While toilet paper seems like a product that should have been around for as long as there has been commerce, it actually is a fairly modern invention. Before 1857, the most common “toilet paper” in the United States actually consisted of pages from the Sears Roebuck catalog. That finally changed when one brave innovator, entrepreneur Joseph Gayetty, got the idea that a better alternative could be created.
And so he developed and marketed a line of manila sheets infused with aloe in a neat, discreet box meant to live in a customer’s bathroom or outhouse. But, in truth, outhouse owners were probably sticking with the Sears catalog, because the earliest iteration of toilet paper was considered a luxury good. Each box contained about 1,000 sheets of toilet paper for the cost of one dollar. If that sounds like a pretty good price, keep in mind that in 1857, a dollar was worth roughly $28.86 in modern money. Buying toilet paper in the latter half of the 19th century is quite literally an example of flushing money down the toilet.
Accrol Group Holdings PLC (LON:ACRL) manufacture a wide range of household and away-from-home paper products from our purpose built production facility in Lancashire.