“The L’Oreal Group has decided to remove the words white / whitening, fair / equitable, light / lightening from all its night products,” the French cosmetics giant said in a statement.
L’Oreal faced a backlash earlier this month after a Twitter post saying it “stands in solidarity with the black community and injustice of any kind.” The post garnered comments accusing the company of hypocrisy for leaving British model Munroe Bergdorf to its brand in 2017, following comments it made about systemic racism.
The model herself also criticized the brand for its solidarity message to Black Lives Matter, saying that L’Oreal “threw me at the wolves for talking about racism and white supremacy.” She was the first transgender model for the UK brand before being abandoned.
Bergdorf said in a Twitter statement that L’Oreal Paris brand president Delphine Viguier “expressed regret at how the situation was handled” after a conversation between the two. The company rehired Bergdorf and will now join the UK company’s diversity and inclusion advisory board.
L’Oreal is not the first company to make changes to its brand, as rejection continues because of skin-lightening product controversy and beauty companies’ lack of racial diversity in products and ads.
On Thursday, Hindustan Unilever, the Indian and Bangladeshi unit of the Anglo-Dutch firm Unilever (UL), announced that “it would stop using the word ‘Fair’ in its ‘Fair and Lovely’ skincare products. Unilever said its reason was to move towards” a more inclusive vision of beauty. ”
Johnson and Johnson (JNJ), also announced Thursday that it has discontinued two lines of skin care products for its brands that include the word “justice” on their labels for the same reasons.
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