Mustela

Mustela is a French skincare brand specialising in care for babies, children and expectant mothers. It was founded in 1950, when entrepreneur Paul Berthomé partnered with the pharmacist Claude Guillon to create what the company describes as the very first baby cleansing milk, formulated specifically for infant skin [1]. The brand is the flagship of Laboratoires Expanscience, a French dermo-cosmetics company that remains family-owned and independent and is today led by Jean-Paul Berthomé, the founder's son.

The brand is closely tied to the French pharmacy tradition, where it is sold as a dermatological care line for the whole family from birth. Its products are distributed in close to 120 countries, and 85% of them are manufactured in France, at the company's site in Epernon in the Eure-et-Loir department.

⚑ Thinner sourcing. The article relies largely on the brand's own statements (T2–T3). Glowpedia is seeking independent sources.

The story begins in 1950 with the partnership between Paul Berthomé, an entrepreneur, and Claude Guillon, a pharmacist [1]. Their first product, a cleansing milk designed for the delicate skin of infants, became the foundation of both the Mustela name and its parent company. Because that cleansing milk was the company's first product, the brand and Laboratoires Expanscience share the same 1950 founding date; no separate founding year exists for the brand on its own.

From the outset the company positioned itself around a single, consistent ambition. According to Mustela, that ambition has stayed the same across generations: "to be by parents' side and make their lives easier." The brand has remained family-controlled throughout its history.

Mustela built its identity gradually around research and child-focused care. In 1977 the company began extracting botanical ingredients in-house using what it calls green technologies. In 1982 it established the Mustela Foundation, a body dedicated to research on child development; the foundation supports university research, field initiatives and public awareness, and over more than forty years it has awarded more than 250 research prizes and grants.

Later milestones reflect a shift toward formal sustainability and governance commitments. The company joined the United Nations Global Compact in 2004. In 2018, parent Laboratoires Expanscience became the first French pharmaceutical and dermo-cosmetics laboratory to obtain B Corp certification [7]. In 2022 it adopted the legal status of a société à mission, a French designation for a company that writes social and environmental goals into its statutes [4]. The company describes itself as having spent 75 years supporting families.

Mustela is owned and operated by Laboratoires Expanscience, described as a pharmaceutical laboratory specialising in dermo-cosmetics, dermatology and rheumatology. The company is led by Jean-Paul Berthomé as president and Sophie Robert-Velut as chief executive [7]. Mustela is its primary brand; the wider portfolio includes dermatological and pharmaceutical products such as Piasclédine 300, Effizinc, Hyalexo and Procuta [7]. According to Wikipedia, Laboratoires Expanscience reported revenue of 364.3 million euros in 2024, with 78% of that generated outside France [7].

The company's headquarters are recorded at Paris La Défense [7], while its main manufacturing operations are based at the Epernon site in the Eure-et-Loir department, in use since 1957.

Mustela presents itself as a maker of natural-origin skincare for the entire family, beginning at birth, and frames its purpose around supporting parents. The company says its products are designed to be "safe, effective and always gentle," and that it puts each formula through extensive safety validation, citing more than 450 tests and measures. Its stated values link the two sides of the brand: that caring for children also means caring for the planet.

The brand is also strongly associated with the French pharmacy beauty category, where it is positioned as a trusted dermatological option combining neonatal skin expertise with plant-based ingredients.

Mustela's ranges are organised around three areas: baby and child care, maternity, and family face and body care. Signature products include the Hydra Bébé facial cream, the Maternité stretch-mark cream and a multi-purpose balm made with three avocado extracts.

The brand's best-known proprietary ingredient is Avocado Perseose, which it describes as a patented active ingredient unique to Mustela products [5]. According to the company, it is derived from organic avocados and helps strengthen the skin barrier of babies' immature skin by stimulating the production of proteins and lipids [5]. The avocados are upcycled — sourced from fruit deemed unsuitable for food because of its size, colour or shape — and processed at a dedicated factory the company set up in Lima, Peru, where the sugar, oil and polyphenols are extracted. Other ingredients the brand highlights include sunflower, beeswax and schisandra.

Mustela states that some of its products carry organic certification and that a number of its formulas are vegan. A third-party medical review reported that the Maternité stretch-mark cream is vegan and contains 96% naturally derived ingredients, and that it has been tested under dermatological, gynaecological and paediatric control [8]. The same review noted a caveat applying to the whole product category: that no clinical studies have proven any topical cream to be genuinely effective at preventing or removing stretch marks [8].

In a parent-tested roundup of baby skincare, the UK title MadeForMums named the Hydra Bébé facial cream "best for faces," describing it as a gentle cream suited to dry or irritated skin [9]. The brand is also frequently cited in French-beauty coverage for its expertise in neonatal dermatology paired with plant extraction [10].

Sustainability is central to how Mustela describes itself, and several of its commitments are externally framed. The company's greenhouse-gas reduction trajectory has been approved by the Science Based Targets initiative, with stated goals of cutting emissions 35% by 2030 and 81% by 2050 against a 2019 baseline. Its Epernon site has run on 100% renewable electricity since the end of 2022, with renewable energy reaching 69.7% of the site's overall energy use in 2024. The company also reports that, through eco-design measures, 310 tonnes of virgin plastic were saved between 2018 and 2024. The brand's B Corp certification, obtained in 2018, anchors these claims within an external assessment framework [7].

Mustela is active and operates globally, with products sold in close to 120 countries. As the flagship brand of Laboratoires Expanscience, it continues to publish sustainability reporting, with its most recent figures covering 2024, and it retains both its B Corp certification and société à mission status.