Natura & Co

In 2024, Natura & Co executed one of retail's most dramatic examples of controlled decomposition. The company recorded an R$8.9 billion net loss, driven largely by a non-cash R$7.0 billion charge when Avon Products filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Rather than let the infection spread, Natura performed surgical amputation: cutting 1,100 employees (25% of Avon's headcount), mothballing underperforming brands, and selling The Body Shop and Aesop. This is autophagy at corporate scale—breaking down damaged organelles to recycle their components.

The strategy mirrors starfish autotomy or branch abscission in trees: sacrifice the infected limb to save the organism. While Avon collapsed, Natura's core brand grew 21% in Q4 2024, demonstrating protected germline viability. The company completed "Wave 2" integration in Brazil, merging Natura and Avon's distribution networks from multilevel to bilevel commercial models—essentially fusing two circulatory systems while one was hemorrhaging.

By 2025, the remaining tissue shows recovery signals. Q1 revenues grew mid-teens in Spanish-speaking markets and high single-digits in Brazil. EBITDA margins improved to 15%. The decomposition released R$524 million in underlying net income once non-recurring charges cleared—nutrients liberated from dead tissue. This is textbook resource reallocation: what kills undisciplined organisms (sunk cost attachment) becomes survival strategy when executed with biological precision.

Natura now operates as streamlined organism: consolidated holding structure merged into Natura Cosméticos in April 2025, eliminating redundant corporate layers. The lesson: sometimes growth requires controlled death. Organisms that can't perform autophagy accumulate damaged proteins and die. Companies that can't decompose failing divisions suffer the same fate.