Kiwi (shoe polish)
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The Kiwi logo
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| Owner | S. C. Johnson & Son |
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| Introduced | 1906 Australia |
| Previous owners | Sara Lee Corporation |
| Website | kiwicare |
Kiwi is the brand name of a shoe polish, first launched and sold in Australia in 1906 and as of 2005[update] sold in almost 180 countries. Previously owned by the Sara Lee Corporation since 1984, it was sold in 2011 to S. C. Johnson. It is the dominant shoe polish in some countries, including the United Kingdom and the United States, where it has about two-thirds of the market.
The polish was developed in Australia by William Ramsay who named it Kiwi after the flightless bird endemic to New Zealand, the home country of his wife, Annie Elizabeth Meek Ramsay. Its success in Australia expanded overseas when it was adopted by both the British and American armies in World War I.
In the UK, Kiwi was for many years manufactured at its British headquarters in Ealing (Brumwill Road, London W5 1DT). From here the factory manufactured for the UK market, and exported the Kiwi brand to much of Europe and the Middle East. In the mid-1970s as part of a major streamlining, the UK factory was closed with production switched to France. The UK operation moved to Surrey (Yately) becoming, effectively, a sales and marketing office, with distribution contracted to a third party.
In 1980 production for the UK market moved back to the UK, and was housed in a factory near Huddersfield. The UK head office was relocated to Maidstone, Kent, where Kiwi had other product interests.
Following the global merger with Nicholas Laboratories, the UK head office was again relocated to Slough at the Nicholas building on the Bath Road.
While a number of older leather preserving products existed (including the Irish brand Punch, which was first made in 1851, and the German brand, Erdal, which went on sale in 1901), Kiwi's invention in 1906 made it the first shoe polish to resemble the modern varieties, aimed primarily at inducing shine. Ramsay and fellow Scottish expatriate Hamilton McKellan began making boot polish in a small factory in 1904 in Melbourne, Australia. They developed and improved their new formula and Ramsay launched the product in 1906 and began marketing it in Melbourne. Ramsay loaded boxes of the polish on his horse and cart, and sold it to farmers to protect their boots.
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