Glad (company)

Infobox Company
company_name = Glad
company_
company_type = Unknown
foundation = 1963
location = flagicon|USAUSA
key_people =
industry = Plasticware
products = plastic wrap
revenue =
operating_income =
net_income =
num_employees =
parent =
subsid =
homepage = [http://www.glad.com/ www.glad.com]
footnotes =

Glad is an American company specializing in trash bags and other plastic storage containers.

History

The Glad brand originated in the United States of America in 1963 when the owner and CEO of the company, David Darroch, launched "Glad Wrap", a polyethylene film used as a food wrap.

Glad Wrap and Glad Bags were introduced in Australia in 1966. The brand originally belonged to Union Carbide, but was divested in 1985 to First Brands Corporation in the United States. In Australia, the Glad brand was acquired by Industrial Equity Limited in 1988, and then by National Foods Limited in 1991.

Australian History

Glad Wrap was invented in Australia by Union Carbide's research chemist, Dr Douglas Lyons Ford, in the early 1960's, working in Union Carbide Australia's Rhodes plant in Sydney, Australia. The film was made from polyethylene with a stickifier added, blow molded, slit and rolled. It was introduced to the American market in 1963 in competition with Saran wrap. In Australia, Glad was the first to introduce cling-type wrap to the market.

In order to promote the product, a competition was run in the Australian Women's Weekly asking readers to write in with suggested uses for the product. The winner of the competition was Lady Gwynnedd Casey, the wife of the then Governor-General of Australia, who suggested it could be used to cover the hors d'ouvres before guests arrived at her garden party. Second prize went to a woman from western Sydney, who suggested it could be used to wrap up different kinds of buttons in her sewing kit to keep them separate from one another.

Union Carbide purchased the Brisbane company, OSO, and in 1968, launched the OSO brand in competition with its own Glad brand. The OSO brand was made to be cheaper than, and inferior to, the Glad brand.

The "Glad Man"

The Glad Man is the Glad company's spokesman featured in many of their advertisements. He is an older gentleman with white hair and is always dressed in a white suit. In the 1960's he was known as the "Man From Glad", and was summoned to various households in order to save housewives from their domestically challenged spouses. He wore a trenchcoat and would arrive in a wild variety of spy type contraptions (such as a jet pack or gyroglider), in the style of "The Man from U.N.C.L.E" and ""

He has been portrayed by several actors over the years, most famously Tom Bosley. The trash bags' slogan is "Don't get mad! Get Glad!"

Mardi Gras 2006

In 2006, following Hurricane Katrina, Glad became the first official sponsor of Mardi Gras in New Orleans. This was a one time decision by the city government due to budget problems after the storm. Without this decision Mardi Gras 2006 might have been cancelled.

External links

* [http://www.Glad.com Glad's commercial web site]
* [http://www.glad.com.au/home/default.asp Glad Australia's commercial web site]