A Weil team has successfully guided Avon Products, Inc. (“Avon”), the former U.S. holding company for the Avon International beauty brand, through its chapter 11 cases. Avon obtained court confirmation of its chapter 11 plan (the “Plan”) on September 24, 2025, and the plan was substantially consummated and became effective on October 7, 2025 – just over one year after Avon first commenced its chapter 11 cases.

Avon filed for chapter 11 on August 12, 2024, facing significant lawsuits alleging injury caused by Avon’s talc products and $1.3 billion of funded debt. With the guidance of a multidisciplinary Weil team, including lawyers in its restructuring, M&A, litigation, and finance practices, Weil fostered a global settlement among Avon, its parent, Brazilian cosmetics giant Natura &Co Holdings S.A. (“Natura”), and the official committee of unsecured creditors (the “Creditors’ Committee”) on December 6, 2024, that provided for Avon’s estates to receive or retain meaningful consideration and resolved the Creditors’ Committee’s objection to the sale of substantially all of Avon’s assets to Natura. The global settlement and sale resulted in significant assets remaining in the estates for distribution to creditors, including talc claimants, pursuant to the Plan.

Following the successful consummation of the settlement and sale, Avon, advised by Weil, negotiated the Plan with the Creditors’ Committee and other constituencies to administer the estates’ remaining assets. The cornerstone of Avon’s Plan was the establishment of a trust (the “Avon Liquidation Trust”), funded with a combination of cash, insurance rights, and retained estate causes of action, that will administer multiple funds for the benefit of talc claimants and other general unsecured creditors. The Plan received overwhelming support from creditors, including 100% of voting talc claimants and approximately 97% of the voting general unsecured creditors. 

Following a two-day contested confirmation hearing in July, the Court issued a memorandum decision on August 21 finding that Avon’s chapter 11 Plan was confirmable subject to certain modest modifications to make clear that the rights of all parties under Avon’s insurance policies are neither impaired nor expanded as a result of the chapter 11 cases. In the Court’s memorandum decision regarding the Plan, Judge Goldblatt emphasized more than once that the record contained a substantial body of evidence demonstrating that Avon, through its counsel, had taken note of issues arising in other mass tort cases and had set out from the outset of these chapter 11 cases “to do things right” and that the evidence presented at confirmation was broadly consistent with that representation. 

After a September 22, 2025 status conference, Avon filed a modified Plan to incorporate the Court’s prior rulings, which was confirmed by order of the Bankruptcy Court dated September 24, 2025. The Plan was, thereafter, substantially consummated and became effective on October 7, 2025.

The Weil team is led by Restructuring Department Co-Chair Ronit Berkovich, partner Matthew Goren and associates Alejandro Bascoy, Carlos Sardina, Alexandra Langmo, Melissa Dzenis-Garcia, Resilda Karafili, Jillian Ingrisano, Devin W. Burdo, and Immanuel Vorbach (Not Yet Admitted in New York); Complex Commercial Litigation partner Jessica Falk and associates Sydney Hargrove, Kathleen Stanaro, Rocco Recce, Jasmine Harris, Tiffany Kim, and Courtney Carpinello; Mergers & Acquisitions partner Mariel Cruz, counsel Barrett Schitka and associates Enrico Bueno Da Silveira Leite, Daniel Ruzi, and Gabrielle Fressle; Banking & Finance partner Andrew Yoon and associate Danielle Cepelewicz; Technology & IP Transactions partner Karen Ballack; and Head of M&A Tax and International and Cross-border Tax Devon Bodoh, partners Alfonso Dulcey and Jenny Doak and associates Jonathan Vita and Grant Solomon. In addition, Avon was advised by Ankura Consulting Group, LLC, Rothschild & Co, and Richards, Layton & Finger, P.A.