Wrap It Up

Ralph and Dow Chemicals did.

Wrapping up his time at college, Ralph earned extra money washing beakers and glassware in a lab at Dow Chemicals. One day he noticed something odd … he couldn’t scrub one of the vials clean because of a strange substance coating it … so he called the coating eonite after the indestructible material in a comic book.

Well researchers at Dow were intrigued and figured out all sorts of uses for eonite as it was resistant to oxygen, water, acids and solvents. Pretty soon eonite was on planes and in cars and Dow had developed it into a thin film that could be easily be applied anywhere.

Then Dow did something it had never done before …. Up to that point everything Dow made was sold to commercial businesses … now with, eonite, they had a chance to market a product to consumers …. And that’s what they did … with amazing success.

Today, 80 years after Ralph Wiley discovered eonite in that lab there’s a roll of it or a competitor brand in virtually every kitchen. Don’t know eonite? Well that because early on Dow knew they needed a new name as no one was clinging to eonite. So Ralph’s boss came up with a new one … and renamed eonite for his wife Sarah and daughter Ann .. Sarah and Ann .. Saran Wrap.

Saran Wrap is a great idea because curiosity can lead to amazing results.