L’Oréal broke two of three climate promises. The fine: €3 million. Its profit: €6 billion
In 2022 the world’s biggest beauty company made three climate promises, with a fine if it broke them. It broke two. It paid the fine, about €3 million, and almost nobody noticed.
€3m finepaid for missing two of three climate promises. L’Oréal’s profit in 2025: about €6 billion
- Gathering
- Building
- Breaking
The promise in five steps · E · environment and climate
- 1The goalCut the carbon behind every product sold by 14%, run its own sites on renewable energy with almost no leaked gas, and make half its plastic packaging recycled or plant-based.
- 2The timeBy 31 December 2025, against 2021; written into a loan repaid in June 2026.
- 3The conditionsMost of the carbon sits with suppliers and transport firms it does not control, and the mix of products it sells shifts with fashion.
- 4The resultsPlastic packaging 50.14% (met). Sites 96% under the bond’s count (missed: leaking cooling gas at six sites broke the limit). Carbon per product −5%, or −10% on L’Oréal’s comparable count (missed).
- 5The explanationL’Oréal: a different product mix, and suppliers and transport firms cutting too slowly. My reading: its own factories moved fast, the value chain did not, and the fine was too small to force it.
How I read every sustainability report: goal, time, conditions, results, explanation.
Today’s hidden heroHero rating · Ahead
AkzoNobel says it halved the carbon from its own factories, four years early
In 2020 the Dutch paint maker promised to halve the carbon from its own operations by 2030, against 2018. In July 2026 it announced it had done it, four years early, mostly by switching 92 sites to renewable power.
Provisional: the last audited figure is 47%, and the bigger half, the carbon in what it buys and sells, is far behind.
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