Award-winning luxury skincare retailer L’Occitane gets green tick for first global Green Store

An eco-friendly Sydney retail store known for its natural skincare, body and home products has been awarded a five-star Green Store certificate for its first-ever global green store.

French retailer L’Occitane’s Green Store at Westfield Bondi Junction has been operating for less than a year, but the store has already been recognised for its commitment to a more sustainable and greener future for the beauty and retail industries. 

The store was awarded the Green Building Council of Australia’s (GBCA) 5 Star — Green Star Certified Rating for Interiors, which represents Australian excellence in environmentally sustainable building practices.

The design of L’Occitane’s Green Store is highly intentional in both functionality and aesthetics, and includes a refill fountain that allows shoppers to refill their empty and reusable product bottles to help repeat customers reduce their plastic consumption.

L’Occitane states on its website that its eco-refill range, which allows customers to get involved by refilling and reusing products, has amounted to less plastic and packaging of up to 60-90%.

Photo by James Griffin of Edgeline Photography.

Cosmetic waste has become a huge problem for Australians, and globally, with Zero Waste Week confirming that in 2018 alone more than 120 billion units of cosmetics packaging were produced globally.

The L’Occitane store also has a green wall with a fully integrated irrigation system that will act as a natural air filter and an Icebreaker sink created with recycled L’Occitane bottles from its TerraCycle program.

L’Occitane general manager of Australia, Pierre-Emmanuel Joffre, said the team is proud of its achievement. 

“To achieve this accolade, L’Occitane’s first ever Green Store globally was developed with sustainability at the forefront — from demolition and construction through to styling. Features such as the Green Wall, which acts as a natural air filter, and the Refill Fountain, which encourages the reuse of packaging to reduce waste, all contribute to this 5-star rating,” he said in a statement.

“From inception, it has been L’Occitane’s intention to reduce our impact on earth and seek sustainable alternatives to lead the way across both the beauty and retail sectors. This certification is an example of the incredible work and countless hours dedicated to making an impact on reducing L’Occitane’s footprint and being cultivators of change.”

Davina Rooney, CEO of the Green Building Council of Australia, congratulated L’Occitane on achieving a milestone that “represents Australian excellence, demonstrates how Green Star can be taken to retail and sets a benchmark for other Australian retailers to follow”.

All the building materials used for the Green Store are supported by credible environmental certifications, including Programme for the Endorsement of Forest, the Green Building Council of Australia’s Green Tag and Good Environmental Choice Australia.