Wisk


Wisk was a brand of laundry detergent manufactured in the United States by Unilever and Sun Products.

History

Wisk was introduced in the United States by Lever Brothers Company in 1956 as the first liquid laundry detergent.
In 2008, Wisk was purchased by Vestar Capital Partners after Lever Brothers' parent company Unilever divested its North American laundry brands and combined with Vestar Capital Partners' Huish Detergents, Inc. to form The Sun Products Corporation.
In 2010, Wisk was re-launched with a new formulation with new packaging, featuring its new Stain Spectrum Technology and its ability to fight tough stains. A new advertising campaign was also launched, that features the "science of stain fighting". The brand came in a variety of formulations, including "Deep Clean", "High Efficiency", "Fresh Boost" and "Oxi Complete".
In June 2016, Henkel acquired Sun Products and discontinued the brand in favor of its own Persil brand, another laundry detergent.

Marketing

The brand was widely known for its successful "Ring Around The Collar" campaign introduced in 1968, spotlighting sometimes-difficult to treat stains that appeared on shirt collars, and the product's ability to help fight them. The campaign received significant criticism decades later for being misogynistic, with the implication that it was the fault of wives that their husbands left home with dirty collars.