Owner of multiple cleaning product brands, SC Johnson continues to openly test its products on animals.
It is the subject of a boycott call from animal rights group Naturewatch along with all its brands – including Duck, Mr Muscle, Method and Ecover.
Environment
Despite buying the ‘green’ cleaning brands Method and Ecover in 2017, SC Johnson performed poorly when it came to the environment. The company received Ethical Consumer’s worst rating for Environmental Reporting as it failed to set any targets for reducing its environmental impact.
It also continues to use all three of the toxics commonly contained in cleaning products – parabens, phthalates and triclosan. It therefore received Ethical Consumer’s worst rating for its toxics policy and lost a full mark under Pollution & Toxics.
People
SC Johnson has subsidiaries that operate in a number of oppressive regimes. This included China, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Venezuela and Vietnam. Therefore SC Johnson and Ecover lost half a mark under Human Rights.
Animals
SC Johnson still openly tests on animals.
The Naturewatch Foundation is now asking consumers to boycott all SC Johnson brands, until the entire company is cruelty-free. It is also calling on Ecover and Method to use their new position of influence with SC Johnson to convince their parent company to stop all commissioning or conducting of animal tests across their entire range of products.
Politics
The company received Ethical Consumer’s worst rating for likely use of tax avoidance strategies and lost a whole mark under Anti-Social Finance.
SC Johnson & Son Inc also made $440,732 in political donations over the 2017 to 2018 election cycle. The vast majority of donations were made to the Republican party:
- Republicans: $386,950
- Democrats: $53,767
As a result, the company received Ethical Consumer's worst rating for Political Activity and lost a whole mark under the category.
Ethical Consumer Best Buy: No
Boycotts: Yes