Do we like Procter & Gamble?
Makes household and personal-care brands like Tide, Pampers, Charmin and Gillette; based in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Our score: 5 out of 10. Mixed. The clean-water programme is real and large. Against that, critics keep raising forest sourcing for tissue products, and P&G is cutting up to 7,000 jobs. We'd hold, not cheer.
P&G is one of the world's biggest consumer goods firms. It is run from Cincinnati and sells to about 5 billion people in more than 180 countries a year. It's listed on the NYSE, so there's no single owner behind it.
Shailesh Jejurikar took over as CEO on 1 January 2026. He joined the company in 1989 and had been COO. Jon Moeller moved to Executive Chairman, and P&G's own board page now lists Jejurikar as chairman too.
The big recurring complaint is forests. Campaign groups like NRDC say Charmin is made from virgin forest fibre and that P&G lags rivals. Shareholders have also backed resolutions pushing it to do more on deforestation. These are the critics' claims. P&G points to third-party certification of its pulp.
There have also been product-safety and consumer cases. P&G recalled aerosol products over benzene in 2021, then paid $8m to settle class actions without admitting wrongdoing. In 2015 it paid $850,000 over oversized Olay packaging, again without admitting wrongdoing.
On the plus side, its water-purifying packets have been handed out since 2004. P&G and its partners say they've delivered over 25 billion litres of safe water. Against that, it's cutting up to 7,000 non-manufacturing jobs by the end of fiscal 2027. That makes us a bit cautious: a middling score.