How did Preparation H & WD-40 get their names?

- Master-of-Disaster

Posted on May 10, 2012 in Business & careers, Home & Living, Other stuff

history names products trademarks

Where did Preparation H, WD-40 and Formula 409 get their names? Were the previous versions failures? Did Preparation F cause people to catch on fire? Did anyone survive the beta testing of WD-27? Seriously, though. How did these oddly-named products get their names?

WD-40

WD-40 is one of those things that belongs in every household and garage, along with duct tape. Remember: If it moves and it shouldn’t, use duct tape. If it doesn’t move and it should, use WD-40. (Check out a flow chart demonstrating this crucial engineering concept here.)

So is the combination of letters and numbers arbitrary? Is it someone’s initials and birthday? Or was there just a lot of trial and error involved?

The latter. According to company history, the story starts in 1953 with a small company (and I mean small, it was three people) called the Rocket Chemical Company. Their goal was to create a lineup of rust-preventing solvents and degreasers for the burgeoning aerospace industry. Though it took a number of tries to create a formula they were happy with — 40 of them, in fact — when they finally did find the solution, it was a good one: the original formula used in Water Displacement 40 back then is still the same formula of WD-40 sold on shelves today.

Preparation H

Like making jokes about all things butt-related isn’t funny enough, Preparation H is just begging for it. Hemorrhoids aren’t really any laughing matter if you have one — or so I’m told, at any rate — but you just can’t help but giggle when wondering if there were preparations A through G, and why they weren’t successful. Were they failures? Did people die horribly? I’ll wait till you finish giggling.

The truth is, there’s nothing so dramatic or amusing about the name Preparation H. Originally developed around 1935 by a researcher at the University of Cincinatti by the name of George Sperti, it was acquired by the company American Home Products (which became Wyeth in 2002 and bought by Pfizer in 2009).

Discovered during, of all things, cancer research, the ointment was found to be effective for the relief of hemorrhoids. In fact, the H simply stands for “hemorrhoid” and was allegedly a reminder for consumers that the ointment belonged on the, erm, rear instead of as a remedy for chapped lips — or a toothpaste, as it was originally sold in a nearly identical type of tube.

Formula 409

Although they’d like you to think that the world isn’t ready for Formula 410, the name Formula 409 is much like WD-40 — a story of persistence. A lot of persistence.

Although the urban legend has persisted for years that the name comes from the birthday of the inventor’s daughter, the truth (found under the “About Us” tab of the company website) is much simpler. It took inventor Morris Rouff and his brothers 409 attempts to create what was originally a heavy duty alkaline-based industrial degreaser in 1957. By 1960, Rouff had sold the formula to Chemsol, who dialed back the back the harshness and toxicity of the mix and marketed it for household use.

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