Warner-Lambert was ordered to stop making the claims, and to include in the next $10.2 million worth of Listerine ads specific mention that 'Listerine will not help prevent colds or sore throats or lessen their severity.' The advertisement run by Listerine added the preamble 'contrary to prior advertising'. In 1976, the Federal Trade Commission ruled that these claims were misleading, and that Listerine had 'no efficacy' at either preventing or alleviating the symptoms of sore throats and colds.

įrom 1921 until the mid-1970s, Listerine was also marketed as preventive and remedy for colds and sore throats. Among Lambert's assets was the original land for Lambert-St. The court, however, ruled in favor of Lawrence and the defendants, citing that the conditions were plainly-worded, implicit, and could be waived by ending production of the product. The company cited that the payments were based upon Listerine's formula having initially been a trade secret, but that since the formula had been published in 1931, the property no longer had a value, and that the indefinite agreement was legally unreasonable. Following the merger, Warner-Lambert attempted to back out of the aforementioned royalty agreements with Lawrence by filing a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. In 1955, Lambert Pharmacal merged with New York-based Warner-Hudnut and became Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical Company, and incorporated in Delaware with its corporate headquarters in Morris Plains, New Jersey. Twitchell writes, 'Listerine did not make mouthwash as much as it made halitosis.' In just seven years, the company's revenues rose from $115,000 to more than $8 million. Until that time, bad breath was not conventionally considered such a catastrophe. 'Can I be happy with him in spite of that?' one maiden asked herself. Listerine's new ads featured forlorn young women and men, eager for marriage but turned off by their mate's rotten breath. But it wasn't a runaway success until the 1920s, when it was pitched as a solution for ' chronic halitosis' - a then obscure medical term for bad breath. It was later sold, in distilled form, as both a floor cleaner and a cure for gonorrhea. Listerine, for instance, was invented in the nineteenth century as powerful surgical antiseptic. Listerine entered common household use after Jordan Wheat Lambert's son Gerard Lambert joined the company and promoted an aggressive marketing campaign. The Salvation Army, American Bible Society, and Wellesley College also held shares in Listerine royalties. Real estate broker John Reynolds bought a roughly 50% stake in the royalties in the 1950's, which he then transferred to the Archdiocese of New York, and was later resold to other parties to help fund the diocese. Most of these royalty shares are held by Lawrence's heirs. Lambert's licensing agreement with Lawrence required that he and his 'heirs, executors and assigns' be paid royalties by Lambert or its successors for each bottle sold in perpetuity, until such time that Lambert or its successors ceases manufacturing Listerine. Listerine was promoted to dentists for oral care in 1895 and was the first over-the-counter mouthwash sold in the United States, in 1914. Lambert subsequently started the Lambert Pharmacal Company, marketing Listerine.

Lawrence hoped to promote Listerine's use as a general germicide as well as a surgical antiseptic, and licensed his formula to a local pharmacist named Jordan Wheat Lambert in 1881. Lawrence named his antiseptic 'Listerine' in honor of Lister. Louis-based doctor Joseph Lawrence to develop an alcohol-based formula for a surgical antiseptic which included eucalyptol, menthol, methyl salicylate, and thymol (its exact composition was a trade secret). Inspired by Louis Pasteur's ideas on microbial infection, the English doctor Joseph Lister demonstrated in 1865 that use of carbolic acid on surgical dressings would significantly reduce rates of post-surgical infection.

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