John Bird:
John Bird was born in a Notting Hill slum to a poor London Irish family. He became homeless at the age of five and lived in an orphanage from the ages of 7-10; he was often excluded from school. After leaving the orphanage, he became a butchers boy and supplemented his income from stealing. Between work, he spent time in prison during his teens-20s; here, he learnt how to read and write. Bird attended Chelsea school of art, but became homeless again by 1967 and began sleeping rough in Edinburgh while being sought after by the police for petty offences. During the early 70s he built upon his prison education and set up a small scale printing and publishing business in London. Additionally, for two weeks in 1970 he worked as a dishwasher in the Houses of Parliament canteen.
He launched The Big Issue in September 1991. Currently he is on the Board of Directors for The Big Issue Group, which incorporates The Big Issue, Big Issue Invest (its social investment arm) and The Big Issue Foundation.
The Big Issue magazine started as a London venture but expanded with specific editions and services to other British cities, and then to other countries. John Bird is also the founder of the International Network of Street Papers, which incorporates over 100 street papers, and is published in 34 countries in 24 languages.
In 2001, with The Big Issue Group chairman, Nigel Kershaw OBE, Bird founded Big Issue Invest which is a provider of finance for businesses, charities amongst others with the aim of creating positive social change.
In 2007, Bird announced his intention to stand for election to the post of Mayor of London as an independent candidate. However later that year Bird announced that he had decided not to stand and was instead going to launch a movement. In November 2016, Bird suggested that he had been asked to stand as the Conservative Party candidate in 2007 - in place of the eventual winner and later Prime Minister Boris Johnson - but turned the offer down.
Bird was a Social Enterprise Ambassador, a scheme run by the Social Enterprise Coalition to promote awareness of social enterprise. The programme was supported by a part of the UK Government Cabinet Office, and ran between 2007 and 2010.
Bird revealed in 2010 that "my secret is that I'm really a working class Tory.... I'd love to be a liberal because they're the nice people, but it's really hard work. I can't swallow their gullibility and I think their ideas are stupid.... I know this will destroy my reputation among middle-class liberals.... Wearing the corsetry of liberalism means that every now and then you have to take it off." He has since stated that he has "been hurt by the left, and helped by the left. Just like I've been helped by the right and hurt by the right."
The Body Shop and Anita Roddick:
Dame Anita Lucia Roddick was a British businesswoman, human rights activist and environmental campaigner, best known as the founder of The Body Shop (now The Body Shop International Limited, a cosmetics company producing and retailing natural beauty products which shaped ethical consumerism.) The company was one of the first to prohibit the use of ingredients tested on animals in some of its products and one of the first to promote fair trade with developing countries. She believed that business should offer a form of moral leadership, being a more powerful force in society than religion or government.
Roddick opened the first Body Shop in 1976, with the aim of earning an income for herself and her two daughters while her husband was away in South America. She wanted to provide quality skincare products in refillable containers and sample sizes, all marketed with truth rather than hype. Six months later, she opened her second shop. On her husband's return, he joined the business. By 2004, the Body Shop had 1980 stores, serving more than 77 million customers throughout the world. It was voted the second most-trusted brand in the United Kingdom, and 28th top brand in the world. On 17 March 2006, L'Oréal purchased Body Shop for £652 million. Some controversy and criticism was raised, as L'Oréal was known to use animal testing and the company was part-owned by Nestlé. The latter had been criticised for its treatment of third-world producers.
In 1990 Roddick founded Children on the Edge (COTE), in response to her visits to Romanian orphanages. She created COTE to help manage the crisis of poor conditions in the overcrowded orphanages and worked to de-institutionalise the children over the course of
their early life. COTE's mission is to help disadvantaged children affected by
conflicts, natural disasters, disabilities, and HIV/AIDS. After her death in 2007, her husband, Gordon Roddick, founded 38 Degrees in her memory. He said, "I knew what would make Anita really laugh would be to cause a lot of trouble. Roddick died of acute brain haemorrhage at about 6:30pm on 10 September 2007. As promised earlier, she left her estate to charities rather than to her family and friends. When details of her estate were published, it was disclosed that she had donated all of her £51 million fortune upon her death.
The Body Shops ideologies align with those of the Big Issue as they both aim to help people in need and strive for social change. John Bird met up with Gordon Roddick and his wife Anita, who helped him found the Big Issue in 1991 after meeting a homeless man selling magazines in New York. The magazine was launched to help people help themselves.
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