Kilmer House

One of the affiliate companies in the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies is known for its tradition of using famous actresses in its advertising.  As it turns out, actresses like Jennifer Garner in the U.S. and Deepika Padukone in India are not the first celebrities to endorse our products.  Some very well-known actresses (and some actors and athletes) were also singing the praises of one of our products almost 100 years ago, in the Nineteen Teens…  The product was Synol Soap, an antiseptic soap, and famous Broadway and vaudeville actresses of the day were writing to Johnson & Johnson to tell the Company about how much they liked the product and how they used it as part of their theater routines.

The most famous of those actresses was Louise Dresser, who appeared in 49 films and was one of the three nominees for the first-ever Academy Award for best actress for 1928.  In 1914, she was in a Broadway play called “Potash and Perlmutter” and wrote to the Company:

“ ‘Upon the recommendation of my physician, I have been using Synol Soap for the past year and have gotten so that I cannot do without it.  It is a most excellent preparation for the complexion and a wonderful mouth wash.  I have recommended it to all of my friends as an absolute necessity.’ “  [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. VII, No. 1, June, 1914, p. 14]

In the more than slightly melodramatic style of the day, Dresser continued:

“ ‘For the sake of humanity, I would suggest that you make known to the world the benefits that can be derived from this wonderful preparation.’ ” [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. VII, No. 1, June, 1914, p. 14]

An endorsement like that was of course way too good to pass up, so scientific director and chief publicity officer Fred Kilmer printed it in THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, the Company publication for retail pharmacists, along with the line drawing of Louise Dresser seen above.

Trixie Friganza

Trixie Friganza, a leading musical comedy actress known for her many roles and her social activism, wrote: “ ‘To me Synol Soap has proved itself indispensable for its many uses.  I have used it for several years and have found that none can compare with it as a toilet necessity, and I am never without it.  Wishing you continued success in your needful venture.’ ” [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol VII, No. 2, July, 1914,  p. 38] Besides being an actress, vaudeville headliner, and dedicated fan of Synol Soap, Trixie Friganza was also known for championing the struggle for women’s right to vote.

Public Domain photo of Trixie Friganza campaigning for women’s suffrage, courtesy of Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons

Illustration of Florence Reed from THE RED CROSS MESSENGER

Florence Reed, another well-known actress, also sent a letter to Johnson & Johnson.  She was in a very popular play during the 1914 theater season, and she, too, made the Company’s antiseptic soap a part of her backstage ritual.  She wrote:    “ ‘I have used thousands of toilet preparations in my career, but have found Synol Soap to be incomparable for the complexion, hair, scalp, and as a mouth wash.’ ”  [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. VII, No. 1, June, 1914, p. 14]

Ms. Reed was clearly someone who believed in products that could multitask.  Synol, which had a pleasant, slightly camphory smell, was antibacterial but mild enough for people to wash their hair and faces with it, and many of the actors and actresses used it to remove their heavy theatrical makeup.  (That heavy makeup, worn daily, could wreak havoc on the complexion.)  Stella Mayhew, an actress who appeared in many musicals and vaudeville reviews, wrote to tell Johnson & Johnson the following:

“ ‘Just a line to let you know that I have used your Synol Soap for the past few months and know of no other preparation that has any of the qualities that Synol has.  It is excellent in removing makeup.’ ” [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. VII, No. 1, June, 1914, p. 14]

Naturally, Fred Kilmer printed that excerpt from her letter in THE RED CROSS MESSENGER.

Sam Bernard used Synol Soap backstage on Broadway

It wasn’t just the women who were using Synol.  Sam Bernard, appearing in a play at the Schubert Theater, wrote to tell the Company that “ ‘Your Synol Soap has proven a splendid addition to my toilet articles.  I use it steadily and prefer it to all other such products.’ ” [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. VII, No. 1, June, 1914, p. 14]

Public domain photo of Valli Valli, courtesy of Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons

A popular European silent film actress with the unlikely name of Valli Valli also was a fan of Synol.  She wrote in a letter to Johnson & Johnson:  “ ‘It is absolutely one of the best preparations I have ever used in my career for keeping the skin in perfect condition.’ ”   [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. VII, No. 1, June, 1914, p. 14]

So what exactly was this product that actors and actresses of the silent film and vaudeville era couldn’t do without?  It’s another example of a product developed for doctors, surgeons and nurses that found wider use in society.  Synol Soap had been developed by Johnson & Johnson around 1900 in response to a request from physicians for an antiseptic, germ killing soap that they could use to wash their hands, disinfect instruments and clean their patients.  It came in cake form and liquid form (as shown above) in a glass bottle with a shaker top.  In the days before antibiotics, Synol was widely promoted for a variety of uses to help keep people and their families healthier.  Like all of the Company’s products, it worked well and, since Synol Soap was mild enough to be used like a regular soap, people were advised to do all kinds of things with it, from washing their hands and faces, to diluting it for use as a mouthwash, to shampooing their hair, to disinfecting their houses during spring cleaning.  It’s not surprising that actors and actresses, looking for an all-purpose reliable product to help wash their makeup off, keep their complexions clear and keep themselves healthy so they wouldn’t miss a performance, would write rave reviews about Synol Soap.

Kilmer made these celebrity Synol testimonials a feature of two editions of THE RED CROSS MESSENGER in 1914.  In other MESSENGERS, he printed Synol Soap testimonials from professional and amateur athletes.  With the outbreak of World War I in Europe in August of that year, the articles in THE RED CROSS MESSENGER took a more serious turn.  But it’s certain that retail druggists told their starstruck Synol Soap customers that some very famous faces were using Synol Soap too…just like they were.

It’s January, 1910: exactly 100 years ago.  It’s the start of a new year and a new decade, and Johnson & Johnson is marking that beginning by launching a major new advertising campaign for one of its consumer products:  JOHNSON’S® Shaving Cream Soap. 

The product had been introduced in the early 1900s, and was developed out of the Company’s medicated soaps that were manufactured for use by doctors, surgeons and patients.   It was it considered to be an excellent product by the consumers who used it, and it came in innovative packaging – a collapsible tube! – but it hadn’t achieved the popularity or critical mass enjoyed by some of the Company’s other products, like belladonna and kidney plasters.

Ad for Belladonna Plasters with its well-known slogan

The Famous Feels Good on the Back ad for Kidney Plasters

Those products each had a famous advertising slogan that made its way into popular culture.  The Company was looking for similar ways to attract some attention to JOHNSON’S® Shaving Cream Soap.  So in 1909, they tried this:

Calling All Retail Pharmacists – we need a catch phrase.  Someone?  Anyone?

When that didn’t achieve the desired result, Company management decided to apply the latest developments in the growing field of advertising to the product, and conduct a “modern” advertising campaign.

In 1910, before radio and television, that would of course be a print campaign.  Fred Kilmer, our scientific director and editor of THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, announced that the target audience would be (no surprise) men who shaved their faces.  Ironically enough, that subset of the population did not include Kilmer, who wrote so extensively about and helped market the product. 

Fred Kilmer, who probably did not use JOHNSON’S® Shaving Cream Soap on a regular basis.

Kilmer, as editor of THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, our publication for retail pharmacists, provided regular updates about the development of the advertising campaign before it launched.  THE MESSENGER printed articles talking about plans for the campaign, how it would roll out, and how retail pharmacists could participate.

Here’s what Fred Kilmer reported:

“The advertising will run continuously and the space used will be full pages and half pages and prominent locations; in certain instances the advertisements will appear in colors.”  [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. II, No. 7, December, 1909,  p. 314]

The ambitious advertising campaign was set to appear in the hugely popular Scribner’s Magazine, to take advantage of former President Theodore Roosevelt’s series of articles appearing in the publication.  System, a magazine targeted to businessmen, was also going to run the ads, as would the Sunday magazine sections of some of the major U.S. newspapers, the Literary Digest, Harper’s Weekly, The Saturday Evening Post and Collier’s, a popular magazine of the era.  Not to miss an opportunity to reach men who needed to shave, the ad campaign also included magazines for military officers, a magazine called Everybody’s Magazine (despite the title, it was chosen because of its large male audience, and it focused on investigative journalism) and The American Review of Reviews.   The ads offered a free trial tube of JOHNSON’S® Shaving Cream Soap to anyone who wanted to try it.  Interested customers would then be directed to the retail pharmacy nearest to them that carried the product.   Kilmer estimated that the campaign would bring an estimated two million new customers into retail pharmacies.  Needless to say, pharmacists were eager to participate.   Kilmer urged them to cut out the full-page magazine ads and exhibit them in their store windows, in order to draw people in. 

One of the Saturday Evening Post ads

The modern ad campaign was created by the J. Walter Thompson Company of New York, continuing the relationship that started when James Walter Thompson himself started working with founder Robert Wood Johnson on the Company’s advertising.  The ads were designed to be informative and convincing, and used techniques that Thompson pioneered, such as the more sophisticated use of product testimonials. 

An ad from 1919 using the more modern techniques

According to Fred Kilmer, the J. Walter Thompson agency’s mission was nothing less than the following:

“They will undertake and expect to succeed in placing the merits of Johnson’s Shaving Cream Soap before every man in the United States who has need for it.  It will be their work to send customers to the drug store, and to keep them going.”  [THE RED CROSS MESSENGER, Vol. II, No. 7, December, 1909,  p. 314]

Besides the magazine ads, there would also be a large number of displays, product booklets and other materials for the drugstores selling the product. 

Example of an in-store drugstore advertisement

So why would retail druggists care about the plans for the ad campaign?  Because as Kilmer explained, it wasn’t just designed to sell more JOHNSON’S® Shaving Cream Soap (although that was its primary goal).  It was also designed to get more people into the retail drug stores who sold the Shaving Cream Soap, thus increasing the druggists’ overall business.  So if druggists sold or decided to start carrying the product, they were able to participate in a campaign that had as its secondary goal increasing their business. If you were a retail druggist in 1910, you had to be excited by that.  It was another example of the close and cooperative relationship between the Company and its customers, which dated back to the founding of Johnson & Johnson, and would later find expression in the first paragraph of Our Credo. 

One day’s worth of letters — 3179 of them — requesting the free sample from the ad campaign

The modern ad campaign was a success, and spurred thousands of letters requesting the free samples from men eager to try the product.  In later years, customer testimonials to JOHNSON’S® Shaving Cream Soap would continue to be used in ads for the product, and be reprinted in THE RED CROSS MESSENGER.   The product never did get a slogan that made it into popular culture, though.