weDo

weDo, styled weDo/ Professional, is an eco-ethical haircare brand that launched in August 2019 in Sweden and the wider Nordic region [1]. It began as what its founders called the "unofficial eco lab" of Coty Professional Beauty, developed by a small group of internal beauty insiders together with scientists from the Wella Professionals haircare labs. The line pairs salon-oriented performance with vegan formulas, pared-back ingredient lists and recyclable packaging.

The brand no longer operates as an independent house. Following KKR's $4.3 billion carve-out of Coty's professional beauty division in 2020, weDo was transferred to the newly formed Wella Company, which now owns it. Its standalone site, wedoact.com, redirects to Wella's corporate pages, and the brand continues to be sold mainly through professional and salon channels rather than promoted as a headline label.

weDo was created in 2019 by a small group described only as "passionate beauty insiders who had the unique chance to start a new brand from scratch." The individuals are not publicly named. Rather than building from nothing, the team co-developed the formulas with the scientists of the Wella Professionals haircare labs and worked alongside hairdressers, positioning the result as a professional product with an environmental focus.

The company frames the brand as an "unofficial eco lab" of Coty Professional Beauty, and states its purpose as helping people "transition to a happier and more sustainable lifestyle, for a more beautiful self and a more beautiful planet."

weDo launched first in Sweden and the Nordics on 20 August 2019 [1]. A wider rollout to the UK, the rest of Europe and the United States followed in January 2021, distributed through selected salons and the online retailer lookfantastic.com [3]. Because of this staggered release, sources differ on the brand's start date: the original Coty launch places it in 2019, while later trade coverage of the broader European launch is dated to 2021. The 2019 Nordic launch is the brand's founding; 2021 marks the international expansion.

In February 2022, actor Phoebe Dynevor was announced as weDo's first Advocate for Positive Change [2]. Around the same time, the company reported that its partnership with the social enterprise Plastic Bank had removed more than 10 million plastic bottles from the environment.

At launch, weDo sat within Coty Inc., described in the launch materials as one of the world's largest beauty companies [1]. Ownership then changed hands: in 2020, KKR's $4.3 billion acquisition of Coty's professional beauty division created the standalone Wella Company, and weDo moved into that portfolio [2]. Wella's own press materials later described weDo as having been "created by a small group of people within Wella Company," reflecting its current standing as a Wella-owned brand [2]. It sits alongside sister brands including Clairol, Sassoon, Sebastian Professional, Nioxin and OPI.

weDo describes itself as eco-ethical, offering vegan and cruelty-free products with "up to 50% less ingredients than average" and 100% recyclable packaging [1]. Its stated tagline frames it as "more than a brand," calling it "a mindset; a call to action; a community." The brand targets millennial and Gen Z consumers looking for professional-grade haircare with a lower environmental footprint [3].

The range centres on rinse-out and leave-on haircare, built around collections such as Light & Soft and Moisture & Shine, each spanning shampoo, conditioner and mask. Hero ingredients include ethically sourced murumuru and cupuaçu butters, olive oil, upcycled macadamia oil, bamboo water, organic argan oil and rooibos extract.

Its most-cited product is the No Plastic Shampoo Bar, which the company says is 95% natural origin, lasts more than 80 washes and uses 99.8% biodegradable ingredients [3]. The formulas rely on two signature approaches the brand names as sulfate-free cleansing using low natural-origin surfactants and silicone-free coating derived from olive oil. weDo states its products are certified vegan by The Vegan Society and cruelty-free by Cruelty Free International, and are formulated without sulfates, silicones or artificial dyes [1].

Sustainability is central to weDo's positioning. The company reports natural-origin content between 93% and 99.7%, packaging that is fully recyclable and made with up to 94% recycled plastic, and a commitment to remove eight plastic bottles from the environment for every product sold through its Plastic Bank partnership [2]. Marie Claire UK noted the brand's own acknowledgment that it "isn't perfect but continuously strives for improvement."

At the Marie Claire UK Hair Awards 2021, weDo Professional was named Best Sustainable Haircare Brand [4]. The No Plastic Shampoo Bar was separately recognised in the same awards for having the best natural formula in the shampoo category [5].

weDo is an acquired brand, integrated into the Wella Company portfolio rather than run as an independent house [2]. It remains available through professional and salon channels and Wella's professional store, but its public profile has been limited: the most recent major announcement was the Phoebe Dynevor partnership in February 2022, and the original brand site now redirects to Wella's corporate pages. Distribution continues while active marketing appears to have wound down.