The company was founded on March 16, 1879 by 23-year-old Robert McNeil, who paid $167 for a drugstore complete with fixtures, inventory and soda fountain, as a retail pharmacy, in the Kensington section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Robert McNeil was a graduate of the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science. In 1904, one of McNeil's sons, Robert Lincoln McNeil, became part of the company and together they created McNeil Laboratories in 1933. The company would focus on direct marketing of prescription drugs to hospitals, pharmacists, and doctors. Development of acetaminophen began under the leadership of Robert L. McNeil, Jr., who later served as the firm's chairman. In 1953 McNeil Laboratories introduced Algoson, a preparation containing acetaminophen together with sodium butabarbital, a sedative. In 1955, McNeil Laboratories introduced Tylenol Elixir for children, containing only acetaminophen. In 1959, Johnson & Johnson acquired McNeil Laboratories and a year later the company was able to sell Tylenol for the first time ever, without a prescription. In 1961, the company moved into its Fort Washington, Pennsylvania headquarters. Along with its Fort Washington plant, McNeil also has plants worldwide. In 1977, two companies were created: McNeil medicals products and McNeil Consumer Products Company or McNeil Consumer Healthcare. The focus of McNeil medicals products is to market prescription drugs. In 1993 McNeil medicals products merged with the Ortho Pharmaceutical to form Ortho-McNeil Pharmaceutical. In 2001, McNeil Consumer Healthcare changed its name to McNeil Consumer & Specialty medicals products. However, it was changed again and is now known as "McNeil Consumer Healthcare". In 2018, Johnson & Johnson changed the name of the McNeil Fort Washington, PA facility to Johnson & Johnson Consumer Inc. As part of Procter & Gamble's acquisition of Gillette in 2005, Procter & Gamble's Gillette was required by the Federal Trade Commission to divest itself of Rembrandt toothpaste. Consequently, it sold Rembrandt to Johnson & Johnson's McNeil-PPC division. That year, Rembrandt had sales that likely exceeded $100 million. The company markets over-the-counter and prescription medicals products including complete lines of Tylenol and Motrin IB products for adults and children. The company is located in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania, and currently employs 2,600 people. Annual sales in 2004 were US $2.1 billion. McNeil's Canadian head office is in Markham, Ontario.
McNeil Nutritionals
McNeil Nutritionals, LLC markets and sells a range of products including Lactaid, and Benecol in the UK, Ireland, Belgium, and in the US under license from Raisio Group. In June 2007, McNeil became involved in lawsuits with Merisant, the makers of the artificial sweetenerEqual. It also produced a sweetener made with stevia and cane sugar, marketed as Sun Crystals. In 2012, it started to sell a monk fruit-based sweetener called Nectresse.
Known as the "JV," this 50/50 joint venture between Johnson & Johnson and Merck handled the OTC product lines Pepcid, Mylanta, and Mylicon and is located at the McNeil Consumer Healthcare headquarters in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania. In September 2011, however, the JV ended, when Merck sold its 50 percent interest in the joint venture. Merck said it sold its interest in the joint venture so it could focus on building the consumer products division it gained through its acquisition of Schering-Plough in 2009. By terminating the joint venture, Merck said it will have greater freedom to exploit opportunities to switch prescription medicines to over-the-counter products that can be purchased without a doctor's prescription. As a result, all former Johnson & Johnson-Merck products are now handled by McNeil Consumer Healthcare.
In 1982, seven people were murdered in Chicago by Tylenol pills, manufactured by McNeil Consumer Healthcare, which had been tampered with after manufacture and placed on the store shelves.
In April 2010, McNeil Consumer Healthcare recalled 43 over-the-counter children's medicines. Tylenol, Motrin, Zyrtec and Benadryl products were affected.
