On the occasion of National Youth Day on 12 January, and a chilly day during the winter, a few lines that someone sent me a while back, felt like a perfect fit for this story – “Your life lies ahead of you like a sheet of driven snow. Be careful how you tread on it, for every step will show.” We, youngsters, know so well that our steps are going to show, our actions are going to be in the limelight and we’re going to be watched. And truly speaking, we genuinely want to put up a good show.

But the question is, will we, the young, be given the opportunity to prove ourselves, voice our opinions and be made sure that we are heard? That only time will tell. But for now, beauty brand which stepped into India in 2006, The Body Shop and the Young India Foundation (YIF) are doing their bit tirelessly by getting on with the #Why25 program to drive greater youth participation and representation in public life.

The Body Shop India and YIF marked National Youth Day in an impactful manner with an event on 10 January celebrating young changemakers from various walks of public life.

Starting in 2022, the #Why25 program is a comprehensive, non-partisan social impact effort aimed at creating long-term changes to make public decision-making and participation more inclusive of the young people of India via three main goals:

·         Raising 2.5 million Signatures for the Why25 petition: Through the Why25 petition, The Body Shop and YIF are calling upon policymakers to lower the age of candidacy in the Lok Sabha/Lower House of Parliament from the current 25 years to 21 years of age. The present age barrier is one of the key obstacles to youth participation in public representation at the highest levels of policy-making. The petition aims to drive awareness as well as mobilize non-partisan public opinion on this pressing issue. So far, 250,000 signatures have been raised in support of the petition indicating immense public support for the cause.

·         Adding 25 million young voters to voter rolls by 2024: The Body Shop and YIF are engaging with young voters to drive youth voter awareness by conducting Youth Voter engagements across urban and rural centres between 2023-24. The festivals and workshops will serve as venues to register and re-register young voters enabling participation in the electoral process by 2024. So far, over 1000 young voters have been registered with significant scale up planned by engaging with universities and campuses across the nation.

·         Supporting 25 youth-led development projects at grassroots levels by 2025: 25 Community projects will be supported by the Why25 program, empowering young changemakers working on community impact projects in environmental and social justice at panchayat or municipality levels to create real, on-ground change. The support for youth-led community projects is planned for 2023-2025.

The event took off with a panel discussion with significant young personalities with change-making voices. The panellists included the Young India Foundation (YIF) founder Sudhanshu Kaushik (27 years); sarpanch of a village in Maharashtra Yashodhara Shinde (21 years); Miss India finalist who ran for Zila Parishad elections in Jaunpur (UP) Diksha Singh (24 years), and YIF program manager Shefali Gupta (26 years), each speaker shared their inspiring journey of taking action towards the change they want to see in the country.

Indiantelevision.com in a confab with The Body Shop, vice president of marketing e-commerce & product South Asia Harmeet Singh discusses the Why25 campaign, the brand’s causevertising agenda and more.

Edited excerpts:

On the idea and thought behind the Why25 program

So going back to last year in 2020, you know, The Body Shop International and The Body Shop world over - they are always a very forward brand when it comes to doing campaigns. And campaigns are always focused on doing good for people and communities, whether it has an environmental impact, or whether it has a social impact, but something which resolves some issues. So that's what The Body Shop would actually look forward to and would strive upon.

The Why25 campaign is actually focused on the younger people, that they should come forward and have their voice and which is not like a temporary voice, where they talk and it's been missed by many people. The Why25 campaign is actually for changing policies in the parliament. And these policies will actually determine the future generations so that they have a much better world, a much better environment, and more equitable generations where there is no differentiation between men and women. And, of course, to have better social policies where people are really happy for a better future and they have a happy future.

And we did The Body Shop Global Youth Survey. And this was last year, and those survey results were that almost 86 per cent of Indian young people said that they are very keen to make a positive impact on society and on the living standards of the people in India because that's where they come from. They're like, “We want to have a better world, and how to make it better?” The obstacle was and the obstacle is still there - they don't know how to do it, like where to start and how to bring forward this positive change.

Also, the survey results show that India, as everybody knows, India's population is very young population. So, almost plus 50 per cent of people are under the age of 30. And for that very reason, a lot of focus is on India and the Indian economy. It is a growing economy and growing at a rate which nobody is able to compete with right now. So we have a great advantage, I would say, that we have the young generation with us, and all these youngsters are just looking to do something, which helps them and also helps others. So then we, at The Body Shop, identified this particular need about the younger generation, and how do we help these young people come forward. We started doing our homework, The Body Shop India, and we wanted to identify the right partners, because always what we have done as a brand as a company, we have partnered with the right non-profit organization. We have gone forward to spread the message and awareness more, I would say in a more structured manner.

So we've done some past campaigns. We did period shame – We did that with CRY. We are still working on plastic recycling – we’re working with Plastics For Change (PFC). We have also done many more campaigns in the past where we've had very credible partners who are already working in certain areas for many years and they bring about the impact that we are looking for.

So, the Why25 campaign is a campaign where we wanted to address young people. We identified the Young India Foundation (YIF) which was already working in this area since 2017. And their objective and our objective kind of just matched and we could shake hands and say let's do it together, and let's make this impact that you have a platform where the brand voice is there as we have been around since 16 to 18 years here in India. We have extremely loyal customers, customers who understand The Body Shop.   They understand that The Body Shop is not only about the products, profits and commercial advertising, we are all about doing something good for the community. As small as cleaning up the streets or the waste, the beaches in Mumbai, and even the plastics.

So, we take up from the smallest to the biggest work, I would say, for people so that they are happier, and they have a healthier, happier, and more beautiful life. Yeah. So we identified YIF, and we launched a campaign along with them just last year in September 2022 – wherein we are going to set some goals with them.

On the goals chalked out for the Why25 program

There are three primary goals which we've set with this amazing nonprofit organization. The first goal is that we need to have a petition which we want to present to the policymakers. And we want this petition to have 2.5 million signatures wherein we want them to understand and take us very seriously about the petition that the young people should be represented in the parliament, and you should hear out what they have to say and should take it seriously. Because these are the people who have a vision, a voice, and who can also think very fresh, and good for society. So the parliament is all about how we can make India better. So, our first objective is to have these 2.5 million signatures and have the petition ready.

Second, is that we want to have 25 million young people to be registered as voters. We have come to know through our survey that there are a lot of young people who don't have a voting identity. If you haven't voted, you probably would not know the importance of your vote. It’s about carving the future and having a better future and better life for the coming generations. It is the responsibility of every citizen, especially when you're already aware that one vote makes a difference. We want 25 million young voter registrations to happen. This is why the YIF and The Body Shop are working together. We are doing a lot of workshops and engagements with young people.

Workshops are happening in colleges, universities, and different parts of the country – both, urban and rural. We’re having it in Bombay, Delhi - we already did some universities in Delhi in the month of December. We've collected signatures over there, and have also enrolled people in the voters’ registration list. So, 1000 plus people have already been enrolled in the month of December. And we've already done about 2.5 lakh signatures till now on the petition, but, it's a long way to go.

But we have a lot planned for 2023 starting from January. So we're targeting about five to 10 institutions every month. We want to reach out to these young people who are 18 to 25 years old, and they should be aware of the Why25 campaign, their voting rights - their voice, you know, in the parliament, it can be heard, it can be something we could change in the future. Voting and getting representation in politics is such a big thing.

So as we know that the parliament allows young people over 25 years to enroll, so as petitioners we want the parliament to lower the candidacy age to 21 years - a 21-year-old today is very well aware of his/her duties, and responsibilities.

So we are reaching out pan India- both, urban and rural areas. The Body Shop is very committed. We want to do this across India and spread the awareness and the message as much as we can.

Our aim is to go maximum, wherever we can. And along with the young volunteers of the Young India Foundation, they're helping us. You just met two women who are from different walks of life. So, they both are helping us, in fact, 52 volunteers in the YIF would help us travel to workshops, and achieve that goal.

And the third very main objective is we want to support 25 projects, which are led by young people who are working towards a better society.

At The Body Shop, we always have part of our sales that always goes to campaigning and we support nonprofit organisations. It does include some commercials on our part. Right, right. And you're right about supporting these 25 projects, and YIF is very happy that they're getting support from our beauty brand. Because, you know, we're the only beauty brand who can talk the walk exactly - it's basically we would say it, but it would do it to do it also. So that's what we're doing.

These projects are starting from March onwards this year. So we've already identified a few projects led by young people. And we will be going ahead and supporting them, you will already probably get to know about it in March. Although we would like to announce these projects right now, we are not in a position to give details. These 25 projects are what we want to do till next year. It just started in 2022 and will be spread over till 2024. And these are all long-term projects – you can’t do things in six months.

On The Body Shop associating with social issues and taking up causevertising, beyond commercial advertising

It's a great point that you highlighted – About The Body Shop, you must have not seen much commercial advertising

The latest Edelweiss campaign has Sanya Malhotra in it - that is essentially digital-led.

Being in India, a country where people are very influenced, I would say by Bollywood and cricket. We adopted the route where we wanted a very strong influential brand ambassador on our boat so Sanya Malhotra is a recent one we have worked with, before which Shraddha Kapoor and others. But this is a little investment so that our beauty products, which are great products, we are able to demonstrate and of course, it's a good voice where we want to let people know about our products and reach out to that segment.

So that is one way where Edelweiss sales are done. But we have not been doing any major ads, or ad campaigns. The reason for that is that the DNA of The Body Shop is back in 1967 when it was launched by a woman called Anita Roddick - and she believed in the brand and that people should know the brand - love it and come to me. The whole thing was that we don't want to advertise a brand for people to come in and shop with us. It was mainly that The Body Shop has been built on the trust of people, word of mouth and credibility. So that's where the brand comes from.

I am so happy to be a part of the brand since 2006. Because that's when I got to understand the brand value, you know that what the brand demonstrates, it really touches a person. So I don’t feel that I’ve been working for a brand to have a salary, but I'm working for a brand where this brand is extending its services and support to make lives of the community at large.

So for me, in a very easy way to explain this is that - I think I'm being a social worker. Yeah, it's more like social work. And so that is something which I think people who work with The Body Shop team know that they are not only working to get a monthly salary, or to get more sales for the brand, but they're working for a social cause.

So because Body Shop has always believed in doing and identifying social causes and working for them.

On taking up causevertising since the brand stepped in India in 2006

Oh, yes, absolutely. We have done lots of campaigns on issues like sex trafficking, animal testing, children etc.

Very recently we did a very nice campaign post-covid - this was called Light a Little Life, which was around Diwali in 2021. We did that with Miracle Foundation and where we supported the kids who lost their parents in the COVID situation. I would say it's very close to my heart also because of the testing times that we have seen with covid. And what more a brand could do than reach out to them and support them in the way we can?

So we at The Body Shop, at the beginning of the year, think about what the pressing need of society is. What is the pressing need to make this society better? Make people feel better and communities feel supported. That's when we felt it was about covid when we knew this was our result and we went ahead and we took some action.