Beiersdorf chief executive Vincent Warnery has warned that Europe's cosmetics industry could lose its leading position in international competition. "We do not want to become the next auto industry," he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur in an interview published on 13 September 2026. Source: https://www.rhein-zeitung.de/deutschland-welt/nivea-chef-wollen-nicht-die-naechste-autoindustrie-werden_arid-4154692.html.
His appeal to the EU was direct: do not overburden the industry with regulation. Europe, he said, must be very careful when it looks at the US, China and Korea, where many of the rules do not apply. European skincare is already subject to the strictest quality standards, and yet companies are being asked to remove ingredients that pose no risk under normal use.
He also named a specific grievance: the revised EU Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, which he said requires companies like Beiersdorf to make high payments even though they are responsible for only a small share of the pollution.
That last point is the one worth a smaller brand's attention, because it is the rule most founders have not yet looked at.
What the wastewater levy is
The revised directive, 2024/3019, adds a new stage to urban wastewater treatment, known as quaternary treatment, to remove micropollutants. To pay for it, Article 9 requires member states to ensure that producers cover at least 80% of the investment, operating and monitoring costs through an extended producer responsibility scheme. The products listed in the relevant annex are currently only medicines and cosmetics.
Member states must transpose the directive by 31 July 2027, and the EPR obligations are due to become operational by 31 December 2028.
According to Baker McKenzie's summary of the adopted text, each producer's contribution in a member state will be based on the quantity and hazardousness of the substances in the products it places on that market. Producers are expected to join recognised producer responsibility organisations, contribute financially and report annual quantities and hazardousness.
Why it might not survive in its current form
The levy has been contested since it was adopted. Several actions brought by industry bodies and companies at the General Court were dismissed as inadmissible, with Renewable Matter reporting a ruling on 18 February 2026 that the applicants had not shown an individual interest. That was a ruling on standing, not on the substance.
The substance is now in front of the Court of Justice. In Case C-193/25, brought by Poland, Advocate General Kokott delivered an Opinion on 3 September 2026 recommending annulment of the provisions that make pharmaceutical and cosmetics producers fund 80% of quaternary treatment. The Commission's impact assessment relied on a study concluding that the two sectors account for 73% of micropollutant quantities entering treatment plants and 92% of the relevant toxic load. The AG did not find those figures necessarily wrong, but concluded that the institutions failed to examine or adequately explain the underlying data before relying on them.
An AG Opinion is not binding, though the Court often follows it. The Irish High Court has also referred similar questions to the Court of Justice. So Warnery's complaint lands at a moment when the financing model is genuinely open.
The line that matters for smaller brands
The directive includes exemptions. As Baker McKenzie summarises them, producers are exempt where the relevant products placed on the market do not exceed one tonne per year, or where the products are rapidly biodegradable in wastewater or do not generate micropollutants at the end of their life.
One tonne sounds like a threshold designed for companies the size of Beiersdorf. It is not.
A rough illustration: a 50ml skincare product with a density close to water weighs about 50 grams of formula. Twenty thousand units is about a tonne. A 250ml body wash reaches the same weight at around four thousand units. A brand turning over £1m to £3m with a meaningful EU business can pass that volume in a single year without noticing.
The exact basis of the calculation, including whether it is assessed per member state and whether it refers to finished product or to the substances in it, is the kind of detail that will be settled in national transposition and by the producer responsibility organisations. That is precisely why it is worth knowing your own numbers before those rules arrive.
What to do while the Court decides
None of this means paying anything today. It means being ready to answer three questions quickly, whichever way the Court goes.
First, tonnage by market. Units shipped into each EU country, by SKU, multiplied by fill weight. If you sell through a distributor or a marketplace, find out who is recorded as the producer placing the product on that market, because that is who the obligation attaches to.
Second, ingredient profile. Contributions are expected to reflect hazardousness as well as quantity, and the second exemption covers products that are rapidly biodegradable or do not generate micropollutants. Ask your formulator which ingredients in your range are likely to be relevant, and whether biodegradability data already exists.
This is also useful work regardless of the levy. The same ingredient questions come up in retailer sustainability questionnaires and in reformulation planning for the EU's ingredient restrictions, so the file you build now will get used more than once.
Third, ownership. Someone in the business, usually your responsible person or regulatory consultant, should own the file, track national transposition in your biggest EU markets and brief you when producer responsibility organisations start forming.
The plain version
Beiersdorf's chief executive is making a political argument about Europe's competitiveness, and it may well succeed: an Advocate General has already recommended that the Court of Justice strike down the financing rule he is complaining about.
For a smaller brand, the practical question is narrower. If the levy survives in any form, does your EU volume sit above or below one tonne a year? Work it out now, while it is a spreadsheet exercise and not a compliance deadline.