Revenge of the Chemistry Nerds: P&G Teams With Health Watchdog
The Environmental Working Group just helped the world's largest consumer company reinvent a 1971 shampoo. Has the long-time industry gadfly become a de facto regulator?
Herbal Essences’ two new EWG-verified shampoos.
In August 2015, Procter & Gamble Co. held a focus group for its Herbal Essences shampoo—a brand launched in 1971 and inspired by wildflowers, herbs and fresh mountain water. But during the sessions, something much less peaceful came up: repeated references to the industry’s long-time tormentor, the Environmental Working Group.
The Washington-based non-profit, known as EWG, has a Skin Deep Database that ranks the toxicity of everyday items based on studies that show links to hormone disruption or illnesses like cancer. The cosmetics industry and bloggers have often decried it as producing “pseudoscience” and “fear mongering.” But at P&G’s focus group, women were singing its praises.