Good morning, Broadsheet readers! New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s former deputy chief of staff was charged with acting as a Chinese agent, there’s a racial pay gap for egg donors in the U.S., and the cofounder of the Laundress wants to warn other founders about what can go wrong post-acquisition.
– Bad deal? When Gwen Whiting sold her cleaning brand the Laundress to Unilever in 2019, it was a triumphant moment 17 years into her run as a boot-strapped founder, securing a reported $100 million exit to a giant of the Fortune Global 500.
Almost four years later, her product was recalled and taken off store shelves for nine months. Whiting now considers her decision to sell to Unilever a catastrophic mistake for her brand—and now that her non-disparagement agreement has expired, she wants to talk about it.
Whiting shared her experience with me in a new story for Fortune. She describes building the business on an SBA loan and credit card debt, a Unilever executive approaching her retail store staff about a potential acquisition, sealing the deal—and quickly spotting red flags. Unilever didn’t respond to request for comment and Whiting’s cofounder, Lindsey Boyd, declined to comment.
Whiting says that Unilever mismanaged the Laundress brand from day one post-sale. Things came to a head when, after Whiting had left the brand, customers began reporting rashes and other skin ailments. Unilever recalled the Laundress’s products. (The company now says products produced after July 2023 are safe to use).
You can read more details in my story here. Overall, Whiting wants to warn founders about what can go wrong after an acquisition—and remind founders that, despite pressure to exit, they often know what’s best.
“The reality was no one cared as much as I did,” she says. “I know what’s best, and I believed otherwise.”
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
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ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
- Criminal charges. Linda Sun, former deputy chief of staff to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, was charged with acting as a Chinese agent and pushing Beijing’s agenda, receiving millions of dollars in return. Sun was charged with eight criminal counts and was arrested with her husband yesterday; their lawyers did not respond to requests for comment. Wall Street Journal
- Raising prices. Canva, cofounded and led by CEO Melanie Perkins, is raising some of its subscription prices next year as the company offers more generative AI features for users. Subscriptions for global Canva Teams users are expected to increase by 300%. And in the U.S., some users saw their annual subscriptions go from $120 to $500. Fortune
- Donor disparity. In the U.S., white egg donors are paid up to eight times more than Black donors. A study found that white donors earned up to $100,000 per donation, while the most a Black donor made was $12,000; 78% of the donors in the study were white. Semafor
- Changing their minds. More men in red states are supporting reproductive rights after seeing firsthand their partners’ dangerous pregnancy experiences. Polling shows that 1 in 5 men considered abortion to be a top voting issue this year, compared to the less than 10% of men who thought so in 2019. Washington Post
MOVERS AND SHAKERS
Novocure, an oncology company, named Ashley Cordova chief executive officer. Currently, she is the company’s chief financial officer.
Uniqlo appointed Clare Waight Keller as creative director. Last year, Keller developed the collection Uniqlo: C line.
Christian Dior Couture named Benedetta Petruzzo managing director. Previously, she was Miu Miu’s chief executive officer.
PUMA appointed Tara McRae as senior vice president of marketing and brand strategy in North America. Most recently, she served as global chief marketing officer and digital officer at Clarks.
MiQ, a programmatic media partner, appointed Zuzanna Gierlinska as UK chief commercial officer. Previously, she was chief solutions officer at GroupM Nexus.
ON MY RADAR
Departing Salesforce CFO pulled off an ‘extremely rare’ C-suite move Fortune
Abortion has huge financial consequences in a woman’s life—and in the economy NPR
Can fashion ever have a conscience? Indré Rockefeller thinks so Washington Post
PARTING WORDS
“Having people see themselves in me is one of my greatest joys, because I want them to know that they can do this.”
— Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson on occupying a public role; she shares her story in her new memoir, Lovely One