Great Scott!
Scott Paper Towels have always been known as an affordable and high quality solution to household messes and spills. They are widely available from grocery stores, mass merchandising stores, club stores and, since the IT explosion of the nineties, even online.
What most people don’t know is that paper towels were actually a result of what could have been a very expensive mistake. In 1879, brothers E. Irvin and Clarence Scott founded the Scott Paper Company in Philadelphia, a company often since credited with the commercial introduction of the toilet paper roll. They entered into the market manufacturing what were termed “coarse” paper products like paper bags and wrapping paper. Their first paper towels went up for sale in 1907, and by 1931, kitchen-specific Scott Paper Towels were introduced, and have been a standing feature in kitchens across America ever since.
Of course, as with most tales of success, this story is a little less straightforward than it might at first blush appear. You see, Scott Brand Tissue was originally introduced with 1,000 sheets and sold at 10 cents to the roll, and was considered hygienic enough to be classed as medical cleaning item. One day, Arthur Scott, then head of the paper products company, received a railroad car full of trouble. It was a shipment of paper that had been rolled too thick for toilet tissue as it was then made; however, the load was big enough that wasting it would have constituted a large financial blow to the company. By that time, he had heard tell of teachers who, in an effort to combat the spread of the cold virus, had taken to giving their students pieces of soft paper on which to wipe their hands. With this in mind, Arthur had the paper perforated into the size of small hand towels and the first Scott Paper Towels were taken to market, and sold as “disposable” towels. Before long they were rebranded under the name ‘Sani-Towel’ and sold to hotels, restaurants and train stations for use in public washrooms.
In 1931, the towels were perforated to be 13 inches wide and 18 inches long, and sold as kitchen towels. It took a long time before these gained acceptance as the superior hygienic replacement for kitchen cloth towels, but Scott Paper Towels would eventually be seen an indispensable part of the modern kitchen set-up.
Scott Paper merged with Kimberly-Clark in 1995, but still operates under the better-known Scott brand name. Scott Paper Towels, with their tradition of high quality, are often a touch more expensive than store-branded products. However, they’re still found to be top performers when it comes to the actual properties called for when cleaning up messes and spills. Of course, these days there are a great many brands known for similar quality, including Brawny, Bounty, Sparkle and Viva Paper Towels.
Scott is nonetheless distinguished for its comprehensive range of products – indeed, the company specializes in family products, such as bath tissues, napkins, flushable wipes and scrub cloths. They’re also available in innumerably various prints to suit any taste, from the restrained to the gauche, with products adorned with flowers, Disney characters and images from NASCAR.
One other point on which Scott really stands out is the company’s evident commitment to contributing to the conservation of the environment. While, of course, Scott Paper Towels are made from 100 percent virgin pulp, the cardboard that fills their rollers, and the boxes in which their tissues are packages, are made from 100 percent recycled paper. Scott also sells a variant on their traditional toilet tissue that’s made of 80% recycled fiber, leaving the decisions of whether to fight global warming and the felling of rainforests up to the consumer.
