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Vegan Shopping : Tom’s of Maine

Posted in Vegan stuff by Glô! on the April 17th, 2009

Tom’s of Maine,
or Tom’s of Greed!?

Tom’s of Maine is an American company founded in 1970 by Tom and Kate Chappell. The company manufactures personal care products, such as toothpaste, soap and deodorant.

Tom of Maine has, up to 2006, been praised by ethical consumers, and was probably one of the most ethical companies around.
In March 2006, the Ethical consumer * magazine gave Tom’s of Maine the highest rating for its environmental reporting and animal testing policy (16 out of 20)*. Tom of Maine’s products are vegetarian and most of their products do not contain any animal ingredients.

In 2006, a controlling 84% stake in Tom’s of Maine was purchased by Colgate-Palmolive for $100M. The Chappells kept a 16% share in the company.
In other words, a once-proud local company is now 84% swallowed up by one of the worse corporations which is heavily involved in animal testing and environmental destruction.

To defend their action, Kate


Chappel stated : ‘’We chose Colgate as our partner because they have the global expertise to help take Tom’s of Maine to the next level […] We see Colgate-Palmolive as an excellent fit with our cultural values. Those values include a policy of giving 10 percent of pretax profits to community groups that benefit the environment and other causes.”

She also admitted that the couple would not be here forever and that they needed to find a “good home” for the company.

“We were becoming aware that remaining an independent company was going to be very high-risk…. We needed to bring the business to scale, and we just weren’t doing it at a pace that was fast enough to catch up with the phenomenal growth going on in natural products.”

Tom Chappel, Tom’s of Maine Co-founder.

We cannot help but wonder why a company which has been making some of the most ethical products for more than 30 years would see Animal Testing giant Colgate-Palmolive as a “good home”. Why would a company which has never compromised on the animal testing issue** sell to a company without any ethics in regard to animals?
We also wonder why would Tom’s of Maine founders state in an interview that they share the same values as their parent company?***

There seems to be winners on both sides:
A small socially responsible company gets to expand their market, ensure their continued existence with the support of a mega corporation by their side, and of course, gets a nice compensation in return for their diluted principles. Their new owner swallows a piece of the increasingly popular natural-products market, and at the same time gets rid of a small but successful opponent.

Everybody wins but the animals


and the ethical consumers who no longer have the guarantee that the money they pay for the product will not go towards animal testing and corrupted corporations.

If you support a company that doesn’t itself carry out animal testing, but is owned by a company which does, then the money you spend will in part (84% of Tom of Maine’s) end up in the pockets of the animal testing company. How much more animal testing will Colgate use that money on?

* Ethical consumer on Tom’s of Maine:
www.ethicalconsumer.org

** Tom’s of Maine on animal testing:
Tom of Maine was the first company to win FDA approval of its fluoride toothpastes without involving the testing of animals.

*** Interview with Tom’s of Maine founders:
www.sfgate.com

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