The History of Head & Shoulders Shampoo

In 1949, Dr. John Parran Jr. joined Procter & Gamble. A chemical engineer and bacteriologist from the University of Tennessee, he was tasked with coming up with a new solution for controlling dandruff. At the time, most dandruff solutions were either unpleasant, ineffective, or damaging to the hair, such as coal-tar or egg-oil. Dr. Parran and his team worked on the problem and after 10 years of clinical testing, their product — codenamed Head & Shoulders — finally reached the market testing phase in 1961. It was so successful that one year later, it hit store shelves all across the country. Interestingly, when Head & Shoulders was first released, it was a cream formula. It wasn’t until 1975 that a shampoo version was released. It was reformulated again in the early 2000s after the company learned more about Malassezia globosa, the dandruff-causing fungus. Today, Head & Shoulders is one of the best-known dandruff shampoos on the market and the brand offers many different versions of the product, including a stripped-down formula called Bare that was introduced in 2023.