Beiersdorf CEO Vincent Warnery has warned that Europe's cosmetics industry could be "overburdened" by impending regulations, telling Deutsche Presse-Agentur in Berlin: "We do not want to become the next auto industry."

The head of the Nivea-owner argued that competitors in the US, China and South Korea operate under far lighter regulatory regimes, and that this asymmetry threatens European competitiveness. His comments add a CEO-level voice to a widening industry pushback against the EU regulatory agenda.

"Europe must tread very carefully, particularly when we look at the US, China and Korea, where many of these rules do not apply," Warnery said.

Which regulations are drawing fire?

Warnery's complaint centres on two pressure points for formulators and compliance teams.

• Ingredient removals. He questioned requirements to strip certain ingredients from European formulations even though, in his words, they "pose no risk when used as intended" — a direct challenge to restriction processes that force reformulation work across entire product portfolios.
• The revised EU Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive. The revision holds cosmetics and pharmaceutical manufacturers financially accountable for water treatment costs. Warnery criticised the requirement for companies such as Beiersdorf to make significant payments despite contributing only a small share of the pollution.

He also pushed back on the premise driving much of the tightening. "Skin care products from Europe are already subject to the strictest quality standards," he said, framing further restrictions as duplicative rather than risk-based.

For brands, each mandated ingredient removal means stability retesting, INCI relabelling, supplier renegotiation and, in some cases, claims support rebuilding. The wastewater directive adds a direct cost line unrelated to formulation.

A coordinated campaign, not a lone voice

This is not Warnery's first intervention. Earlier this year he stood alongside L'Oréal CEO Nicolas Hieronimus in calling on European policymakers to "stop being the world's chief regulator and start becoming its chief innovator" — a warning framed around safeguarding the €180 billion beauty industry.

In March, the Value of Beauty Alliance, a group of top executives from 17 beauty and personal care companies, formally called on EU policymakers to act, arguing that inaction risked weakening one of Europe's most competitive and globally influential industries.

The pattern matters for procurement and regulatory planning. When the CEOs of the two largest European beauty groups, plus a 17-company alliance, repeat the same message within a single year, industry lobbying resources are concentrating around regulatory relief rather than accommodation.

What does this mean for formulation teams?

The immediate practical takeaway is unchanged: reformulation deadlines tied to EU restrictions still stand regardless of CEO objections. What the interventions signal is a campaign to shape the next wave of restriction decisions — including how ingredients are assessed under normal conditions of use, and whether extended producer responsibility for wastewater is calibrated to actual pollution shares.

For suppliers of contested ingredients, the lobbying effort could affect the pace at which substitution timelines are set. For private-label and mid-size brands without Beiersdorf's compliance budgets, any softening of removal requirements would reduce reformulation costs; any hardening would concentrate the burden further.

Watch the next data points: how the EU implements the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive's cost allocation for cosmetics manufacturers, and whether the Value of Beauty Alliance secures a formal response from policymakers before the year is out.