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The story
Founded by William Colgate in 1806.1
William Colgate, an English immigrant to the United States and devout Baptist, established a starch, soap, and candle factory on Dutch Street in New York City under the name William Colgate & Company in 1806.
In 1833, he suffered a severe heart attack, stopping his business's sales; after a convalescence he continued with his business. In the 1840s, the company 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 his similarly devout Baptist son Samuel Colgate, who did not want to continue the business but thought it would be the right thing to do. In 1872, he introduced Cashmere Bouquet, a perfumed soap.
In 1873, the company introduced its first Colgate toothpaste, an aromatic toothpaste sold in jars. In 1896, the company sold the first toothpaste in a tube, named 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, it initiated mass sales of toothpaste in tubes. Another of William Colgate's sons, James Boorman Colgate, was a primary trustee of Colgate University (formerly Madison University).
In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the B. J. Johnson Company was making a soap from palm oil and olive oil, the formula of which had been developed by Burdett J. Johnson in 1898. The soap was so popular that the company was re-named Palmolive in 1917. Around the start of the 20th century, Palmolive was the world's best-selling soap.
In June 1928, rumors started that "officials of the Palmolive-Peet Co. are negotiating to purchase the Colgate Co.", privately held by the Colgate family. Peet Brothers Soap Company of Kansas City had merged with Palmolive two years before the merger with Colgate. The merger combined the three oldest and largest soap and perfumery companies in the US and became effective on July 1, 1928. The combined company was named the "Colgate Palmolive Peet Company". The combined pre-merger sales in 1927 of the three companies exceeded $100,000,000 (equivalent to $1.875000000×109 in 2025). The newly combined company had seven US manufacturing facilities as well as factories in 14 foreign countries. In 1953, the companies became a joint venture, known as the Colgate-Palmolive Company.
From Wikipedia’s article on Colgate-Palmolive, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.8