Beiersdorf
Established 1882Founded in 1882 by pharmacist Paul Carl Beiersdorf, Beiersdorf AG is a German personal care company based in Hamburg. Their most iconic product is Nivea (which means ‘snow-white’ in Latin), a personal care brand specialized in skin- and body care. In 1890 Oscar Troplowitz took over the firm and developed a water-in-oil emulsion to which he added Eucerit, creating the first stable skin cream of its kind. The first cream containing Eucerit was Eucerin. In 1911 Beiersdorf introduced Nivea.
In addition to Eucerit, the ‘mother of all creams’ also contained glycerin and citric acid. It was fragranced with rose and lily-of-the-valley oils and came in a fancy art nouveau tin. In essence, Nivea cream has changed very little over the last 100 years. In 1925 the existing tin was replaced by a simple and more distinctive look: the iconic cobalt blue tin with white lettering, which is still in use today.
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