Givaudan SA

Obviously, he'll have been working on ones a couple of years ahead, so you'll still he- see his name popping up.

But yeah, so he is leaving Givaudan, and he is going to Hermès.

Wow.

Mm.

Our first guest, Marie Kozlowski, brings a deep well of professional wisdom to our discussion thanks to her long food industry career in account management and business development.

Marie retired recently from flavor and fragrance company Givaudan, and she's now focusing on another role that makes her a perfect fit for our conversation, career coaching through the company she founded, Wise Words LLC.

Welcome, Marie.

Thank you so much, Mary Ellen.

Mm-hmm.

So I go see Firmenich, Givaudan, IFF, Robertet, Mane.

You only get the best pineapple, the best coconut.

Show me-

Okay.

Fascinating.

Okay, so those two are with Man, and then the other was with Givaudan, right?

With Givaudan, correct.

Increasing regulatory, consumer, and climate pressures are driving the push for decarbonization across industry sectors.

In a recent webinar, I was joined by Tori Hofmeister from Colgate-Palmolive, Matthias Maase from BASF, Francesco Davila Olotto from Givaudan, and Alexandra Floriot from MEDIKATE to case study the personal care sector and how it is tackling the difficult to quantify Scope 3 supply chain emissions.

Highlights from the conversation are coming up.

First, though, is our regular roundup of some sustainable business news with Innovation Forum's Babette Bache.

The goal is to make waste reduction part of how organizations run day by day, cutting emissions and cost, and to support the UN target of halving per capita food waste at retail and consumer level by twenty-thirty.

[outro music]

[outro music]A few days ago, I was delighted to join Tori Hofmeister, Senior Manager, Sustainable Sourcing, Climate and Water Lead at Colgate-Palmolive; Matthias Maase, Director of Global Sustainability Care Chemicals at BASF; Francesco D'Avila Alotto, Global Environmental Sustainability Senior Manager at Givaudan; and Alexandra Fleuriet, Head of Sustainability, Medikate.

During an innovation forum webinar, we talked about how their companies are tackling Scope 3 emissions.

But that's not the case.

There are all these sort of scent manufacturers behind it, like Givaudan, which is from Switzerland.

There's also IFF in America, which is a massive one.

And then you have the star noses like Céline Barrel, who's one of my favorites.

It was a kind of evidence because...

My older sister, Françoise, she went to the Rue Bertrand Dupont, which is Givaudan now, school.

And my brother, Jean, he was also following the same path.

And at the age of 18, when I got my baccalaureate diploma, my parents spoke to me and they said, well, you, you, you will be a lawyer.

But that's not the case.

There are all these sort of scent manufacturers behind it, like Givaudan, which is from Switzerland.

There's also IFF in America, which is a massive one.

And then you have the star noses, like Céline Barrel, who's one of my favorites.

A bunch were with startups, like I was mentioning the animal-free meat and things like that, but a bunch were with like giant, you know...

In the chemical industry, worked with Sumitomo, flavors and fragrances with Givaudan and IFF.

Like we worked with Bayer and like it was like all, all like big ag, big chemical.

And then right before the IPO, we started to just stack pharma companies.

I am delighted to introduce my guest, George Ledes, a veteran of the prestige beauty and fragrance industry who with more than 35 years of experience working alongside some of the world's most iconic beauty and fragrance brands.

Through his family's beauty, fashion, and cosmetic world magazines, George has built relationships across virtually every corner of the industry, from Chanel, Estee Lauder, L'Oreal, LVMH, and Revlon, to leading fragrance houses including Givaudan, IFF, and Roberté, as well as packaging companies, distributors, and retailers.

Today, George brings that deep industry knowledge and global perspective to This Week with George Ledes, his widely read digital newsletter connecting beauty and fragrance leaders around the world.

Welcome to the show, George.

You're not as constricted by the ways you were brought up.

And...

Gosh, we just saw, we ran a story, it's the 50th anniversary of the Givaudan Perfumery School, run by Calise Becker, who just did the Merchant of Venice fragrance.

She was, I remember back in the day, she did the first Tommy Hilfiger fragrance.

We wanted probably a musk, and we wanted maybe an orange, but we were not sure.

And when I first came in with, in Givaudan and, and came to pitch about my brand, because today it's the case.

You need to go and pitch.

They have to, they say probably no to a lot of more brands than they would say yes today.

Mm-hmm.

So, and I was very fortunate because Givaudan said yes, IFF said yes, and I let the perfumer choose which note would you like to prefer to work on to start.

Mm-hmm.

And none chose the same note, so.