The idea of being more than a beauty retailer was always in Jo [Horgan, Founder, MECCA]’s psyche. She often talks about how the first decade was about keeping the lights on and becoming financially sustainable. Once that was achieved, her attention turned outward to the community. From the beginning, Jo’s giving thesis was about elevating and empowering women and girls. In 2017, the first goal was to support 10,000 girls through secondary school by the end of 2022, to coincide with MECCA’s 25th anniversary. We partnered with Skyline Education Foundation, CAMFED in sub-Saharan Africa, and the Stars Foundation in Australia, which supports Indigenous girls - and we reached that goal 12 months ahead of schedule. 

That’s when I became involved, to help the company explore what bigger, bolder and more disruptive philanthropy could look like. We realised we needed a broader approach - a philanthropic model that mirrored what MECCA does for beauty: offering a broad range of products for people to look and feel their best. So, we curated a group of not-for-profits and social impact entrepreneurs tackling gender equality in different ways, but with a shared leadership ethos. We wanted to apply MECCA’s business principles of treating our brands with the same care as our customers to philanthropy. That’s why we fund in an untied or unrestricted way and work from a place of being partners, not simply funders. We don’t want to overburden organisations with reporting; instead, we focus on trust, shared goals and long-term vision. Over the past three years, our philanthropy has shifted from something small and bolted on, to becoming central to our purpose, vision and cadence as a business. 

With our not-for-profit partners, we acknowledge that each organisation has its own agenda, strategy and way of operating, but we are also building a sense of community and collective. Each year we host a Learning Lab, bringing together internal experts and external speakers to learn alongside our partners and build shared context. We’ve also adopted a CEO-forum-style model, running small peer-to-peer groups with external facilitators. These sessions create space for leaders to build trusted relationships, navigate complex challenges, and support one another. They’ve generated deeper collaboration, collective inspiration, and valuable insight that helps guide where we focus our support.

Internally, we actively engage our teams through initiatives like brown-bag lunches and buddying team members with partner organisations to help in different areas. As a result, engagement with M-POWER has grown steadily across the business. One of the most powerful decisions we made was to make what had been a philanthropic ambition – to play a role in driving towards gender equality - central to the business, not separate from it. We have 8,000 team members - 95% are women - and in early 2025 we articulated a new purpose: to embolden through beauty. We’ve seen how beauty can be an agent for equality through representation, self-expression, and breaking down harmful gender norms. The goal is that people come to work each day feeling like they’re part of meaningful change - and that’s been critical to embedding this work at the heart of MECCA.

We donate $5 million a year and, over the past three years, have supported more than 20 organisations. Because we’re an unrestricted funder, we judge success by the success of the organisations themselves - and the impact is clear. A good example is two of our partners: The Man Cave has now reached around 100,000 boys nationwide and is working directly with government on positive masculinity, while The Flourish Journey has reached more than 20,000 girls and is now part of a powerful ecosystem of youth mental health organisations. 

Looking ahead, we’re working with a new data and insights platform to help us better measure our impact and we’ve refined our giving pillars around education, health and wellbeing, and arts and culture - areas where our team and customers feel the strongest alignment. That creates exciting opportunities to go deeper, bigger and bolder with the work we support.

When you get a group of people genuinely excited about doing things differently, it’s extraordinary. Alignment really matters. A great example is the ResourceFULL Collective, formed between the IWDA - an MPOWER partner - and different Pacific organisations that have joined forces and are now co-hosts of the Women Deliver Summit. These groups come from different countries and contexts, but they share a deep alignment around climate, collaboration and having their voices heard.

One key watch-out is ensuring collectives don’t get stuck in the problem, especially when the issues are heavy, and people want to share their experiences. You have to be mindful of moving the conversation forward with an action orientation - clear outcomes, tangible next steps. 

We’ve recently announced a partnership with Co-Impact, alongside a $10 million commitment. Their model takes on hard problems from the very kernel, approaches them in a disruptive and thoughtful way, and commits for the long term alongside extraordinary women leaders around the world. It’s deeply aligned, and we’re excited about what’s ahead. 

Our ambition is what in MECCA speak is a ‘triple bullseye’ in that it achieves multiple objectives: advancing gender equality through the work itself and our partnerships; engaging our team so they feel part of the movement; and using our brand and platform to spark awareness, belonging and action among our customers and partners. After three years of M-POWER, purpose is now emerging as one of the top three reasons people choose to work at MECCA, and one in three Australian women associate the brand with driving positive change for women and girls. We still have a long way to go - but using our brand as a force for good is a role we’re proud to play.