Unilever: Margarine Meets Soap, Dove vs. Axe and the 2026 McCormick Deal

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Unilever was formed in 1930 when Dutch margarine maker Margarine Unie merged with British soapmaker Lever Brothers, two companies that had been bidding against each other for the same palm oil, whale oil and tallow. During the Second World War, profits trapped in the U.S. and U.K. were spent on local businesses such as Thomas J. Lipton tea and Batchelors peas. As margarine sales stagnated and Procter & Gamble's synthetic detergents gained ground, Unilever moved into Sunsilk, Dove and Good Humor, then bought Brooke Bond, Pond's and, in 2000, Ben & Jerry's, SlimFast and Bestfoods, which brought Hellmann's and Knorr. In 2004 it ran Dove's Real Beauty campaign alongside Axe body spray ads aimed at teenage boys.

Under CEO Paul Polman it sold its spreads business, including Flora and I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, to KKR in 2017 for nearly 7 billion euros, the same year it fended off a $143 billion takeover bid from Kraft Heinz. A Reuters investigation found Unilever lobbying in India, the Philippines and Sri Lanka against bans on multilayer sachets it produces by the billions each year. It stayed in Russia after 2022, where profits doubled to about 108 million euros, before selling its Russian and Belarusian business to Arnest Group in late 2024. It then spun off the Magnum Ice Cream Company in November 2025, bought Dr. Squatch for $1.5 billion and agreed in March 2026 to combine most of its food arm with McCormick & Company.

• Unilever paid about $1 billion for Dollar Shave Club and also bought Seventh Generation after the Kraft Heinz bid.
• The company now works with a network of roughly 300,000 digital creators and influencers instead of top-down TV campaigns.
• The U.K. Competition and Markets Authority's greenwashing probe of Unilever did not close until late 2024.
• In 2021 Florida put Unilever on a scrutinized companies list after Ben & Jerry's stopped sales in Israeli-controlled territories.
• The McCormick deal created a sauces and spices business valued at over $65 billion and gave Unilever a $15.7 billion cash payout.