Skip to Main Content
2 minute read

Providing Transparency about Ingredients

With ingredient lists available across 10,000 products and in 35 languages, our disclosure reaches 6 billion people.

When consumers choose an SC Johnson product, we want them to trust that it's developed using our highest safety standards and to feel confident they can understand what's inside. That's why we've been investing in a robust ingredient disclosure program for over a decade.

The idea is to make it easy for consumers to find out about our products by listing our ingredients on a website, WhatsInsideSCJohnson.com. This way, they can make informed choices based on facts about our products. 

We don't summarize or simplify what's in our products. We provide a detailed list using the scientific names of the ingredients for full transparency.

And it's not just ingredients. Our listings also include the function of the ingredient in that particular product, a detailed description of the ingredient, and whether the ingredient appears on SC Johnson's list of potential skin allergens.

We introduced skin allergen disclosure in 2017. In the European Union, disclosure of 26 skin allergens is required. But when we developed our program, we analyzed about 3,000 data sets from public and industry sources for potential skin allergens identified on country regulatory lists, fragrance industry lists, dermatology clinic data and more. 

We concluded that for real transparency, 368 ingredients should be listed in our ingredient disclosure - and our plan was validated by an expert panel.

Also notable is the fact that we disclose fragrance ingredients on a product-specific basis, and share more than 99.99% of the fragrance ingredients in the formulas of our global brands. 

Often, suppliers want to make things like fragrance formulas confidential, since they see them as a competitive advantage. We negotiated extensive disclosure with our suppliers so just a tiny bit - 0.01% - is held back to protect their proprietary formulas.

At SC Johnson, we’re passionate about researching the ingredients we choose and being transparent about those choices. By going above and beyond in our disclosure, we help give people the information they need to make the right choices for themselves and their families.  

 

“[In 2009], SC Johnson made a commitment to global ingredient transparency.... By keeping our promise, we have brought ingredient transparency around the world, and in the process, we have helped motivate the industry toward greater transparency.”

– Fisk Johnson, Chairman and CEO, SC Johnson