Safety comes first
Sometimes a product that does not meet our high safety and quality design standards is accidentally released into the market. Such a product might, for example, have a quality defect, or a contamination of the raw materials or a mislabelling of ingredients.
If this happens, protecting consumers’ safety is our number one priority. If necessary we will recall such products.
During 2010 we had five public recalls (compared with 11 in 2009). The reduction of incidents was partly due to our renewed focus on quality as an integral part of our business agenda. We have been putting programmes in place to improve the rigour of our processes – from sourcing and manufacturing to customer and consumer satisfaction with our brands. Our Safety & Environmental Assurance Centre plays a central role in carrying out risk assessments to generate the evidence necessary for decisions on consumer safety.
Some consumers are concerned about the presence of particular chemicals in our products. We continue to work in partnership with research organisations, industry partners, NGOs and regulators to strengthen consumer confidence in our products, and with them we try to find alternative ingredients, where appropriate.
We continually review our safety findings and act on the side of caution if anything changes. To read more about our approach, see our principles of precaution and substitution.