Lifebuoy (soap)

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For other uses, see Lifebuoy (disambiguation).

Lifebuoy

Product type Soap

Owner Unilever

Country United Kingdom

Introduced 1895; 125 years ago

Markets Worldwide

1902 ad for Lifebuoy Soap

Magazine insert advertising Lifebuoy soap

Lifebuoy is a brand of soap marketed by Unilever. Lifebuoy was originally, and for much of its
history, a carbolic soap containing phenol (carbolic acid, a compound extracted from coal tar). The
soaps manufactured today under the Lifebuoy brand do not contain phenol. Currently, there are
many variants of Lifebuoy.

Contents

 1History
 2References in popular culture
 3Sponsorships
 4References
 5External links

History[edit]

Lifebuoy Soap Packaging. Photographed at the Museum in den Halven Maen, The Netherlands
Advertising material for Lifebuoy Soap listing the products many uses. Includes the tag line "Makes Health
Infectious." The list includes the use of the product in the bath, with an endorsement by an "eminent M.D.",
around the house as a general purpose cleaner, and in the kitchen as a drain cleaner.

Lifebuoy was introduced by Lever Brothers in 1895 in England. Originally a carbolic soap containing
phenol, different varieties were later introduced without the medicinal carbolic smell, such as the
coral-coloured Lifebuoy during the late 1950s and Lifebuoy Minty Refresher in 1966. [1] Lifebuoy was
one of the most popular soaps in the United States from approximately 1923 to the mid-‘50s, [2] when
perfumed soaps took over the market. It was the best selling medicated/health soap in North
America until roughly 1951. It was well known for its red and yellow packaging, red color and
octagonal shape, as well as its carbolic aroma. Sometime in 1951 or 1952, due to declining sales,
Lever Bros. experimented with adding perfumes to the soap, and made the changes permanent in
1954. Earlier experiments in 1936, 1938, 1939 and 1940 also added an artificial scent to the soap,
but generally lasted only one batch. Sales, however, continued to decline until 2006, when Lifebuoy
was officially completely pulled from the American market. Lifebuoy's popularity reached its peak
between 1932 and 1948. After World War Two, when more materials were available and rationing
was over, other more appealing soaps began to take hold of the market. Its popularity waned
steadily through the 1950s. In the mid/late 1960s it saw a popularity surge which would last through
1973. This was, in part, caused by the introduction and success of Lifebuoy White in the American
market. After this decline, the Lifebuoy brand was seen less and less in the American market. It was
pulled from American shelves starting in 2003 and was completely phased out of the American
market by 2006. Sometime in 2008 or 2009, Unilever released Lifebuoy Classic, a modern soap with
retro packaging and a medicated scent intended to be similar to that of the 1950s product. It saw
novelty success but was never embraced as a staple product in the American home. It is now
primarily manufactured as a gift intended to be reminiscent of A Christmas Story and is currently
sold in the official A Christmas Story website gift shop.
Although Lifebuoy is no longer produced in the US and UK, it is still being mass-produced
by Unilever in Cyprus for the UK, EU (on hold and under investigation) and Brazilian markets,
in Trinidad and Tobago for the Caribbean market, and in India for the Asian market. Unilever in
Cyprus and Trinidad and Tobago is manufacturing the Red Lifebuoy Soap with a carbolic fragrance,
but as of 1976 it no longer contains phenol.[citation needed] The Lifebuoy soap manufactured in India and
Indonesia for other markets including South and South East Asia has been updated to use red and
other colours with ‘modern’ aromas.[3]

Advert for Lifebuoy Soap from Animal Life and the World of Nature; A magazine of Natural History (1903).

References in popular culture[edit]

When the Philadelphia Phillies played at the Baker Bowl during the 1930s, an outfield wall
advertisement for Lifebuoy stated, "The Phillies use Lifebuoy". One night in 1935, a vandal added,
"And they still stink".[4] Variations of the joke were also employed by detractors of other losing teams.
The term "B.O.", short for "body odor", is often thought to have been invented by Lifebuoy for an
advertising campaign. It was actually coined by a company that made deodorant for women called
Odo-Ro-No in 1919, but Lifebuoy made the term famous. The Lifebuoy radio ad, parodied by
several Warner Brothers' Looney Tunes cartoons and MGM Cartoons, used a foghorn followed by a
"B.O." sound created using a Sonovox.[5][6][7]
It is the bar-soap used in the 1983 movie A Christmas Story by the main character Ralphie and his
family. After his mother washes his mouth out for saying "fuck", Ralphie wishfully dreams that he has
been blinded by "soap poisoning" and reduced to begging on the street. When his family sees him,
they collapse into melodramatic soap opera-like tears and his father cries out, "I told you not to use
Lifebuoy!" In the film, narrator Jean Shepherd noted his disgust toward the soap's taste, even
compared to other soap products of the era.[8]

Sponsorships[edit]
Lifebuoy has been the shirt sponsor of the Bangladesh National Cricket Team since 2018.[9]

References[edit]
1. ^ A History of Health Archived 2014-10-06 at the Wayback Machine,
lifebuoy.com
2. ^ "Supreme Court, Appellate Division- First Department"  – via Google
Books.
3. ^ "Unilever Lifebuoy brand information". Unilever. Retrieved  2013-03-
21.
4. ^ Baseball: Phillies near 10,000th loss, New York Times, June 12,
2007
5. ^ Intimidation Sells Bath Soap, Old-Time.com. Retrieved 2017-07-04.
6. ^ Who Invented B.O.? - Center for History and New Media at George
Mason University
7. ^ Lifebuoy Health Soap 1948 (audio), another commercial mentioning
B.O., Old Time Radio Fans. Retrieved 2017-07-04.
8. ^ "Film: A Christmas Story". TV Tropes. Retrieved  8 October  2012.
9. ^ "Unilever becomes Bangladesh Cricket team's sponsor". The Daily
Star. September 6, 2018.

External links[edit]
 Official website 

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 Products introduced in 1895
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