Procter & Gamble has removed the advertising claim "hair-free for two years" — and any wording resembling it — from all marketing for its Braun Skin-i Expert IPL hair removal device, after an investigation by Italy's competition authority, the Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (AGCM).

The case, first reported in February, centred on how the device's effectiveness was communicated to consumers. At issue was the durability claim attached to the at-home intense pulsed light device: the promise that users could remain hair-free for a two-year period. AGCM scrutinised whether that marketing claim was adequately supported in the forms in which it appeared across the product's advertising.

The regulator has now sanctioned a set of commitments offered by P&G to resolve the concerns raised during the investigation.

The first commitment is straightforward: the claims under scrutiny disappear from every form of product advertising. The second goes further and defines what P&G may say going forward. The company has committed to "use wording that makes no specific reference to the time required to achieve the intended effects or to their duration, removing any promise to deliver results lasting two years."

In practical terms, that bars not just the two-year claim itself but any timeline framing — whether about how quickly results appear or how long they last.

A third commitment changes the commercial terms attached to the device. P&G will extend the "100-day money back guarantee" on the Braun Skin-i Expert until 31 December 2026. The guarantee was otherwise valid until 30 June 2026. Under its terms, consumers can return the hair removal device within 100 days, without any restrictions, and receive a full refund of the purchase price.

The extension effectively doubles down on the company's risk-reversal strategy at a moment when its headline efficacy claim has been withdrawn. A 100-day, no-conditions refund window is a long runway in consumer appliance retail, and its prolongation to the end of 2026 gives shoppers substantially more time to test the device against their own results — and to exit with a full refund if those results disappoint.

For professional salons and clinics offering light-based hair removal, the case is a reminder of the regulatory pressure building around at-home IPL marketing claims. Durability promises have long been a competitive battleground between professional laser and IPL services and their retail counterparts; when a two-year hair-free claim is withdrawn under competition-authority scrutiny, the distinction between clinical-grade results and consumer-device outcomes becomes harder to advertise away.

For device manufacturers and retailers, the AGCM decision also signals a clear preference among European regulators for time-free efficacy language. Claims that quantify duration — months or years of hair-free results — now carry demonstrated regulatory risk in at least one major EU market, and the precedent invites similar scrutiny elsewhere.

Cosmetics Business has reached out to P&G for comment. The commitments now stand as the operative framework for how the Braun Skin-i Expert may be marketed in Italy, and observers will be watching whether P&G applies the same claim-free wording across its other European markets.