Unilever
Unilever PLC is a British multinational fast-moving consumer goods company founded on 2 September 1929 following the merger of British soap maker Lever Brothers and Dutch margarine producer Margarine Unie. It is headquartered in London.
Company type
2 September 1929
Worldwide
- Nils Andersen (chair)
- Hein Schumacher (CEO)
- Graeme Pitkethly (CFO)
-
- Foods
- Condiments
- Ice cream
- Energy drinks
- Wellbeing vitamins
- Minerals and supplements
- Tea
- Instant coffee
- Baby food
- Pharmaceutical and consumer healthcare products
- Breakfast cereals
- Cleaning agents
- Water and air purifiers
- Pet food
- Toothpaste
- Bottled water
- Soft drinks
- Beauty products
- Personal care
See list of brands
€59.604 billion (2023)[1]
€9.758 billion (2023)[1]
€7.140 billion (2023)[1]
€75.266 billion (2023)[1]
€20.764 billion (2023)[1]
127,000 (2024)[2]
Unilever products include baby food, beauty products, bottled water, breakfast cereals, cleaning agents, condiments, energy drinks, healthcare and hygiene products, ice cream, instant coffee, pet food, pharmaceuticals, soft drinks, tea, and toothpaste. It is the largest producer of soap in the world,[3] and its products are available in over 190 countries.[4]
Unilever's largest brands include Axe (Lynx), Ben & Jerry's, Dove, Hellmann's, Knorr, Lifebuoy, Lux, Magnum, Omo (Persil), Rexona, Sunlight, Sunsilk, and Wall's (Heartbrand).[4] The company is organised into five business groups: Beauty & Wellbeing, Personal Care, Home Care, Nutrition, and Ice Cream. It has research and development facilities in China, India, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States.[5]
In the 1930s, Unilever acquired the United Africa Company. During the second half of the 20th century, the company increasingly diversified from being a maker of products made of oils and fats, and expanded its operations worldwide. It has made numerous corporate acquisitions, including Lipton (1971), Brooke Bond (1984), Pond's (1987), Hellmann's (2000), Ben & Jerry's (2000), SlimFast (2000), Knorr (2000), Alberto-Culver (2010), Dollar Shave Club (2016), and Pukka Herbs (2017). Unilever divested its speciality chemicals businesses to Imperial Chemical Industries in 1997. In the 2010s, under the leadership of Paul Polman, the company gradually shifted its focus towards health and beauty brands and away from food brands that showed slow growth.[6]
Unilever has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange and a secondary listing on the Euronext Amsterdam, and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index and the AEX index.
Unilever R&D Centre in Bangalore, India
Unilever R&D Centre in Colworth, United Kingdom
Unilever-Haus in Hamburg, Germany
Environmental record
Mercury contamination
In 2001, a mercury thermometer factory operated by the Indian subsidiary of Unilever in the South Indian hilltown of Kodaikanal was shut down by state regulators after the company was caught dumping toxic mercury wastes in a densely populated part of town.[132] By the company's own admissions, more than 2 tonnes of mercury were discharged into Kodaikanal's environment. A 2011 Government of India study on workers' health concluded that many workers suffered from illnesses caused by workplace exposure to mercury.[133] The scandal opened up a series of issues in India such as corporate liability, corporate accountability and corporate negligence.[133]
In March 2016, Unilever reached an out of court settlement (for an undisclosed amount) with 591 ex-workers of the unit who had sued the company for knowingly exposing them to the toxic element.[134]
Palm oil
In 2014, Unilever was criticised by Greenpeace for causing deforestation.[135] In 2008, Greenpeace UK[136] criticised the company for buying palm oil from suppliers that were damaging Indonesia's rainforests.[137] By 2008, Indonesia was losing 2% of its remaining rainforest each year, having the fastest deforestation rate of any country. The United Nations Environmental Programme stated that palm oil plantations are the leading cause of deforestation in Indonesia.[137]
Furthermore, Indonesia was the 14th[138] largest emitter of greenhouse gases, largely due to the destruction of rainforests for the palm oil industry, which contributed to 4% of global green house gas emissions.[139] According to Greenpeace, palm oil expansion was taking place with little oversight from central or local government as procedures for environmental impact assessment, land-use planning and ensuring a proper process for development of concessions were neglected.[139] Plantations that were off-limits, by law, for palm oil plantations were being established as well as the illegal use of fire to clear forest areas was commonplace.[139]
Unilever, as a founding member of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), responded by publicising its plan to obtain all of its palm oil from sources that are certified as sustainable by 2015.[140] It claims to have met this goal in 2012 and is encouraging the rest of the industry to become 100% sustainable by 2020.[141]
In Côte d'Ivoire, one of Unilever's palm oil suppliers was accused of clearing forest for plantations, an activity that threatened a primate species, Miss Waldron's red colobus. Unilever intervened to halt the clearances pending the results of an environmental assessment.[142]
According to an Amnesty International report published in 2016, Unilever's palm oil supplier Wilmar International profited from child labour and forced labour. Some workers were extorted, threatened or not paid for work. Some workers suffered severe injuries from banned chemicals. In 2016 Singapore-based Wilmar International was the world's biggest palm oil grower.[143]
Plastic pollution
In 2019, Unilever was cited by BreakFreeFromPlastic as one of the top ten global plastic polluters.[144] Unilever produces 6.4 billion unrecyclable plastic sachets per year.[145][146]
Nevertheless, in 2019, Unilever announced that it plans to halve its non-recycled plastic packaging by 2025.[147][148] In 2020, Unilever joined 13 EU member states and more than 60 companies to sign a pact to use recycled plastic for all plastic packaging and single-use plastic products by 2025.[149]
In June 2022, a Reuters report revealed that Unilever had lobbied the governments of India and the Philippines to stop legislation which would ban the sale of cosmetics in single-use plastic sachets, despite vowing in 2020 to stop using them.[150] The design of these sachets had been called 'evil' by Hanneke Faber, Unilever's president for Global Food and Refreshments, 'because you cannot recycle it'. The bans were then dropped by lawmakers. In Sri Lanka, the company pressed the government to reconsider a proposed ban on sachets, and then tried to manoeuvre around the ban after regulations were implemented.[150]
Controversies
Price-fixing
In April 2011, Unilever was fined €104 million by the European Commission for establishing a price-fixing cartel for washing powder in Europe, along with Procter & Gamble and Henkel.[168][169]
In 2016, Unilever and Procter & Gamble were both fined by Autorité de la concurrence in France for price-fixing on personal hygiene products.[170][171]
Hampton Creek lawsuit
In November 2014, Unilever filed a lawsuit against rival Hampton Creek.[172] In the suit,[173] Unilever claimed that Hampton Creek was "seizing market share" and the losses were causing Unilever "irreparable harm". Unilever used standard of identity regulations in claiming that Hampton Creek's Just Mayo products are falsely advertised because they don't contain eggs.[174] The Washington Post[175] headline on the suit read "Big Food's Weird War Over The Meaning of Mayonnaise." The Los Angeles Times[176] began its story with "Big Tobacco, Big Oil, now Big Mayo?" A Wall Street Journal writer described that "Giant corporation generates huge quantities of free advertising and brand equity for tiny rival by suing it."[177] In December 2014, Unilever dropped the claim.[178]
Pressuring media to promote skin whiteners
Kinita Shenoy, an editor of the Sri Lanka edition of Cosmopolitan, refused to promote skin whiteners for a brand of Unilever. Unilever put pressure on Shenoy and asked Cosmopolitan to fire her.[179][180]
Violence against striking workers
In 2019, security forces hired by Unilever attacked workers that were peacefully picketing at a Unilever facility in Durban in South Africa. Workers were shot at with rubber bullets and paint balls and pepper sprayed while attempting to walk to their cars parked on the premises. Four workers were seriously injured.[181]
Trade in the occupied Palestinian Territories
In July 2021, Ben & Jerry's announced plans to end sales in "Occupied Palestinian Territory", within which Israeli settlements are considered illegal under international law, while continuing sales in other parts of Israel.[182] Prior to the release of the statement, Unilever had clashed with Ben & Jerry's independent board of directors, which had not wanted to comment on the continuation of sales in other parts of Israel, as this required board approval.[183] Board chair Anuradha Mittalttal said the board had resolved to end sales in Israeli settlements in July 2020, but the CEO, Matthew McCarthy, appointed by Unilever in 2018, "never operationalized" the resolution.[183]
In June 2022, Unilever announced that it had sold its Ben & Jerry's division in Israel to American Quality Products, the company that has the exclusive license to sell Ben & Jerry's products in Israel and the Palestinian territories.[184] The sale of the division to American Quality Products allows it to continue to sell Ben & Jerry's products in Israel and the Palestinian territories.[184] Later that day, Ben & Jerry's tweeted that it disagreed with its parent company's decision and that the "arrangement means Ben & Jerry's in Israel will be owned and operated by AQP. [...] We continue to believe it is inconsistent with Ben & Jerry's values for our ice cream to be sold in the Occupied Palestinian Territory."[185][186]
Trade in Russia amid the Russo-Ukrainian War
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, many Western companies curtailed their operations in Russia.[187] Unilever have temporarily suspended all imports and exports to Russia, but its Russian wing continues to trade there.[188] Between 2021 and 2022 profits in Russia doubled to 9.2 billion rubles (€108 million) and the business paid 3.2 billion rubles (€38 million) in taxes; giving rise to criticism that the company is directly helping to fund Russia's war effort in Ukraine.[189]
In response to this, and claims that the company had broken previous promises to only sell essential items, and to cut all advertising spending in Russia, Unilever's CEO Alan Jope said: "We still believe that staying is the best option, both to prevent our company from falling directly or indirectly into Russian hands and to protect our people."[190]
In July 2023, the Ukrainian National Agency on Corruption Prevention included Unilever in the list of “war sponsors” for not ceasing operations in Russia, but continuing to profit from this market.[191] It was reported that the company paid €331 million in taxes in Russia in 2022, with a spokesperson for the Ukraine Solidarity Project saying: "Unilever is contributing hundreds of millions in tax revenues to a state which is killing civilians and funding a mercenary group about to be designated a terrorist organisation in the UK. It risks its staff and resources being mobilised into Putin’s machine. Some of the world’s biggest companies have already left Russia. It’s possible – after 16 months of war – that the time for excuses has passed."[192] In a letter to B4Ukraine, Unilever said it paid 3.8bn roubles (£33m) in tax in 2022, similar to the previous year.[193]
In July 2023, it was reported that Unilever would allow 3,000 of its Russian employees to be conscripted into the Russian army fighting in Ukraine.[194][193]
On 25 July 2023, the new CEO of Unilever, Hein Schumacher, appointed that month, told reporters that the company had considered leaving Russia or selling the business. The first option, according to him, was abandoned, fearing the nationalization of the company, as was the second, because they could not find a worthy buyer. As a result, the continuation of a limited presence in Russia was considered the lesser evil. "None of the options are actually good, but the final option of operating our business in a constrained manner is the least bad and that is where we are," he said.[195]