Mary Kate’s Consumption Storymap

Inspired by his childhood in Provence, the 23-year-old Olivier Baussan decided to create a company that would celebrate the tradition of Mediterranean well-being. In 1976, the company started small, as he began distilling Rosemary essential oil to sell in Provence’s local markets. The company recently celebrated its 40^th anniversary and now holds stores in 90 countries across the world, ships worldwide, and is a multi-billion dollar corporation. The company prides itself upon Authenticity, sensoriallty, and respect to the planet, their employees, and the consumers.  Although the company boasts authentic, traceable, natural ingredients, and the fair treatment of workers, as they have expanded to become extremely globalized and source the entirety of their supply of shea butter from female farmers in Western Africa I wanted to investigate the merit of these claims. In this presentation I will be looking at the spatial bridging of place and product, the selling/marketing of place, globalization, uneven development, aid to Africa, and the tyranny of the single site.

For information on what I found visit my storymap!