How ethical is Energizer Holdings?
Our research highlights several ethical issues with Energizer Holdings, including its approach to supply chain management, climate change, the environment, excessive pay, tax, human rights, and conflict minerals. It scored our worst rating across all of these categories.
Below we outline some of these issues. To see the full detailed stories, and Energizer Holdings' overall ethical rating, please sign in or subscribe.
Boycott Call
Workers called for a boycott of Energizer in 2023, using the hashtags #BadBunny and #BoycottTheBunny. This is because the company had planned to close plants in Wisconsin, US, and move offshore to Singapore, the UK, and a non-union plant in North Carolina. The company's plans would mean the loss of over 600 jobs in the small community of Fennimore where it was based and had a population of just 3,000 people. One worker told The Guardian, “This will be devastating to every business in our town, including mine. All I see here by the move is more corporate greed.”
The move was planned despite the strong financial performance of the plants, with the company reporting a gross profit of $1.1bn in 2022, paying out $93m to shareholders through dividends in 2022. Due to this, Energizer was marked down in our Workers’ Rights category and also lost a mark for a Boycott Call.
Directors’ pay
In financially insecure times for many, that’s not the case for Energizer’s highest paid director who received $9,000,000 in 2022. The company lost a mark for excessive pay.
Environment
Energizer lacks publicly available information about what it is doing to reduce its carbon and environmental impacts. It doesn’t publicly report on its emissions or have a carbon reduction target in line with international science-based agreements. For this, it scored a worst rating in both our environmental reporting and carbon ratings.
Potentially hazardous chemicals in its electronic products is an important issue: it publishes no information about chemicals commonly used in electronics such as Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), halogens, brominated flame retardants (BFRs), or phthalates. Substances such as these are widely used in electronics and have a significant negative environmental impact when released after disposal.
Conflict minerals
As an electronics manufacturer, we expected Energizer to have an adequate policy on the sourcing of conflict minerals (tin, tantalum, tungsten, and gold).
Mining for these minerals is often associated with human rights abuses, in particular in places such as the Democratic Republic of Congo. Many electronic products, including batteries, contain minerals commonly sourced from conflict areas so we rate companies for their transparency and sourcing policies because of this. Read more about conflict minerals and the impacts of mining in our article on technology and conflict minerals.
Companies making an effort on this issue should make commitments to only source from mineral processors, or smelters, that have been audited and verified as conflict-free, a commitment to ongoing due diligence, an explanation of how it identifies and mitigates risks in its supply chain, and support for conflict-free initiatives. This rating covers both human rights and the environment, and Energizer was marked down for both.
People
When it comes to supply chain management Energizer leaves much to be desired.
On the positive side, its policies prohibit forced labour, child labour and discrimination, and commit to the payment of a living wage.
But there were many steps it wasn’t taking to uphold workers’ rights in its supply chain, including becoming a member of a multi-stakeholder initiative, engaging with trade unions and NGOs in its auditing, or publishing any meaningful information about its approach to auditing.
Energizer was also marked down for operating in a number of countries considered to be governed by oppressive regimes, including Egypt, India, Philippines, Russia, and Venezuela.
Politics
Energizer lost a mark in our Political Activities category as it was found to have spent $240,000 on lobbying in 2022, according to the Open Secrets website. Four out of the five of the company’s lobbyists previously held government jobs.
Tax
Energizer scored a worst rating in our Tax Conduct category. It has multiple subsidiaries that are high risk when it comes to likely use of tax avoidance strategies (such as holding companies) in known tax havens such as Hong Kong, the Netherlands, the British Virgin Islands, and Switzerland.
Ethical Consumer Best Buy: Yes
Boycotts: No