A Short History of the Drugstore Moisturizer

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The pump bottle of lotion on a drugstore shelf feels like it has always been there. In fact, it’s a fairly recent arrival. Here’s a short look at how it came to be.

Before the drugstore aisle

For most of history, people moisturized with fats, oils, and simple balms. We cover that older story in tallow and olive oil: an ancestral moisturizer pair.

Petroleum enters the jar

In the late 1800s, refined petroleum began to change how creams were made.

• In 1872, Robert Chesebrough received a US patent for petroleum jelly
• Around the same era, mineral oil and petrolatum began replacing plant oils such as almond oil in cold creams
• Along with other changes, this helped cold cream move to industrial-scale production

For how petrolatum compares with tallow on skin today, see Petrolatum vs. Tallow.

Creams in jars

Around the turn of the century, two kinds of cream became common:

• Cold cream, a rich mix of oil, wax, and water, often used to cleanse at night
• Vanishing cream, a lighter cream made with stearic acid that seemed to disappear on the skin

The first commercial vanishing cream appeared in Britain in 1892, and similar creams were on sale in the United States by the early 1900s.

The emulsifier breakthrough

Water and oil don’t stay mixed on their own. In 1911, Beiersdorf introduced NIVEA Creme, built on an emulsifier made from lanolin, the wax in sheep’s wool. The company describes it as the first stable water-in-oil cream suited to mass production.

That stability is much of what a drugstore moisturizer still relies on.

From one cream to many

• In 1916, one company began advertising its cold and vanishing creams together as a two-cream system
• After the First World War, creams were increasingly named by job: night cream, hand cream, foundation cream
• Over time, routines grew from one jar to several

How that marketing shaped what we trust is its own story, told in how we learned to trust lab lotions over tallow.

Rules and labels

• 1938: the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act brought cosmetics under federal law in the US
• 1977: ingredient lists on retail cosmetics, in descending order, became fully required
• 2022: the Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act added facility registration and product listing with the FDA

FAQ

When did ingredient lists appear on US cosmetics?

Rules were proposed in 1973, and after years of legal back-and-forth, ingredient labeling became fully effective in early 1977.

What’s the difference between cold cream and vanishing cream?

Cold cream is richer and oilier, and was traditionally used for cleansing. Vanishing cream is lighter and leaves little trace, so it became the daytime choice.

Where should I start with Reyic?

Reyic balms are grass-fed tallow and olive oil, handmade in the USA. Start with Au Naturel, the unscented jar, or compare every balm in the grass-fed tallow balm collection.

The drugstore moisturizer brought convenience and consistency to millions of shelves. If you’re curious about the older, simpler route, try Au Naturel, or browse the full collection.