PETA Turns Up the Heat on H&M, Mails Bloody ‘Sheep’ to CEO, Vows Nationwide Store Presence

For Immediate Release:
August 27, 2026

Contact:
Alex Payne 202-483-7382

On the heels of a recent investigation that found sheep bloodied, injured, and even killed in shearing sheds, PETA is getting louder and bolder in its push to get H&M out of the wool business. A bloodied, battered “sheep” named Lily is on her way to H&M Group President and CEO Daniel Ervér’s desk—the opening move in an escalating campaign that will bring gruesome sheep replicas to dozens of H&M store entrances from coast to coast, starting in Miami, Philadelphia, and Boston.

PETA is drawing on a decades-long playbook of high-impact protests, including occupying Anna Wintour’s Vogue Headquarters in 1993 and smearing fake blood on Jean Paul Gaultier’s Paris boutique in 2006, in its successful campaign to get nearly every major designer, retailer, and fashion magazine to drop fur. Now, PETA is turning its attention to wool and H&M—and Lily is only the beginning.

“Lily represents the blood, violence, and pain lurking behind H&M’s false reassurances of ‘responsible’ wool,” says PETA President Tracy Reiman. “A label can’t stop a shearer’s boot, and PETA won’t rest until wool at H&M follows fur into fashion’s past.”

PETA is calling out Ervér’s brand for duping consumers with “responsible wool” claims when a recent PETA Asia video exposé into a NATIVA-certified South African wool operation tied to H&M Group’s supply chain revealed workers kicking and stomping on terrified sheep, dragging them by their legs, and leaving them with gaping wounds after crude shearing. PETA entities have now released 17 exposés of over 150 wool industry operations in seven countries on four continents—revealing that even on self-proclaimed “ethical” and “responsible” farms, extreme cruelty and violence are rampant.

Sheep are highly social animals who grow depressed if isolated from their flock. Nearly three-quarters of Americans (73%) would likely reconsider buying wool if they learned sheep are abused even on self-described “ethical” or “responsible” farms, according to a recent survey of over 2,000 U.S. adults commissioned by PETA and conducted by The Harris Poll.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear”—points out that when it comes to the ability to feel pain, hunger, and thirst, a sheep is a dog is a boy. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.

PETA’s letter to Ervér follows.

August 27, 2026

Daniel Ervér

President and CEO

H&M Group

Dear Mr. Ervér:

Meet Lily. She’s been shorn bloody and left battered. While Lily isn’t a real sheep, the suffering she represents is, and we are sending her so that you can look squarely at what happens to sheep behind the reassuring language of your “responsible” wool.

PETA Asia recently investigated a NATIVA‑certified wool operation in South Africa that sells wool through a broker supplying H&M Group with “responsible” wool. Workers were filmed kicking sheep, striking them with shearing equipment and wood, dragging lambs by their legs, and shearing animals so roughly that they were left bleeding. This is not an isolated case: PETA entities have exposed cruelty at more than 150 wool‑industry operations across multiple continents, including at facilities certified to sell this so-called “responsible” wool.

Consumers are realizing that a label cannot stop a shearer’s boot, and a certification is not a shield for sheep. H&M cannot claim the reputational benefit of “responsible” wool while disclaiming responsibility when certified systems repeatedly fail animals. Materials once considered inevitable in fashion have disappeared from H&M’s collections before. Wool can—and should—be next.

Lily is only the beginning. Bloodied sheep like her will be appearing outside H&M stores across the United States, each time asking the same question: How much evidence of suffering will it take before you stop selling wool?

Drop wool, because sheep weren’t born to be worn.

Sincerely,

Tracy Reiman

President