Estée Lauder

Continued onto: Estée Lauder (post 1960)

Like those other grande dames of beauty, Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubinstein, Estée Lauder was very evasive when it came to discussing her origins and early life. When she heard that Lee Israel was going to publish an unauthorised biography, ‘Estée Lauder. Beyond the magic’ (1985) she rushed to print her own version “to set the record straight” (Lauder, 1985, p. 11). However, her book ‘Estée. A success story’ continued her previous pattern of mixing facts and half truths with fiction.

Origins

Estée was born Josephine Esther Mentzer at 9 Hillside Avenue in Corona, Queens, a largely Italian working-class neighbourhood in New York. Her parents, Rose Mentzer (née Schotz) and Maximilian Mentzer were Jewish immigrants from Hungary. Their union produced two children, Estée and her older sister Grace Rhea ‘Renee’ Mentzer [1906-1988] who joined the five surviving children from Rose’s previous marriage to Abraham Rosenthal.

Above: Max Mentzer [c.1878-1962] and Rose Mentzer [c.1872-1957]. Estée places this photograph at her father’s cemetery property. The land in Paramus, New Jersey and been bought in conjunction with a number of Jewish families, later becoming the Beth-El Cemetery (Israel, 1985, p. 15). Max become its manager later in his life.

The family stories that Estée details in her book appear to be selected to cast her in the best light. Her siblings get almost no mention, apart from Renee’s contraction of polio, and her parents’ backgrounds are glamourised. Her mother is described as “discreet, elegant, and deeply committed to family” (Lauder, 1985, p. 8), her father “a Czechoslovakian horseman, an elegant dapper monarchist” who “bought a hardware store on Corona Avenue with savings he bought from Europe” (Lauder, 1985, p. 13). More attention is given to her mother’s younger brother, John M. Schotz [1887-1964]. She credits him with sparking her interest in cosmetics but leaves out or invents significant parts of the story.

Uncle John Schotz. Charming, erudite, inquiring, my mother’s brother came to visit us from Hungary. He was a skin specialist. What glories those words contour up!
On the heels of Uncle John’s arrival came a terrible war in Europe. I was too young to understand its implications, but I did understand that because of its horror, Uncle John had to stay in America. Secretly, I rejoiced.
He captured my imagination and interest as no one else ever had. I was smitten with Uncle John. He understood me. What’s more, he produced miracles. I watched as he created a secret formula, a magic cream potion with which he filled vials and jars and flagons and any other handy container. It was a precious velvety cream, this potion, one that magically made you sweetly scented, made your face feel like spun silk, made any passing imperfection gone by evening.

(Lauder, 1985, pp. 17-18)

In other versions of this story, Estée claims that Schotz was from Vienna not Hungary and came to New York for the World’s Fair. The World’s Fair opened just before the Second not the First World War as she frequently claimed. However, as Schotz arrived in America in 1900 this point is mute.

Schotz was a chemist not the skin specialist or dermatologist Estée describes. In 1925, when Estée was sixteen and still at high school, he was living with his wife Flora Anna Schotz (née Greenstein) [1892-1966] in the house of his mother-in-law and two of his wife’s siblings. By then he had established New Way Laboratories on West 43rd Street, New York and it is there that Estée appears to have been introduced to the manufacturing side of cosmetics.

New Way Laboratories

New Way Laboratories made a wide range of products ranging from poultry remedies through to cosmetics and toiletries. Most of the cosmetics it produced were sold under the Flory Anna or Florana label, both names being references to Schotz’s wife.

Lee Israel suggests that New Way Laboratories was established in 1924. However, there is a 1923 advertisement for the firm, and the Florana trademark also lists 1923 as the first year of use. By 1930, the company had also changed its name to Neway Laboratories and was advertising its services as a private label manufacturer.

Estée’s claim that her uncle constructed a laboratory cosmetics in Queens seems to have been invented to suggest that she was personally experimenting with cosmetics from an early age. This allows her promote her skill as a formulator and distances her cosmetics from those produced by her uncle.

We constructed a laboratory of sorts in the tiny stable behind the house. My parents installed gleaming linoleum on the floors and walls. We set up a table, where I watched my uncle mix his magic.
Do you know what it means for a young girl to suddenly have someone take her dreams quite seriously? Teach her secrets?
I could think of nothing else. After school, I’d run home to practice being a scientist. I began to value myself with so much more, trust my instincts, trust my uniqueness.

(Lauder, 1985, p. 19)

Given that her uncle was the source of her inspiration it might be thought that Estée would try help him and his wife when they fell on hard times. This does not appear to have been the case.

Estée’s business activities between 1925 and 1945 get largely overlooked in her autobiography but Israel suggest that she travelled between New York and Florida making sales wherever she could. Elderly Jewish women probably made up a significant part of her clientele. Life on the road would have been tough, particularly through the years of the Great Depression but this is when she learnt the business of selling. Her ability to keep going despite the difficulties is admirable – she was determined to succeed.

Estée does document some of her personal life during this time. Her marriage to Joseph Lauter [1902-1983] (1930) and the birth of their first child, Leonard Allan Lauter (1933) is covered as is her divorce from Joseph (1939), their reconciliation (1943), and the birth of their second son, Ronald Steven Lauder (1944). After they reconciled Joseph took control of the manufacturing side of the business while Estée went on the road to drum up sales.

Estée recollections of the years when she was a ‘free woman’ are also very selective. She mentions that she struck up a number of friendships with men between 1939 and 1943 but does not divulge her possible romance with Arnold Louis van Ameringen. He would become extremely important to her company in the following decades.

Arnold Louis van Ameringen

Like Estée, van Ameringen was Jewish. He came in New York in 1917 as a representative for Polak & Schwarz, a Dutch essential oil and perfume materials company. After deciding to settle in America he set up his own business in New York (1918). The business incorporated (1927) and established a laboratory and manufacturing facilities (1928) before merging with Morana, Inc. (1929). The newly merged firm, van Ameringen-Haebler, Inc., became a major supplier of raw materials and fragrances for a wide variety of perfume, soap, cosmetic and toiletry companies. It did a lot of business with Estée Lauder over the years, either as van Ameringen-Haebler or as International Flavors & Fragrances, Inc. (IFF), the company formed when van Ameringen-Haebler merged with Polak & Schwarz in 1958.

The exact nature of van Ameringen’s assistance to Estée Lauder’s fledgling company is unknown but Estée puts the development of Estoderme Youth-Dew Creme down to Dr. Jerry Amsterdam, described by Estée as her chief chemist (Lauder, 1985, p. 74). What she fails to mention is that this refers to Herman J. Amsterdam [1905-1966] who was then working for van Ameringen-Haebler as its director of products research. Another van Ameringen-Haebler employee, Ernest Shiftan [1903-1976], is believed to have formulated Youth-Dew, the bath oil that put Estée Lauder firmly on its feet. One can only speculate on other product developments Estée Lauder outsourced to van Ameringen during its early years. It is possible that Lauder relied on van Ameringen for many of its new formulations through to the establishment of Estée Lauder’s research and development laboratory in 1967.

Beginnings

Exactly when Estelle Lauter became Estée Lauder is difficult to pin down. The family is still listed as Lauter in the 1950 census but Israel states that Estée had listed herself as Estée Lauder in the 1937 New York telephone directory (Israel, 1985, p. 24). She also notes that there is no listing for Joseph in the 1937 directory which suggests they had separated by then. It is possible that Estée took on the name Lauder to distinguish herself from Joseph after they parted. I have not been able to track down the 1937 directory entry but do have a record from the 1940 Manhattan directory (issued in 1939) where she is listed as both Estelle and Estee Lauder.

Above: Entries from the 1940 Manhatten Telephone directory.

Equally hard to pin down are Estée business activities in the years immediately before the Estée Lauder Cosmetic Company was founded in 1946. In her autobiography, she mentions having concessions in two hairdressing establishments, ‘The House of Ash Blondes’ and Albert and Carter. The House of Ash Blondes was actually the Florence Morris Salon at 39 East 60th Street occasionally advertised as ‘The Home of Ash Blondes’. Morris started life as an actress but had developed a range of hair dyes sold under the La Playa trademark.

The Estée Lauder range sold through these concessions was extremely limited. Estée only mentions four skin-care products – Cleansing Oil, Creme Pack, Super Rich All-Purpose Creme, and Skin Lotion – but Leonard Lauder says his mother also sold an eye cream in the 1930s (Lauder, 2020, p. 25).

Cleansing Oil: “[A] deep pore cleanser.”
Creme Pack: “[T]o lift and firm the skin, to stimulate circulation.”
Super Rich All-Purpose Creme: “[A] cleanser, lubricant, night cream, conditioner and foundation in one.”
Skin Lotion: “[A] gentle astringent, delightfully cool and refreshing.”

Estée packaged her skin-creams in medicinal-looking, white opal-glass jars with black lids and stick-on labels. The only record I have for how these might have looked is an advertisement published by Leonard Lauder that he claims is from the early 1940s.

Above: Estée Lauder Vacation Kit.

Lauder combined her four skin-care products into a simple facial routine. Unusually, the Creme Pack was included in this routine rather than being used as a stand-alone face mask. If my information is correct, it contained unbleached clay so would have acted as an oil absorber and exfoliant.

1. Cleansing Oil first. Deep, softening,
2. Next, 5 minutes of Creme Pack. Tautening effect.
3. Then smooth on Super-Rich All-Purpose Cream. For that soft baby-glow.
4. Follow with tingling Skin Lotion—the china smooth touch.

(Estée Lauder advertisement, 1950)

In 1947, Estée managed to get a counter in Saks Fifth Avenue. By then, her skin creams had been repackaged in containers manufactured by T. C. Wheaton Co., Millville, New Jersey, painted in a shade later known as Estée Lauder Blue.

Published orders made out to Albert A. Katz of Philadelphia (1946) and Sak Fifth Avenue (1947) show that there was more to Estée Lauder than four skin creams. Her early range also included face powder, lipstick, and eyeshadow as well as a cream and dry rouge. Estée claims that her lipstick, eyeshadow and cream rouge only came in one shade, Duchess Red for the lipstick, Turquoise for the eye shadow, and a cream rouge that would ‘harmonize with all complexions’ possibly called Glow. If this is the case the limited range did not last very long. By 1951, the Duchess Lipsticks also came in at least two other shades Duchess Coral and Duchess Melon. Further shades were added to Estée Lauder lipsticks, eyeshadows and rouges through the 1950s. Unfortunately, the information I have about these new additions is very limited.

1951 Estee Lauder Cream Base Face Powder

Above:1951 Estée Lauder Cream Base Face Powder.

The Creme Base Face Powder may also have only debuted in a single shade, Honey Glow, but was being produced in seven shades by 1951 – Alabaster, Honey Glow, Melon Glow, Sun Glow, Sun Burnt, Sun Tan, and Copper Glow. It was sold in a basic square powder box which was given a lift-up lid by 1956 making it very similar to one used by Elizabeth Arden for her Illusion Powder. Estée may have taken other things from Arden, such as Arden’s idea of combining two lipstick colours to contour the lips, and using light and dark face powder shades together to contour the face.

Department Stores

By 1951, Estée Lauder was available in a number of department and specialty stores. Examples include: Saks Fifth Avenue in New York; Bonwit Teller in Boston, Chicago and Philadelphia; Neiman Marcus in Dallas; Regensteins in Atlanta; Scruggs, Vanderwort & Barney in St. Louis; and I. Magnin in San Francisco.

As Leonard Lauder noted, department stores were the key to Estée Lauder’s success. In the days before the arrival of credit cards like Visa and Mastercard and charge cards like American Express, high-end department stores like Saks offered select customers cards that enabled them to charge in-store purchases to their account. This meant they could buy Estée Lauder cosmetics on impulse even if they were low on cash.

More importantly, addresses from these charge cards enabled department stores to create mailing lists. Estée managed to convince stores to use these to send customers a card that could be exchanged for a free gift at an Estée Lauder counter. The initial resistance from department stores was soon overcome when they realised that the offer of a free gift brought women to the store who might then go off and make purchases in other departments.

Above: 1959 One side of an Estée Lauder gift card distributed by Bullock’s Wilshire.

The free gifts would later become ‘Gift-with-Purchase’. Estée Lauder was not the first cosmetic company to give away free cosmetics or to offer a free gift with purchase but no one used it more effectively.

Youth-Dew

Estée Lauder’s first important addition to her range was Estoderme Youth-Dew Creme (1951) developed by Herman J. Amsterdam as previously mentioned. The name was a good choice as it suggested Estée, skin, youth, and moisture. Used as a night cream or as a base for make-up, the cream contained whole eggs along with ingredients that were supposed to act like hormones but were not. Others had added eggs to cosmetics well before this, Elizabeth Arden’s Venetian Anti-Wrinkle Cream (1921) being a good example.

Estoderme Youth-Dew Creme: “[I]ncludes the whole egg in its formula, reinforced with Vitamin A and D among its moisture-restoring ingredients . . . to give your complexion a lovely dewy freshness! A make-up foundation by day . . . a miracle-working overnight cream.”

Teen Beauty

In 1956, Estée Lauder developed a liquid cleanser, powder compact, and two shades of lipstick – Teen Pink and Teen Coral – for the teenage market.

Teen Beauty Cleanser: “[A] wonderfully thinner-than-water tight liquid that not only floats off every trace of dirt and grime, but goes deep into the pores to remove any oily accumulations and impurities . . . all one application.”
Teen Powder Compact: “[A] fine pressed powder that protects the skin without clogging the pores.”

In her autobiography, Estée Lauder admitted this was a mistake. Her market was mainly mature women, and the range was quickly abandoned.

Another mistake was trying to reach the teenage market. Teen cleanser, teen this, teen that. Teens were simply not our image, even though teens can surely benefit from our products.

(Lauder, 1985, p. 165)

It would be over a decade before Estée Lauder would actively try to engage a younger market once more when it introduced Clinique in 1968.

Re-Nutriv

The company had more success with Re-Nutriv, the ‘creme of creams’, also introduced in 1956. The name suggested the cream was nutritional without specifically claiming that it was so, thus getting around the Wheeler-Lea and Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Acts of 1938. Estée makes no mention of who formulated it in her autobiography but it is possible that it was also developed by van Ameringen-Haebler.

Make-up

Developments in Estée Lauder make-up through to 1960 are difficult to track down as the company did very little product advertising outside of that done in conjunction with department stores until 1960.

Eye make-up

Estée Lauder was selling a cake/block mascara and an eyeshadow in the early 1950s but had very little else on offer until 1959 when the company added Estée Lauder Liquid Eyeliner, Eye Shadow Stick and Roll-O-Matic Mascara, the last item being an automatic mascara similar to the one introduced by Helena Rubinstein in 1957. Like Rubinstein’s Mascara-Matic, it was applied with a grooved rod rather than a brush but the applicator came with a comb on the other end of the rod which suggests it was made by Scoville.

Above: Estée Laude Roll-O-Matic Mascara in original case.

Lipsticks

Most of the new American lipsticks that debuted in the early 1950s were indelibles, a tend started by the introduction of Hazel Bishop’s Lasting Lipstick, an indelible, in 1950.

Estée Lauder’s Duchess lipsticks which first appeared before 1950 do not appear to have been indelible. However, they may have been reformulated in 1953 to make them more tenacious. Lauder also expanded its shade range through to 1956 with new colours including Duchess Orange, Duchess Violet, and Duchess Pastel, as well as Dancing Red, Dancing Pink, and Dancing Pastel.

In 1954, Estée Lauder also introduced its first Lip Gloss, although only in a single shade.

Lip Gloss: “[A] rose cream to be applied over your lipstick. It gives a lasting gleam that will not run or look greasy.”

Estée Lauder’s Color-Locked Lipsticks (1956) look to have been indelibles with some shades also coming as iridescents. They were followed by a Lip liner (1959) in a deep pink and red shades, and the previously mentioned Re-Nutriv Lipsticks (1958), a lipstick of the creamy type that came to predominate the American lipstick market by the end of the decade.

Leonard Lauder claims to have relaunched Re-Nutriv Lipsticks in 1959 and given it chisel-shaped rather than bullet tips, an innovation he said he invented.

I designed a new and better lipstick shape. At the time, lipsticks were bullet-shaped, so that a woman had to purse her lips around the stick to apply the color, which often left lipstick on her teeth or smeared her lip line. One day, I took a Gillette Blue Blade razor and sliced off the top of the stick at an angle, so that a woman could lay the flat side against her lip and use the tip to outline the shape of her mouth. I didn’t even think to trademark it; I just did it. And now it’s the industry standard.

(Lauder, 2020, p. 130)

However, lots of other people had this idea and there are numerous examples of chisel-topped lipsticks appearing on the market well before 1959.

Leonard Lauder

In 1958, Leonard Lauder was discharged from the navy and came to work for Estée Lauder full time. The years following his arrival would see the company professionalise, diversify and become the international brand it is today, something acknowledged by Estée Lauder in her autobiography.

Things have certainly changed. Between then and now. Leonard established a sales force where none existed, created our first research and development laboratory, where none had existed, brought in professional management on every level, and made Estée Lauder a company of international repute.

(Lauder, 1985, p. 99)

Leonard Lauder’s role would continued to grow. He became its chief executive officer between 1982 and 1999 and its president from 1972 until 1995. When the company went public in 1995 he was made company chairman.

Timeline


1946	Estée Lauder Cosmetic company founded in New York. New Products: Cleansing Oil; Crème Pack; Skin Lotion; and Super-Rich All Purpose Creme.
1951	New Products: Estoderme Youth-Dew Creme.
1952	New Products: Estoderme Youth-Dew Flowing Emulsion.
1953	New Products: Estoderme Youth-Dew Bath Oil; and Travel Trick Cream.
1954	New Products: Lip Gloss.
1956	New Products: Re-Nutriv; Youth-Dew Translucent Face Powder; Teen Beauty Cleanser; and Teen Powder Compact.
1957	New Products: Youth-Dew Translucent Powder Base.
1958	Fragrance Products Corporation founded in New York. Estée Lauder products available in Canada. New Products: Liquid Re-Nutriv; Re-Nutriv Lipsticks; Body Satinée; and Sun Creme.
1959	New York headquarters moved to 666 Fifth Avenue. New Products: Lip Liner; Liquid Eyeliner; Shadow Stick; Roll-O-Matic Mascara; and Cool Spray Bath Powder.

Continued onto: Estée Lauder (post 1960)

First Posted: 20th September 2023

Sources

Israel, L. (1985). Estée Lauder. Beyond the magic. London: Arlington Books.

Koehn, N. F. (2001). Brand new: How entrepreneurs earned consumers’ trust from Wedgewood to Dell. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.

Koehn, N. F. (2001). Estée Lauder: Self definition and the modern cosmetics market. In P. Scranton (Ed.), Beauty and business: Commerce, gender and culture in modern America (pp. 217 -251). New York: Routledge.

Lauder, E. (1985). Estée. A success story. New York: Random House.

Lauder, L. A. (2020). The company I keep. My life in beauty. New York: Harper Business.