The Body Shop reply

Well, after a few days the Body Shop did reply (reinstilling my faith in customer care).
Some excerpts:
We would like to reassure our customers that The Body Shop takes the safety of the products it sells very seriously. All formulations developed for The Body Shop are subject to careful evaluation by independent external safety assessors. In fact, The Body Shop has already voluntarily restricted its use of certain preservatives because of concerns about their possible skin sensitisation effects and because of its stance on animal testing.

...we have a responsible approach to the use of chemicals in our products. We proactively assess the chemicals we use against criteria of health and safety, environmental impact and our Against Animal Testing policy. As a result, we prohibit the use of a range of common chemicals in our products.

Although the markets that sell our products make the decision of setting the price, we believe that the excellent quality of the products and the Community Trade programme that sources high grade ingredients from all over the world is set at a fair and reasonable price.

We do encourage all our customers to try the products in-store before making a purchase. Moreover, our trained staff is always on hand to demonstrate the product usage and answer any questions that you may have.

Due to the different skin characteristics of the skin on different parts of the body, The Body Shop has actually developed different product categories to cater to the relevant needs of the different parts of the body. For example, the Bath & Body category, which is meant to be used for the body has ranges for different skin types (eg. normal or dry skin) and different products within the range such as shower gels, body lotions and body butters. These products can be used all over the body depending on skin type or need. They are not recommended for use on the face as the skin on the face is actually thinner than the skin on the rest of the body, thus having
a different set of needs.

Although we do try to include as much relevant information as possible on the product packaging, sometimes the ingredient information, which is a legal requirement, takes up much of the copy space. However, if you ever have any questions about product usage or anything else about the product, please do feel free to approach any of our friendly store staff or write in
to us again.

So, if I go by their mail, I am supposed to try the shower gel in the store, use a separate range for my thin face skin and just continue to be their valuable customer. Amazing how I develop a thick skin for other soaps in the market.. which don't even promise to moisturise.