of the majors in this are removing the use of plastic for
packaging, recycling the materials, using those sources of producing energy which are
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sustainable and many more. In short all those measures should be adopted by the business which
help them to save and protect the planet, so that future generation can get a environment which is
pollution free (Sharabati, 2018).
Social pillar: In this pillar the major concern is on people. People in terms of different
stakeholder like employee, customer,local community, investor and many more. Here all those
major would be adopted by the companies so that they can take care of the people in good
manner. Some of the societal measures are: labour laws, maternity leave, proper working
condition etc.
Economic pillar: The economical pillar talks about implementing those CSR ans
Sustainability practice that will help them to increase their profit. The company should make
those strategy that help them to increase the profit by supporting surrounding. The resources are
spend in such a way that will minimise the wastage as well as reduce the cost of production.
Effective and efficient utilisation of material is important to earn profit.
So these all three pillar plays a vital role in implementing the CSR and Sustainability in the
organisation (Hediger, 2019).
Discuss the impact of CSR and sustainability on the performance of the business in Body shop
As per the view of Benn and Bolton (2021),There is an positive impact of CSR and
Sustainability to the performance of the body shop.
Boost sale: The foremost advantage that Body shop gain is by implementing the CSR and
Sustainability practice, sales of the company will boost. As today even the customer is more
interested in buying those product that is environmental friendly. It will help the brand to
increase the sale and earn more revenue. It is found that company of inve4st in CSR and
Sustainability gain more market share than those company are not investing.
 Brand image: Corporate social responsibility and Sustainability help the body shop to
create a positive brand image for the company. If a strong image is setup by the
organisation then more stakeholders will get attract toward the company and will help in
earning more profit. So if the brand image is setup them it will help the company to
promote their goods and service in much better way. Even it will help the customer to
recognise the name of the organisation and buy the specific product that they want. Even
the trust and loyalty can be enhanced by the customer towards the brand (Schönborn and
et. Al, 2019).
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 High production: The employee are the main assets of the Body shop, so if they know
about the advantages of CSR and Sustainability then they will work in more motivated
way. So these motivated workforce will work for protecting the surrounding and will
utilise the resource in effective manner. So this will help them to increase the production
and supply the goods to buyers in more quantity and quality.
 Increased creativity: CSR and Sustainability helps the organisation to do operation in
more creative way. This will help the company to be more innovative and develop those
ides which help them to reduce the workload. Thus this will help the Body shop to
improve their performance and earn competitive advantage from the competitor
(Platonova and et. Al, 2018).
Examine the challenges that will be faced by the Body shop when they implement Corporate
social responsibility and sustainability within the operation
According to Malik and Kanwal (2018),There are so many challenges that was faced by
Body shop when they implements Corporate social responsibility and Sustainability. These
challenges impact a lot in organisation performance and profit. Some of the challenge are:
Lack of environmental knowledge: When Body shop think of implementing these
practices then they do not posses enough knowledge about the laws and regulation that are being
followed by them so that they can protect the environment and society a lot. They do not have
proper understanding about the policy that need to be fulfilled and how they can apply these on
their operations (Kraus, Rehman and García, 2020).
Providing training to the employee: The other challenges that they face is providing
coaching to the employee so that they can develop the knowledge of CSR and sustainability.
Many of the employee are comfortable in working with the past tools and techniques. So forcing
them and boosting their morale to work in that direction becomes difficult for the company
(Hosoda, 2018).
Globalisation: Body shop operates in more than 10 countries. So it become challenges
for the company to understand the different societal concern and the environment were they are
operating. So globalisation becomes a major concern and company need to hire the economist
who can learn the nature and surrounding of different nations and tell them the strategy that can
be applied so that effective CSR and Sustainability practices can be implemented.
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Forming budget: The next challenge that is faced by Body shop is forming the budget.
For the company initialling the budget for the activity is getting difficult because they need to
prepare budget according to the nation environmental and societal law. So developing an
accurate budget so that capital can be invested in right quantity is the problem for the company
(Nave and Ferreira, 2019).
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RESERACH METHODOLOGY
Research methodology can be defined as a systematic al process that uses various
methods to collect, analysis and interpreted the desirable data. This method I used so that aim
and objective can be achieved in effective and efficient manner. Through this data transparency
and reliability off data can be maintained. Quantitative and qualitative are two type of research
methodology. Quantitative research methodology is that research where data is collected in form
of numbers, graphs and statistics. This type of methodology is used when the researcher want to
test the theories or the assumptions whereas Qualitative methodology is used when the data is in
the form of words. This type of researcher methodology is used by the investigator when they
want to understand the thoughts and expression. In the current report the methodology that is
selected by the research will be Quantitative methodology (Kumar, 2018).
Research philosophy: It is a set of belief about the manner in which data is to be
gathered. There are three branches of research philosophy that is Positivism, Interpretivism and
Realism. Under positivism research the investigator try to gain the factual knowledge. This type
of philosophies depends upon the quantitative data so that statistical analyse can be made.
Interpretivism philosophy is defined as where data are interpreted on the basis of human
perception. In this investigator try to make social relationship with the respondent and is used
when information is in qualitative nature. The last type of philosophy that is realism is based on
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the assumption made by the human. In the current research report the type of philosophy that is
used by the researcher is Positivism because the investigator want factual information in the form
of numbers (Snyder, 2019).
Research Approach: In this time framework it suggest the appropriate approach that can
be used to analyse information. Deductive and inductive are the two types of research approach.
Deductive approach is used when there is an existing theory or hypotheses that is needed to be
test and inductive is used when the investigator want to develop a new hypothesis or theory so
that proper analysis can be made. In the current topic the type of approach that will be selected
by the researcher will be deductive because the topic has existing literature review which they
want to test.
Research design: It is an arrangement of gathered data so that cause and effect
relationship can be made between the variables. They are divided into three that is Descriptive,
Experimental and Exploratory. In the current topic Descriptive design will be selected because I
will give a detail insight about the numerical information that is collected (Novikov and
Novikov, 2019).
Research choice: It can be defined as a method which choose the type of information
that is needed to be gathered so that aim and objective can be achieved in effective and efficient
manner. There are three type of choices that can be made such as Mono method, Mixed method
and Multi method. Mono method is used when either quantitative or qualitative data is to be
gathered, Mixed is used when to or more quantitative or qualitative data is to be collected and
Multi method is used when information is of wider choice. In the Current report the investigator
will select the Mono method because the type of data that is gathered is of Quantitative nature.
Research strategy: Survey, experimental, action research,observation are some type of
strategy that can be used by the investigator to collect data. In the current report Survey strategy
is used because the information that is collected in based on numbers and cover large respondent
to gather data (Bairagi and Munot, 2019).
Time horizon: It refers to the time that is needed to complete the investigation. Cross
sectional and longitudinal are two type of time horizon. Foremost is used when data is collected
at single point of time and later is used when information is to be used multiple time. In the
current report cross sectional time horizon is used because data is to be collected by survey and
will help to complete the report on time.
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Data collection and techniques: It is a technique that is used to collect the data. There
are two sources of data collection that is primary and secondary. Primary source means that
information is gathered first time and is not used before ans secondary data the name itself same
second hand data. This type of data is used multiple time. Tin the current research primary
sources of data collection will be used. The technique to collect primary data will be
Questionnaire. The Questionnaire will be filled by the Managers of Body shop (Coombes and
Ryder, 2019).
Sampling: Sampling is the technique which is used to select the respondent from the
whole population. There are two type of sampling techniques that is Probability and non
probability. In probability each respondent get an fair chance to get selected and non probability
audience does not get fair opportunity to get select. In the current report probability sampling
will be selected in which random sampling will be used to choose the audience. The sample size
will be 30 respondent and are the mangers of Body shop.
Ethical consideration: Research ethical means obeying the ethic and norms for
collecting and analysing the data. They should not harm any person or culture while gathering
the data. Some of the ethics that are to be followed is integrity, confidentiality, trust,
transparency (Säfsten and Gustavsson, 2020).
Budget: For this research the investigator will spend £150 for collecting primary data.
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