12/09/2025
Did you see this in the news yesterday?
I felt shocked when I received an email from Head Office that to me felt “out of the blue”. As an advisor I am sharing what was said with you so you are as aware as I am and able to take it into account when considering using Weleda products.
Weleda launches new enquiry into its historic connection to Dachau
Dear Rachael,
At Weleda, we condemn the atrocities of the regime in Germany during the Second World War in the strongest possible terms. Fascism, antisemitism, racism, or extremist ideology have no place with us. Weleda is, and always must be, a place of humanity. “Never again” expresses our conviction.
Weleda was founded in 1921 and has a long history. This includes the years of the Second World War, which brought unimaginable suffering across the world and represents the darkest chapter in our company’s own history, which we must acknowledge.
A new book, published on 8 September 2025 in Germany, has revealed links between Dachau concentration camp and the Schwäbisch Gmünd branch of Weleda during the war. Weleda has now commissioned further independent research to establish the facts in full.
Our position today
We remember with deep compassion the many thousands of people who suffered or were murdered in Dachau concentration camp and at other sites of terror during those years. We have been shocked and saddened to learn of our company’s links, in any way, to those atrocities.
We welcome further research to bring as much truth to light as possible, so that a clearer understanding can be reached.
“All these works serve as an impetus for us to thoroughly re-examine our company’s history in detail through a major independent study,” says Tina Müller, CEO of Weleda. “And, of course, we will make the results accessible to everyone.”
Weleda has commissioned a comprehensive study by the Society for Corporate History (GUG), which will be published upon completion, expected in early 2027.
Today, Weleda is active in 50 countries worldwide. We stand for tolerance, diversity, and humanity.
Anne Sudrow book shines new light on Weleda’s past
Recently on 8 September 2025 historian Anne Sudrow published her book Seeds of Violence. The “Herb Garden” in Dachau since 1945, commissioned by the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site. Her book examines the significance of organic farming in the Dachau concentration camp, the intentions behind the project, the impact on camp prisoners and implications for those involved. The book includes details about Weleda’s connections during that time, which may not have been fully explored in previous research.
The day before its publication, the German magazine Der Spiegel reported details from the book, also suggesting that aspects of Weleda’s history may still not have been fully examined. Weleda has now pledged to investigate this further. However many of the questions raised by Der Spiegel have previously been asked and answered, and over the years Weleda has opened its archives to other historians to shine further light on this period of our history.
Over the generations we have allowed access to our company archives to try and understand the circumstances Weleda faced at that time and how those responsible acted. In 2023, we commissioned the Gesellschaft für Unternehmensgeschichte (Society for Corporate History) to conduct an expert report on the years 1933 to 1945, which was published in 2024.
Previously in the 1990s, historian Uwe Werner conducted research in the Weleda AG archives regarding the N**i period, publishing his book Anthroposophists in the Time of National Socialism in 1999. A few years later, his book Weleda from 1921–1945 appeared, in which Werner described the company’s founding and its vision of a social, ecological, and economic idea. He characterized the N**i years as “survival in an inhumane environment.” While not an active form of resistance, Werner argued, it could be described as passive resistance. Other scholars, however, have contradicted Werner’s portrayal of anthroposophists as entirely uninvolved or even victims of the N**i era.
Weleda has also granted repeated archive access to historians Peter Selg, Susanne H. Gross, and Matthias Mochner. The first volume of their three-part study appeared in 2024: Anthroposophy and National Socialism. The Anthroposophical Medical Profession. The second volume, Anthroposophy and National Socialism. Weleda and Wala, the Anthroposophical Pharmaceutical Companies 1933–1945, deals in part with Weleda’s complex history during the difficult years of the N**i dictatorship, and was published in August 2025.
The 2024 research of the GUG focused on Weleda’s connections to the Dachau concentration camp doctor Sigmund Rascher, as well as the activities of former Weleda gardener Franz Lippert in the Dachau camp’s herb garden. The GUG also examined, in various archives, questions concerning the employment of forced labourers, the issue of “Aryanization”, and the political stance of the company’s leadership at the time. This research established that none of the management team at Weleda were members of the N**i party or its affiliated organisations. It also confirmed that Weleda was not involved in Aryanization. However it did reveal that Weleda ordered some plants from the Dachau concentration camp herb garden. It is not clear what these ingredients were intended for.
Historical context 1933 to 1945
The Anthroposophical Society in Germany was banned by the N**is on November 1, 1935, and anthroposophists were a marginalized group in the Third Reich. With its links to anthroposophy, Weleda repeatedly faced the risk of being shut down during this time, unless it could justify its existence. Staff would have lost their jobs, been conscripted, or faced an even worse future in the camps. Weleda’s survival strategy in Germany was to continue to manufacture products that were relevant for the German forces.
Weleda’s frostbite cream
In 1943, Weleda delivered 20 kilograms of frostbite cream to the Munich home address of Dr Sigmund Rascher, then a Luftwaffe staff doctor, for the Wehrmacht armed forces. This was a cream to help with frostbite. Rascher was later revealed to have conducted secret experiments on prisoners in Dachau for the SS. In Rascher’s inhumane experiments, inmates at Dachau were subjected to hypothermia. Both the GUG and the research team led by Peter Selg conclude that there is no evidence Rascher used the Weleda cream in his experiments. Nor did those responsible at Weleda appear to have knowledge of Rascher’s human experiments at Dachau. However, Selg and colleagues have speculated that individual Weleda employees, due to personal contacts with Rascher, may possibly have known about his experiments despite the high level of secrecy. Currently it cannot be ruled in or out, which is the difficult truth at present. The extent of Rascher’s experiments was exposed at the end of the 1990s, at which point Weleda learned of them and subsequently issued a written apology to the organization Children of the Holocaust (AKdH). Due to its tragic history, Weleda Frost Cream is no longer manufactured by or available from Weleda UK, out of respect for those that suffered or lost their lives at Dachau.
What was Franz Lippert’s connection to Weleda?
Franz Lippert, who had managed Weleda’s medicinal plant garden in Schwäbisch Gmünd in Germany, ended his employment at Weleda in autumn 1940 after 16 years. He then worked briefly at in Trittau (near Hamburg) before joining the German Research Institute (DVA) facilities in Dachau in September 1941. The herb garden was part of the Dachau concentration camp. Lippert remained until March 1945. The later war crimes tribunal against Lippert was dropped in September 1948 on the grounds that he was “not incriminated at all.” According to sworn statements by former prisoners, Lippert repeatedly tried to ease the situation of inmates. He died in 1949.
Weleda UK
10 September 2025
