Nivea CEO Warns EU: We Won’t Be the Next Car Industry
The head of the German consumer-goods group behind Nivea has warned that Europe’s cosmetics industry risks losing its leading global position under mounting EU regulation, invoking the fate of the continent’s ailing carmakers. “We do not want to become the next car industry,” Vincent Warnery, chief executive of Hamburg-based Beiersdorf, said in an interview with the German press agency dpa in Berlin, as reported by Belgium’s VRT NWS.
Warnery’s appeal to Brussels reflects a widening anxiety among European manufacturers: that strict regulation is eroding their ability to compete with rivals in the United States, China, and South Korea, where far fewer rules apply.
A Warning Rooted in the Auto Crisis
The comparison to the car industry is deliberate. European automakers have seen profits fall sharply in recent years, squeezed by regulation, high energy costs, and intensifying Asian competition. Just days before Warnery’s remarks, Volkswagen confirmed plans to cut 50,000 more jobs worldwide by 2030 — bringing total planned reductions to 100,000, about 15 percent of its workforce, with four German plants under threat of closure, according to VRT NWS.
“Europe must be very careful, especially if we look at the United States, China, and Korea, where a lot of regulation does not apply,” Warnery said. “The European cosmetics industry creates jobs and prosperity. So do not overwhelm us with regulatory burdens.”
Two Specific Grievances
Warnery’s critique centers on two issues. First, ingredient rules: he argues that European skincare products already meet the world’s strictest quality standards, yet companies are required to strip out ingredients even when they pose no risk in normal use. “That is a major challenge,” he said.
Second, the revised EU Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, which introduced an Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) mechanism making cosmetics and pharmaceutical manufacturers financially liable for water pollution. Under the rules, companies must cover 80 percent of the investment and operating costs of a fourth wastewater treatment stage, designed to filter out trace substances such as pharmaceutical residues, according to the German water association DWA.
Warnery contends that firms like Beiersdorf would be forced to pay large sums despite being responsible for only a small share of the pollution. The industry fought the measure in court, but in February 2026 the EU General Court dismissed its challenges as inadmissible, upholding the EPR principle. German pharmaceutical manufacturers have since appealed to the European Court of Justice, Pharma Deutschland e.V. noted.
A Company Under Pressure
Warnery’s warning comes as Beiersdorf itself faces headwinds. The company recently posted stagnant revenue of about 9.9 billion euros, with organic growth of just 2.4 percent — down sharply from 6.5 percent in 2024 — while its share price plunged to a four-year low, the German magazine Der Spiegel reported.
Warnery, a French executive who took the helm in May 2021 after working at L’Oréal, attributed the slowdown to a globally weakening skincare market and more price-conscious consumers. Beiersdorf has launched an 18-month turnaround plan for Nivea, with profitable growth not expected until 2028, as WirtschaftsWoche reported.
That context cuts both ways. A struggling CEO has an obvious incentive to blame regulation for sector-wide pressures. Yet the concern is not his alone.
Part of a Broader Debate
The cosmetics chief’s remarks feed into a much larger argument about European competitiveness. The 2024 Draghi report, commissioned by the European Commission, warned that slowing productivity, rising energy costs, and global competition are threatening Europe’s long-term prosperity and urged a lighter regulatory touch.
Warnery’s peers face the same landscape: Unilever of Britain, France’s L’Oréal and LVMH, and Germany’s Henkel all compete in a market where regulatory asymmetry is becoming a strategic factor. The European industry argues that rules designed with good intentions can still impose costs that competitors abroad simply do not bear.
What to Watch
The immediate test lies with EU member states, which must now transpose the wastewater directive into national law. How strictly they do so — and whether the Court of Justice revisits the EPR mechanism — will shape costs for cosmetics and pharmaceutical makers for years.
Warnery’s broader plea will be tested in Brussels, where the Commission has signaled openness to cutting red tape. For Europe’s consumer-goods champions, the question is whether that rhetoric translates into relief — or whether cosmetics follows automobiles down the same road. The industry’s message is that the window to act is now.