How Black hair care grew Black power

What It Covers

George and Joan Johnson built Johnson Products Company into the first Black-owned firm on the American Stock Exchange by creating Afro Sheen and Ultra Wave hair products, generating $39 million in sales by 1975 before losing market dominance.

Key Questions Answered

• •Market identification: George Johnson recognized Black consumers as an underserved profitable market in the 1950s, creating shelf-stable hair straightener Ultra Wave by solving the chemical emulsification problem that plagued existing products, then expanding market by market using profits from each city.
• •Cultural alignment strategy: Johnson Products shifted from hair straighteners to Afro Sheen moisturizer in the mid-1960s when civil rights movements rejected white beauty standards, then sponsored Soul Train in color television starting 1971, driving sales from $11.2 million to $39 million in four years.
• •Public disclosure risk: After going public in 1971, Johnson Products revealed detailed profit margins by product in annual reports to demonstrate transparency, inadvertently providing competitors like Revlon a blueprint to enter the Black hair care market and capture market share with superior resources.
• •Market timing failure: Johnson Products lost dominance by arriving late to the Jheri curl trend popularized by Michael Jackson's Thriller album, allowing competitors including a white inventor and other Black-owned companies to capture the market while Johnson's rushed product failed to match quality standards.