Chapter 1: Overview of Marketing (Brief History and Mission Statement)

Mission Statement 

"As a company that strives to be the best truly global consumer product company, we are committed to doing business with integrity and respect for all people and for the world around us."

Brief History

The Colgate-Palmolive Company is an American multinational consumer products company focused on the production, distribution and provision of household, health care and personal products (including toothpaste and toothbrushes). In 1806, William Colgate, an English soap and candle maker, established a starch, soap and candle factory on Dutch Street in New York City under the name of "William Colgate & Company". In 1833, he suffered a severe heart attack, stopping his business' sales. After convalescence he continued with his business. In the 1840s, the firm began selling individual cakes of soap in uniform weights. In 1857 Colgate died and the company was reorganized as "Colgate & Company" under the management of Samuel Colgate, his son, who did not want to continue the business but thought it would be the right thing to do.In 1896, the company sold the first toothpaste in a tube, Colgate Ribbon Dental Cream (invented by dentist Washington Sheffield). Also in 1896, Colgate hired Martin Ittner  and under his direction founded one of the first applied research labs. By 1908 they initiated mass sales of toothpaste in tubes. 

In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the B.J. Johnson Company was making a soap entirely of palm oil and olive oil, the formula of which was developed by B.J. Johnson in 1898. The soap was popular enough to rename their company after it - "Palmolive". Around the start of the 20th century Palmolive, which contained both palm and olive oils, was the world's best-selling soap.A Missouri-based soap manufacturer known as Peet Brothers merged with Palmolive to become Palmolive-Peet. In 1928, Palmolive-Peet bought the Colgate Company to create the Colgate-Palmolive-Peet Company. In 1953 "Peet" was dropped from the title, leaving only "Colgate-Palmolive Company", the current name.