| Ensuring sustainable and responsible growth
L’Oréal’s goal is to ensure sustainable and responsible growth. We are convinced that sustainable success is based on strong ethical principles, which provide a framework of values, shared by all employees, and guide our growth. It is also based on a genuine sense of responsibility towards the wider community.
The six key principles of our Sustainable Development approach
- We are committed to ensuring growth which creates value for the largest possible number of those who contribute to our success.
- We want to promote sustainable innovation by incorporating the principles of sustainable development into the heart of our Research and Development activities.
- We want to offer our employees a safe, healthy and stimulating working environment, in which personal talent and merit are recognised, diversity is valued, private life is respected and the balance between professional life and personal life is taken into account.
- We build strong and lasting partnerships with our customers and our suppliers, based on mutual trust and interest.
- We are aware of the impact of our activities on the natural environment, including biodiversity, and are constantly striving to reduce it.
- Finally, we are determined to be a genuinely good corporate citizen, making a positive contribution in the countries and communities in which we operate and in particular by fostering science, support for the vulnerable, and education.
 2007: new edition of the Code of Business Ethics
L’Oréal has always aimed at being an exemplary company, not only in economic but also in ethical terms. The group has been built on strong values such as respect, integrity and excellence. L’Oréal’s ethical approach is determined and pro-active, and develops in tandem with the group’s growth.
In 2007, L’Oréal appointed a Director of Ethics, who reports directly to the Chief Executive Officer of the group. In October, a new edition of the Code of Business Ethics was issued simultaneously in all the countries in which the group has subsidiaries. The process of drawing up the Code of Business Ethics is an illustration of L’Oréal’s respect for its remarkable diversity. In order to create a universally acceptable document, employees from 22 countries took part in international working groups in Europe, North America, Latin America and Asia.
The ethical dimension is considered in the appraisal of all managers, through two management skills criteria “Leading with human sensitivity” and “Achieves results with integrity”, the later criteria being added at the end of 2007. The launch of the new code was accompanied by the creation of an intranet site dedicated to ethics which is available to all group employees.
External recognition
L’Oréal’s sustainable development initiatives are widely recognised:
- The strategic value advisor Innovest ranks L’Oréal as the leader in its sector for managing environmental, social and governance risks (ESG).
- Corporate Knights, a Canadian magazine for responsible business, ranks the group as one of the 100 most sustainable corporations of the world. The ranking includes companies from 17 countries, covering all sectors of the economy.
- L’Oréal is designated as one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies by Ethisphere Magazine, published by the Ethisphere Council. Of more than 5,000 companies assessed over a 6-month period, fewer than a hundred were selected.
- L’Oréal is ranked as a Carbon Leader by Merrill Lynch.
- L’Oréal is included in most international sustainable development indices, such as ASPI Eurozone, FTSE4Good and Ethibel.
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