Sustainable Beauty

“CSR for Dummies” is an Earth911.com series highlighting the different pledges and commitments made by companies in regards to product stewardship and recycling. Companies and services featured do not pay for placement and are not endorsed by Earth911.com.

With the addition of new EU laws that control the use of toxic chemicals in products, the beauty industry throughout the EU has been forced to take a hard look in the mirror. With this in mind,  L’Oreal’s 2007 CSR report brought many new initiatives to the table to help clean up their output, as well as create a quality product. 

History & Today

• L’Oreal was founded by a french chemist who developed a special hair dye in 1907.
• Today, they are one of the largest global cosmetics companies.
• Their current management team is 54 percent female.
• They audit their suppliers for fair labor practices as well as many other areas of corporate social responsibility.

Achievements

A  few highlights from L’Oreal’s 2007 achievements include:

• Reduced energy per unit of finished product by four percent on last year
• Reduced water consumption in factories by 6.8 percent per unit of finished product and overall by two percent
• Reduced carbon dioxide (CO₂₎ emissions by five percent from 2005 levels
• Reduced total sulphur dioxide (SO₂) emissions last year by 21.5 percent
• Reduced total emissions of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) by 1.1 percent
• Reduced waste per unit of finished product by 9.7 percent from 2005 levels, exceeding the company’s five percent target
• Increased the proportion of factories and warehouses sending zero waste-to-landfill from 44 percent to 54 percent
• Increased the proportion of waste recovered, reused or recycled from 91.2 percent in 2006 to 94.9 percent in 2007

The Plan

The cosmetics industry has a low profile on the environmental front compared to industries like energy or oil. For a company like L’Oreal, the challenge is to maintain health and safety, for both of workers and customers. The company’s goals for 2008 (compared to 2007) in those areas:

• Reduce energy use by five percent per finished product
• Reduce total CO₂ emissions by two percent
• Reduce factory water use by three percent per finished product
• Reduce waste by five percent (excluding returnable packaging)
• All paper and paperboard used in packaging to originate from sustainably managed forests (ideally Forest Stewardship Council certified) by the end of 2008