Dear ,

For many calves, a hot iron in the face is just the beginning of years of torture.

A PETA exposé of cattle ranches in Brazil that supply JBS SA – the largest leather processor in the world – reveals that ranch workers dragged calves away from their mothers before twisting their necks and standing on their faces while using a hot iron brand to burn a symbol into their flesh.

For the next three years, these animals will endure beatings, electric shocks, and neglect, until the day they are kicked and shoved into the trucks that will take them to the slaughterhouse. There, workers will slit their throats and peel off their skin so that it can be turned into the leather we see in cars, furniture, footwear, belts, jackets, and accessories sold around the world.

From the cattle farms of Brazil to the hellish slaughterhouses in China where dogs are among the animals stripped of their skin to make the leather in gloves, cat toys, and other consumer goods, the global leather trade is responsible for nightmarish cruelty to animals.

Will you please make a generous donation to PETA today and help power our work to combat the cruelty of the leather industry, promote non-animal materials, and foster respect for all living beings?

It takes an average of three cows' hides to cover the interior of a single standard car (but up to eight for some models), and what those animals endure even before they're sent to slaughter makes it easy to see why the popularity of animal-friendly fabrics is growing.

Our exposé reveals that in addition to the face-branding of calves, adult cows are forced into chutes and painfully branded on the back. Workers applied hot irons without administering any pain relief at all, counter to Brazil's minimum animal-welfare recommendations. "Handling" on these ranches is typically extremely rough, involving beatings and sometimes electric shocks. The video shows that panicked cows in chutes were shocked, kicked, and pulled by their delicate ears and tails. The eyewitness also saw a calf with a severe maggot infestation, a cow with a swollen head, and animals with open, bloody wounds.

Every year, millions of cows are slaughtered at JBS slaughterhouses in Brazil. Workers slit their throats before removing their skin and sending it to JBS tanneries. In 2015, the most recent year for which records are available, JBS' 26 factories on three continents processed 10 million individual animals' skins – but much of the cruelty revealed in this exposé is far from unique to that company. Around the world, branding, electric shocks, and severe neglect – even of animals with serious, painful medical conditions – is commonplace in industries that use cattle, and PETA affiliates have documented similarly violent treatment during transport here in India and during slaughter in Bangladesh.

By making a much-needed gift today, you'll be strengthening PETA's work to stop animals from suffering for something as trivial as a car seat.

Synthetic and plant-derived materials are both compassionate and fashionable – and PETA's innovative campaigns are informing consumers, designers, and manufacturers every single day about sustainable, durable fabrics for which animals aren't harmed. Today, 13 automobile manufacturers, including BMW and Nissan, offer at least one completely vegan interior – and together with our international affiliates, we're continuing to push Toyota and other hold-out companies to follow their lead.

Please, think of the mother cows whose calves were torn away from them and mutilated and support our work to help them and all other animals. Together, we can put the brakes on cruelty.

Thank you for your compassion and generous support.

Kind regards,


Poorva Joshipura
Chief Executive Officer