Unilever

Unilever is a British - Dutch company. The company is one of the largest manufacturers of consumer goods. The main business areas include the production of food, cosmetics, personal care and household and fabric care products.

Unilever employs 167,000 employees in more than 100 countries ( 1990, 304,000 ), of which 5,400 in the Federal Republic of Germany (2011) (1962 there were 36,000, in 1990 27,400, and the end of 2005 8,000 employees).

The formed in 2008 Unilever organization for the countries Germany, Austria and Switzerland (DACH) has its headquarters in Hamburg.

• 3.1 Current Group Structure
• 3.2 Locations in the German speaking 3.2.1 administration
• 3.2.2 production sites in Germany

• 4.1 Foods (Unilever Foods)
• 4.2 home and fabric care
• 4.3 Body Care

• 5.1 Environmental
• 5.2 cartels
• 5.3 racism allegations

Structure

Even if the company appears to the outside as a business, it has since the formation by merger in 1929 a double structure consisting of two equal parts company with own shares: the Dutch Unilever NV and the British Unilever PLC. There are also two general meetings, two corporate offices in Rotterdam and London, however, the board of directors of both companies - in a similar construction as the company Royal Dutch Shell - identical. Both are led by the Dutchman Paul Polman since late 2008.

Worldwide sales in 2012 were 51.3 billion euros.

History

Start-up phase ( 1888-1929 )

1888, a native of the Netherlands Oss, North Brabant margarine producer Simon van den Bergh in the Lower Rhine Kleve a company for the industrial production of margarine to avoid in this way the high protective tariffs of the German Reich on butter and margarine. His compatriot Anton Jurgens erected not far from Kleve in the neighboring town of Goch also a factory for the production of margarine. In 1927, these two family merged in Rotterdam for margarine Unie and in London for Margarine Union.

William Hesketh Lever and his brother James Darcy Lever founded 1885, the soap factory Lever Brothers, which was initially based in Warrington in the North West of England and was later moved to the Wirral peninsula, west of Liverpool. Your product was innovative because they used palm oil instead of tallow for soap making and found large sales. The brothers Lever gave him the name "Sunlight Soap" and built as a residence for the factory workers, the model village of Port Sunlight. As the German offshoot originated in 1899 in Mannheim, the Sunlicht Soap Factory Ltd., which was sold in 1914 in the wake of an impending expropriation by the then German governance and then bought back in 1924.

1929/1930 finally united Margarine Unie and Lever Brothers Ltd.. Unilever. The union presented represents the largest ever corporate merger

Stagnation ( 1929-1945 )

Parallel was established in 1929 from the merger of ten companies, including the Georg layer AG, Unilever Austria, in 1938 - was integrated into the Unilever Germany - after the Anschluss. 1932, 69 companies, and another 31 owned by Unilever. This included also Perfumery, founded in 1925 Elida AG. 1935 were due to strict foreign exchange regulations (introduced in the wake of the Great Depression ), which prohibited the outflow of funds from Germany to the parent company to Rotterdam, companies like Lagnese and cheese manufacturers, textile and paper mills, the company added.

Expansion (1945 to 1970)

1948 was the production in most operations again. 1958 Margarine Union was transformed from a public company into a GmbH. In 1960, Unilever took from the Austrian Wiener dairy industry AG ( MIAG ) Founded in 1927, the ice cream shop, the ice cream "Eskimo" sales under the brand name.

The HB's Iglo GmbH was formed in 1962 from a merger of the two Unilever companies Lagnese ice cream GmbH ( since 1936 at Unilever ) and " Iglo GmbH". In August 2005, the Lagnese - Iglo GmbH became part of Unilever Germany GmbH and no longer functioned as an independent company.

Consolidation (since 1970 )

Unilever separated from unprofitable companies by selling some textile factories. This process of restructuring was continued in the 1980s. This was followed by years of growth in which Unilever bought many corporate investments. Among the new acquisitions included, inter alia, Brands such as Calvin Klein, Bestfoods, Ben & Jerry's, Slim-Fast and Amora Maille.

In recent years, the business of Unilever lost market share, sales stagnated. In Germany, this was inter alia attributed to the loss of importance of brands and the market share gains by discounters.

In 2004, several Unilever brands, including Biskin ( since 1968 in the market), Livio (since 1958) and palmin (since 1894), sold to the company Peter Kolln KGaA in Elmshorn.

In a process of restructuring the management of the company has been reduced. A resident company was founded in Schaffhausen, which includes all European plants.

After 45 years, on 9 February 2006, Unilever announced the sale of its European frozen food brands Iglo and Birds Eye. Therefore the range of frozen food was spun off to the newly formed Iglo GmbH on July 1, 2006, which was sold on 28 August for 1.73 billion euros to the British investment company Permira.

Group Overview

Current Group Structure

The Unilever NV is a conglomerate and has, among other things, the following subsidiaries (as of March 2009):

• Ben & Jerry's, founded in 1978, since 2000 part of Unilever
• Bestfoods founded in 1916, since 2000 part of Unilever
• Hindustan Unilever founded in 1933, 41,000 employees (as of 2006)
• Unilever Food Solutions GmbH

Locations in the German speaking

Management

The formed part of a new European strategy three-country organization for Germany, Austria and Switzerland has its headquarters since January 1, 2008 in Hamburg. There, the persistence of Unilever Germany GmbH is also, as previously, a resident.

The head office moved in June 2009 from the former Unilever high-rise to a new building at the Strandkai in HafenCity. The new building, designed by architects Behnisch & Partner, the company will open a grocery store, a small spa, a Eislokal with a terrace directly on the Elbe River in addition to the still to be built cruise terminal to the end user.

The Unilever Switzerland GmbH has its headquarters in Thayngen. It was created on 1 January 2005 by the merger of Lusso Foods in Ostermundigen and previous Unilever Bestfoods Switzerland in Thayngen. On July 1, 2005, the previously -based train Lever Fabergé went on in it.

The Unilever Austria GmbH has its headquarters in Vienna.

Production sites in Germany

Unilever owns several production locations in Germany, but produces goods for the German market, partly also in other European countries and exported German products in the world.

At the following locations products are manufactured for personal cleansing and skin care:

• Buxtehude: body cleansing and skincare
• Mannheim: " Dove" soap bars

Food is produced at the following locations:

• Ansbach: Sausage Products ( "You may " and " Becel " ), meat and bakery snacks
• Auerbach: instant soups, ready meals, " Croutinos "
• Heilbronn: soups, sauces, cornflour, salad dressings, basic products, shaker bottles, Products for Food Solutions
• Heppenheim: HB's ice cream
• Kleve, "Rama Cremefine " ( herbal alternative to cream), Sauces
• Pratau: " Latta ", " Rama ", " Becel ", " Sanella ", " flora " and " Homa ", margarine and fat spreads
• Stavenhagen, " Pfanni " potato products ( puree, potato dumplings, mugs snacks, mini dumplings, potato flakes, dried potatoes) and bread dumplings

Management

• Unilever NV / PLC Paul Polman, CEO

• Henricus Brouwer, Chairman

Divisions, brands and products

• Amora
• Becel
• Ben & Jerry's
• Bertolli
• BiFi / Peperami (both 2014 sold to Jack Link's )
• Are you allowed
• Flora ( Becel )
• Hellmann's
• HOMA
• Knorr
• Lagnese ( brand of ice cream )
• Lätta
• Lipton
• Maille
• Mazola
• Mondamin
• Pfanni
• PG Tips
• Rama
• Sanella
• Slim-Fast
• Thea
• Unox

• Coral (formerly Coral )
• Domestos
• OMO
• Viss
• Skip

• Axe
• Baba
• Dove
• Duschdas
• Impulse
• Lux
• Pond's
• Rexona
• Signal
• Sunsilk
• TIGI
• Timotei

Food (Unilever Foods)

With an extensive range of brands in the food industry succeeds Unilever to occupy a place in the top 5 of the largest food manufacturing companies. This range includes brands such as Bertolli, Becel or Lipton, but also many German brands such as You can, Mondamin, Rama, Latta, Knorr or Lagnese, as well as the introduced from the Unilever Austria Austrian brands such as Eskimo and Igloo ( 1970 Eskimo Iglo merged, since 2005 alone), Apollo, Kuner (founded as Kunerol ), Elida, Bensdorp ( early 2007 sold), etc.

A wholly owned subsidiary of the Unilever Group was Frozen Fish, one of the largest fishing enterprises and suppliers of renowned fish producers. This operation is now part Permira, which has acquired the entire frozen food division (brand Iglo ) of Unilever. Thus, it was also the last fish processing operation after the sale of fresh fish sales chain Nordsee, the combination fishing fleet and processors German lake ( Bremerhaven ) and the canned fish producer Norda - Lysell ( Cuxhaven ) are submitted.

Apart from revenue from the sale of retail products, Unilever is also active in the field of raw material production. This includes both our own tea plantations as well as its own palm oil plantations. ( AR07 )

Unilever claims to be the world's largest ice cream manufacturer. The ice cream is sold worldwide with state-owned names (eg Germany Lagnese, Austria Eskimo, Switzerland Lusso, United Kingdom Walls, France Miko, Turkey, Italy and Greece Algida, Philippines Selecta ) but uniform logo ( Heart Fire ), since the respective names before the takeover had acquired by Unilever a great reputation.

Lagnese ice cream was a long time by the Lagnese -Iglo GmbH produced as part of the Unilever Germany and distributed. After the individual legal entities were merged into one company, Lagnese is produced and distributed in Germany by the Unilever Germany GmbH.

Household and fabric care

In the years since rapidly changing market for detergents, cleansers or detergents Unilever is represented by brands such as Domestos, Cif, Skip, OMO, Coral and Viss.

Body Care

In the market for personal care products, Unilever is with brands like Axe, Dove, Impulse, Lux, duschdas, Rexona, Sunsilk, Timotei, Pond's, Baba, Suave Clear, TIGI Haircare, Lifeboy ( deodorized soap), Pitralon, Vaseline and Vasenol represent signal and Close up oral hygiene in the area.

Criticism

Environment

In 2008, the company PALMCI laid on behalf of Unilever swamp forests dry in the Ivory Coast and stubbed them for palm oil plantations. These are the last refuges of endangered species such as the Diana monkey, the Geoffroy- colobus monkeys and a subspecies of red colobus monkeys, whose last refuge is located in the Tanoé forest. Unilever is the world with 1.6 million tons of the largest palm oil consumer, which is why the company has a special responsibility in dealing with palm oil. The former Unilever CEO Patrick Cescau subsequently announced that the company will undertake to relate the entire demand for palm oil from 2015, exclusively from suppliers that are certified for sustainable cultivation. In 2004, Unilever founded together with other companies and the WWF " Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil cultivation " (RSPO ) and has recently announced that it would support a moratorium on the rain and Torfwaldabholzung in Indonesia. The UN fears but already for the year 2012, the total destruction of forests in Sumatra and Borneo. Unilever has been criticized by the environmental organization Robin Wood for a long time because they relate Palm oil from the Asian agribusiness Wilmar. This operates in Sumatra overexploitation for their plantations and displaced the indigenous people of Sumatra at gunpoint. The certification Wilmar by the RSPO sustainable palm oil supplier is referred to by Robin Wood to be void, because the industry itself Certify only themselves.

To biofuels Unilever CEO Paul Polman, the temporary boost in grain prices in 2008 /09 expressed was a " perverse effect " high biofuel subsidies in the industrialized countries. Here, Unilever is the largest plantation operator in Africa. She is accused of being responsible for the destruction of many local businesses and the exploitation of farm workers there. Unilever is also the largest palm oil processors in the world and is of similar damage as it accuses the group biofuels, responsible. For the manufacture of cosmetics and food products for Unilever wide areas rainforest were cleared to grow palm oil. Thus, for example, were taken from large areas for palm oil plantations for soap production in the Congo of the local population.

Cartelization

The European Commission has condemned Unilever in April 2011 together with the companies Procter & Gamble and Henkel for operating a cartel, to a total of EUR 315.2 million euros. At Unilever accounted for 104 million euros the punishment was reduced by 25 %, as the company cooperated with the European Commission and divulged details of the cartel agreement. A further 10% were adopted, since Unilever agreed to a comparison and thus eliminated the possibility of an appeal against the fine. The cartel lasted from 2002 to 2005 in the countries of Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal and Greece and was used for systematic collusion in pricing for powder detergents for machine washing.

Racism allegations

The use of advertising award, " I want mohr! " As part of an advertising campaign of the brand of ice cream Eskimo (Unilever Austria ) for a Eisvariante the " Mohr in shirt " led to complaints to the Austrian Advertising Council due to the racial background of the word Mohr.

More allegations against Unilever were collected for the use of the slogan "White Power" in connection with advertising for a toothpaste in Turkey, as it is used by right-wing extremist organizations since a long time. Unilever stressed to have it related only to the tooth color and dismissed all allegations of racism by itself.

Awards

Unilever and people from his management received for their company policy both positive and negative Awards:

• In 2011, Harry JM Brouwer received the BAUM Environmental Award because he "sustainability activities of the Group and marked important progress, " have.

• Save the Rainforest awarded in the same year his Unilever TREE DOWN price. The anti- Prize was awarded to Unilever " for aid to environmental degradation and abuse of human rights in Indonesia ."

• In 2012, Unilever received the German Sustainability Award in the category Most sustainable strategy. The company wants to double its size, a halving of global impact on the environment, purchase 100 percent of the agricultural raw materials from sustainable sources and improve the lives of a billion people.

• In 2013, the European Works Council ( UEWC ) Unilever was " a say in Europe " for its continuing commitment to the design of participation rights in multinational Unilever Group with the German works councils Award 2013 in the special category award.