| Type | Public (NYSE: KMB) (BMV: Kimber) S&P 500 Component |
|---|---|
| Industry | Paper Products |
| Founded | Neenah, Wisconsin (1872) |
| Headquarters | Irving, Texas, United States |
| Key people | Thomas J. Falk, CEO/Chairman Mark A. Buthman, SVP/CFO |
| Products | Kleenex Huggies Kotex Depend Scott VIVA Cottonelle Andrex Pull-Ups GoodNites Little Swimmers Poise Neat Sheet |
| Revenue | US$19.1 Billion (FY 2009)[1] |
| Operating income | US$2.67 Billion (FY 2009)[1] |
| Net income | US$1.88 Billion (FY 2009)[1] |
| Total assets | US$19.2 Billion (FY 2009)[2] |
| Total equity | US$5.41 Billion (FY 2009)[2] |
| Employees | 56,000 (July 2010) |
| Website | http://www.Kimberly-Clark.com |
Kimberly-Clark Corporation (NYSE: KMB, BMV: Kimber) is an American corporation that produces mostly paper-based consumer products. Kimberly-Clark brand name products include "Kleenex" facial tissue, "Kotex" feminine hygiene products, "Cottonelle", Scott and Andrex toilet paper, Wypall utility wipes, "KimWipes" scientific cleaning wipes, and "Huggies" disposable diapers. Based in Irving, Texas, it has approximately 56,000 employees. Kimberly-Clark UK holds a Royal Warrant from Queen Elizabeth II and the Prince of Wales in the United Kingdom.
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Kimberly, Clark and Co. was founded in 1872 by John A. Kimberly, Havilah Babcock, Charles B. Clark, and Franklyn C. Shattuck in Neenah, Wisconsin with US$30,000 capitalization.[3] The group's first business was operating paper mills, which the collective expanded throughout the following decades. In 1914 the company developed cellu-cotton, a cotton substitute used by the United States Army as surgical cotton during World War I. Army nurses used cellu-cotton pads as disposable sanitary napkins, and six years later the company introduced Kotex, the first disposable feminine hygiene product. Kleenex, a disposable handkerchief, followed in 1924. Kimberly & Clark joined with The New York Times Company in 1926 to build a newsprint mill in Kapuskasing, Ontario, Canada. Two years later, the company went public as Kimberly-Clark.
The firm expanded internationally during the 1950s, opening plants in Mexico, Germany and the United Kingdom. It began operations in 17 more foreign locations in the 1960s. The company formed Midwest Express Airlines from its corporate flight department in 1984. Kimberly-Clark's headquarters moved from Neenah, Wisconsin to Irving, Texas the following year.
In 1991, Kimberly-Clark and The New York Times Company sold their jointly owned paper mill in Kapuskasing, Ontario. Kimberly-Clark entered a joint venture to produce personal care products in Argentina in 1994 and also bought the feminine hygiene units of VP-Schickedanz (Germany) and Handan Comfort and Beauty Group (China).
Kimberly-Clark bought Scott Paper in 1995 for $9.4 billion.[3] In 1997, Kimberly-Clark sold its 50% stake in Canada's Scott Paper to forest products company Kruger Inc. and bought diaper operations in Spain and Portugal and disposable surgical face masks maker Tecnol Medical Products. Augmenting its presence in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, in 1999 the company paid $365 million for the tissue business of Swiss-based Attisholz Holding. Adding to its offerings of medical products, the company bought Ballard Medical Products in 1999 for $744 million and examination glove maker Safeskin in 2000 for about $800 million.
Also in 2000, the company bought virtually all of Taiwan's S-K Corporation; the move made Kimberly-Clark one of the largest manufacturers of consumer packaged goods in Taiwan. The company later purchased Taiwan Scott Paper Corporation for about $40 million and merged the two companies, forming Kimberly-Clark Taiwan. In 2001, Kimberly-Clark bought Italian diaper maker, Linostar, and announced it was closing four Latin American manufacturing plants. Kimberly-Clark Sub-Saharan Africa's vision is ambitious – nothing less than turning the $250 million business into a $1 billion business by 2015.[4]
In 2002, Kimberly-Clark purchased paper-packaging rival Amcor's stake in an Australian joint venture. Adding to its global consumer tissue business, in 2003 Kimberly-Clark acquired the Polish tissue-maker Klucze.
In early 2004 Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Thomas Falk began implementation of the global business plan the company detailed in July 2003. The firm combined its North American and European groups for personal care and consumer tissue under North Atlantic groups and was working to ensure that Asian, Latin American, and Eastern European markets were supplied, specifically in the areas of value-tiered diapers, light-end incontinence, and health care products.
Current members of the board of directors of the Kimberly-Clark Corporation are: John Alm, Dennis Beresford, John Bergstrom, Abelanrdo Bru, Pastora Cafferty, Robert Decherd, Thomas Falk, Claudio X. Gonzalez, Mae Jemison, Linda Rice, Marc Shapiro, and Craig Sullivan.[5]
Midwest Airlines began in 1948, when the Kimberly-Clark Corporation began providing air transportation for company executives and engineers between the company's Neenah, Wisconsin headquarters, and company owned paper mills.
In 1969, K-C Aviation was born from the company's air operations, and was dedicated to the maintenance of corporate aircraft. After the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, Kimberly-Clark and K-C Aviation decided to form a regularly scheduled passenger airline, and out of the initiative, Midwest Express was started on June 11, 1984. The name of the airline was shortened to Midwest Airlines in 2003.
In 2005, Greenpeace launched a campaign against Kimberly-Clark because the company had been linked to the logging of ancient Boreal forests. The environmental organization charged that Kimberly-Clark was using more than 3 million tonnes of pulp a year from forests to produce tissue products, such as the Kleenex brand.
Greenpeace ended its campaign in August 2009, following the release of a new environmental policy by Kimberly-Clark. The two organizations announced that they were moving "away from conflict to a new collaborative relationship to further promote forest conservation, responsible forest management, and the use of recycled fiber for the manufacture of tissue products."[6]
Kimberly-Clark has a target to purchase 100% of wood fiber from suppliers that gain independent sustainability certification, with a preference for Forest Stewardship Council-certified fiber. Kimberly-Clark stated that by the end of 2010, it had achieved 98% of this target. [7]
Brand name for Bath products. Product forms include premium bath tissue and flushable moist wipe products.
Depend is a brand name for incontinence products worn by adults.
GoodNites are absorbent disposable underwear manufactured by Kimberly Clark (makers of Huggies Diapers and Depend Briefs) made primarily for children and teens who still wet the bed at night. The ages average from 5 to 15 years of age (though smaller adults with a 30-inch (760 mm) waist or thinner can fit the larger ones as well). They can also be used for daytime protection. They all come in one absorbency. They are ideal for children with "weak bladders" who feel the need to urinate frequently but cannot get to the bathroom as often as they need to. They hold up to a urination and a half. GoodNites go on and off like regular underwear but have the absorbency of a diaper. They are not recommended for children who cannot feel the need to urinate or for fecal incontinence. They can be worn for long car trips or even to school for children who are accident prone. This product is also popular among AB/DLs.
When GoodNites were first put on the market in 1994, they were plain white without designs, were unisex, and came in two sizes: Medium (45–65 lb) and Large (65–85 lb) In 1998, a third size, Extra Large (85–125 lb) was added. They are still sold in this form in countries outside North America as Drynites. In mid-2004, the GoodNites design was changed for the American market so that they have "custom protection" for boys and girls and gender-specific prints to make them look more like boys and girls regular briefs. The current design is described above.
The main rival for Huggies in North America is Pampers, sold by Kimberly-Clark's main competitor, Procter & Gamble. Huggies has two lines of diapers, Supreme and Ultratrim, also referred to as Baby Shaped. Both versions are unisex. Huggies also sells a diaper size designed specifically for preemies. Additional Huggies brand products include "Huggies Clean Team" products for toddlers such as shampoo, hand soap, wash mitten, etc. Huggies also sells Pull-up training pants, which are used for help in toilet training toddlers.
Little Swimmers are disposable swim pants which protect in the water without swelling up like normal diapers do, with special protection on the outside to keep the swim pants from breaking. Little swimmers come in three sizes. Small (16-26 lbs), Medium (24-34 lbs.), and Large (32+ lbs.)
Kleenex is the brand name of facial tissue paper. Many versions have been made, including with lotion, our softest ever!, and regular.
Kotex is a feminine hygiene product line, which includes panty liners, sanitary napkins, and tampons.
Pull-Ups is a brand name of training pants marketed with the Huggies brand of baby products. The product was first introduced in 1989 and became popular with the motto "I'm a big kid now!" The training pants are marketed with two packages: boys' designs are blue with Buzz Lightyear and similar patterns; girls' designs are lilac with Disney princess and similar patterns.
Scott is a brand name of paper napkins, paper towels, and bath tissue/wipes.
VIVA is a brand name of heavy-duty paper towels.
Includes most of the American products and these products:
Kimberly-Clark distributes a variety of napkin brands (Kleenex, Petalo, Suavel, Delsey, Lys).
Kimberly-Clark distributes a variety of toilet paper brands (Kleenex, Petalo, Suavel, Delsey, Vogue, Lys).
A baby diaperbrand name similar to Huggies. The brand is a combination of "kleen" (Kimberly-Clark) and "bebe" (Spanish word of baby).
Kimberly-Clark also has a variety of brands designed for professional markets and medical markets.
KimWipes are a type of cleaning tissue commonly used in laboratories. They are intended for applications where leaving lint or fibres on a surface would be undesirable, such as slides and pipettes. They are sometimes used to clean lenses as well, but use on optical lenses with special water and solvent based coatings may cause light blemishes, and the manufacturer recommends using a wipe specifically designed for use with coated lenses. KimWipes are composed of virgin wood pulp from certified forests, with little chemical additives.
The Australasian and European version of GoodNites, DryNites were much plainer and sized differently than Goodnites and were unisex. As in GoodNites, Drynites come in three sizes, Medium, Large and Extra Large.
This was changed in 2006, and now, the product mirrors the American version more closely.