| General info : | | The Barbara Gould line was started in 1928 by Woodworth, Inc., an old American company which produced a range of perfumes, flavouring extracts, toiletries and hair-care products.
Woodworth had offices at 392 Fifth Avenue, New York and a factory, the Rochester Chemical Works, in Main Street, Rochester.
By the late 1920s, about 85% of its business was in cosmetics including a range of face powders.
In 1927, it introduced a skin-care product called Weather Cream and the following year it created the Barbara Gould line, registering Barbara Gould Ltd. at its New York offices.
The original Barbara Gould skin-care range consisted of seven creams, one of which was the previously mentioned Woodworth Weather Cream (1927).
The driving force behind the creation of Barbara Gould seems to have been Ralph Harris Aronson [1888-1935], the president of Woodworth, Inc. He married Edwarda Gould in 1917 and the couple had two daughters, Jean Joel Aronson, born April 25, 1923, and Barbara Gould Aronson, born September 6, 1924. This suggests that Aronson named the new company after his 4-year-old daughter.
Barbara Gould products first went on sale in the United States and Canada in 1928.
Woodworth, Inc. merged with A. Bourjois & Co. (New York) in February, 1929 and formed The International Perfume Company, Inc., a new corporation set up to facilitate the consolidation.
In November, 1929 – after the Wall Street crash in October – the stockholders of International Perfume voted to rename the company Bourjois, Inc. (New York) and from January, 1930, products branded as Woodworth disappeared or were rebadged as Bourjois.
The demise of Woodworth did not mean the end of the Barbara Gould and the brand was expanded by Bourjois both within the United States and overseas.
Product development for the line appears to have been done in Paris in the Chanel/Bourjois laboratory run by Ernest Beaux [1881-1961].
The person assuming the role of Barbara Gould appears to have been Ruth Eliza Francis, born in Buffalo, New York State in 1899. Almost nothing is known about her but she may have had a theatrical background. Promoted overseas as an ‘American Beauty Specialist’ she was attractive with good skin and the skills and maturity to do store promotions. Her last broadcasts for Barbara Gould were in 1936 and references to her in company literature disappear after that date. Although Ruth Francis played the role of Barbara Gould, the signature on the bottom of many Barbara Gould advertisements of the period was not hers. This was done in the handwriting of another woman, Olga Peterson.
By the end of 1931, other Barbara Gould salons had opened in London, Berlin, Prague, Rome, Vienna, Budapest and Milan.
In 1932 Barbara Gould Ltd. was merged with Bourjois, Inc. and two new distribution companies were set up – Bourjois Sales Corporation and Barbara Gould Sales Corporation.
Changes also saw Barbara Gould separated once more from Bourjois with Barbara Gould, Inc. being incorporated in the United States in 1937 after Bourjois lost its court cases with the IRS.
In 1940, the company released the Skylark make-up range – face powder, dry rouge, cream rouge, lipstick and nail polish – in a tone that was said to be ideal for blues but could also be used for “pinks, browns, rosy tans, greys, greens, pastels, beige, black or white“.
The following year Barbara Gould added Skylark perfume and Skylark fragranced cologne, dusting powder, talc, bath bubbles, beauty soap, and bath soap, making it the first fragranced-based line for the company. It was heavily advertised in America right through the Second World War.
When Germany invaded France in May, 1940, the Wertheimers fled Paris to Bordeaux and then escaped via Spain to Rio de Janeiro. From there they travelled by ship to New York, arriving in August, 1940 where they were greeted by the vice president and manager of Bourjois (New York), Bernard M. Douglas [1867-1944].
The Wertheimers were Jewish so their assets in France were bound to be expropriated by the Nazis following the French surrender in June, 1940. They got around the problem by ‘selling’ their French assets of Bourjois to a friend, Félix Amiot [1894-1974] in October, 1940. Earlier, in June, 1940, Barbara Gould S.A. had been founded at 135 Avenue de Neuilly, Neuilly-sur-Seine, Paris.
By 1951, the Paris headquarters of Barbara Gould SA had been moved uptown to 43 Avenue Marceau, the new address of Wertheimer Frères, the company that had controlling interests in Barbara Gould, Bourjois, and Parfums Chanel.
There was some overlap between the French and American lines put out by Barbara Gould during the 1950s but there was also increasing divergence. This may be a reflection of the different positioning of the brand on either side of the Atlantic. In France, Barbara Gould appears to have maintained its standing but in the United States it seems to have gone increasingly down market. It had disappeared in Britain sometime around 1948.
Barbara Gould’s continued decline in the United States saw it disappear there sometime after 1970. In France, the range continued to prosper but was sold to Reckitt & Colman (France) SA. in 1987.
It continued to do well there but Reckitt & Colman sold it to Carter-Wallace, Inc. in 1999 as part of a rationalisation of their brands.
In 2001 Carter-Wallace, Inc. was split into Church & Dwight Co., Inc., a company that still owns Barbara Gould.
As of 2026 Barabara Gould is not listed in the brands portfolio of Church & Dwight Co., Inc. | |
| Contact info | | | |
| Websites | | () | |
| Source : | | https://www.cosmeticsandskin.com/companies/barbara-gould.php (www.cosmeticsandskin.com/companies/barbara-gould.php) | |
| Source : | | https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/313927/000119312505047881/d10k.htm (www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/313927/000119312505047881/d10k.htm) | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Barbara Gould Ltd.1928 - 1932 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Barbara Gould SA1940 - | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Barbara Gould Sales Corp1932 - 1937 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Barbara Gould, Inc.1937 - | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Bourjois Sales Corp.1932 - 1937 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Bourjois, Inc.1930 - 1932 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Carter-Wallace, Inc.1999 - 2001 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Church & Dwight Co., Inc.2001 - | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Reckitt & Colman (France) SA1987 - 1999 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : The International Perfume Company, Inc.1929 - 1930 | |
| Relations : | | Brand name used by : Woodworth, Inc.1928 - 1929 | |
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| Image | | 1929-gould-quartette.jpg | |
| Image | | 1938-gould-harmonized.jpg | |
| Image | | 1948-garden-fragrance.jpg | |
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