Unilever
Unilever (, , ) is an
Anglo-
Dutch company that owns many of the world's consumer product brands in foods, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products. Unilever employs more than 206,000 people and had a worldwide revenue of
€39.67 billion (just over
US$50 billion) in 2005.Unilever has two parent companies: Unilever NV in
Rotterdam,
Netherlands, and Unilever PLC in
London,
United Kingdom. This arrangement is similar to that of
Reed Elsevier, and that of
Royal Dutch Shell prior to their unified structure. Both Unilever companies have the same directors and effectively operate as a single business. The current non-executive Chairman of Unilever N.V. and PLC is
Antony Burgmans while Patrick Cescau is Group Chief Executive. Unilever's major competitors include
Procter & Gamble,
Nestlé,
Mars Incorporated, and
Reckitt Benckiser to name but a few.
Unilever was created in
1930 by the merger of British
soapmaker
Lever Brothers and Dutch
margarine producer
Margarine Unie, a logical merger as
palm oil was a major raw material for both margarines and soaps and could be imported more efficiently in larger quantities.
In the
1930s, the business of Unilever grew and new ventures were launched in
Latin America. By
1980, soap and edible fats contributed just 40% of profits, compared with an original 90%. In
1984 the company bought the brands
Brooke Bond (maker of
PG Tips tea),
Fabergé and
Elizabeth Arden, but the latter was later sold (in
2000) to
FFI Fragrances.Unilever acquired Chesebrough-Ponds, the maker of Ragu, Ponds and
Vaseline, in
1987, which strengthened its position in the world skin care market. The company later absorbed the
American business
Best Foods, strengthening its presence in North America and extending its portfolio of foods brands.
Today the company is fully multinational with operating companies and factories on every continent and research laboratories at
Colworth and
Port Sunlight in the
United Kingdom;
Vlaardingen in the
Netherlands;
Trumbull, Connecticut,
Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey in the
United States;
Bangalore in
India; and
Shanghai in
China.
The US division continued to carry the
Lever Brothers name until the 1990s, when it adopted the parent company's moniker. The American unit is now headquartered in New Jersey, and no longer maintains a presence at
Lever House, the iconic skyscraper on
Park Avenue in
New York City.
Unilever has recently completed a five year vitality company initiative in which it began to converge the marketing of disparate arms of their business, including personal care, dieting, and consumables into an umbrella function displaying the breadth of their contributions to personal vitality. This plan has been implemented because of the lack of brand recognition that unilever wields, even despite its ubiquitous presence.
Unilever's highest executive body is called the Unilever Executive. It is led by the Group Chief Executive (
Patrick Cescau), and is responsible for managing profit, loss and growth delivery across the company.
Members of the Unilever Executive include:
Patrick Cescau (Group Chief Executive)
Manvinder Singh (Vindi) Banga (President Foods)
Kees van der Graaf (President Europe)
Ralph Kugler (President Home and Personal Care)
Harish Manwani (President Asia and Africa)
Rudy Markham (Chief Financial Officer)
Sandy Ogg (Chief HR Officer)
John Rice (President Americas)
Executive and non-executive
directors at Unilever are:
Leon Brittan,
Antony Burgmans,
Patrick Cescau,
Lynda Chalker,
Bertrand Collomb,
Wim Dik,
Oscar Fanjul,
Kees van der Graaf,
Hilmar Kopper,
Ralph Kugler,
Rudy Markham,
David Simon, and
Jeroen van der Veer.Currently unilever has chosen to focus on 400 brands out of its 1600 in a bid to increase its profits by reducing the variety of advertising and packaging.
After some recent pruning, Unilever now has a portfolio of about 400 brands, many of them local that can only be found in certain countries. The brands fall almost entirely into three categories as set out below.
Food and beverages
|
A menu from Unilever's Italian subsidiary Algida. |
=Heartbrand
=
Unilever operate a number of ice-cream companies referred to as the "Heartbrand", since in general the only branding they have in common is a heart-shaped logo. They generally manufacture the same ice-cream with the same names, with rare occasions of regional availability, under different brands. Some of these ice-creams include Carte D'Or,
Cornetto,
Magnum,
Solero and
Viennetta. A list of some of these brands is shown below:
Home and personal care brands
*
Clorox*
Colgate-Palmolive*
Henkel*
Procter & Gamble*
Reckitt Benckiser*
S. C. Johnson & Son*
Morris Tabaksblat, a previous
CEO*
Gorton's of Gloucester, a former subsidiary
*
Unilever website*
Unilever Canada website*
Consumer USA website*
Consumer Canada website*
Lipton Soup & Sidekicks website*
Lady Lever Art Gallery*
Lady Lever Gallery in
Port Sunlight
