page_title: Spectrum Brands
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Spectrum Brands / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Press advertisement for Ray-O-Vac published in the USA in 1949
context_page_description: Spectrum Brands Holdings, Inc., a Fortune 500 company, is an American diversified company. Its headquarters are located in Middleton, Wisconsin and was established in 2005 as the successor company to Rayovac Corporation.
  The company manufactures and markets home appliances under the Remington, Black & Decker, George Foreman, and Russell Hobbs brand names, lawn and garden care products under the Spectracide and Garden Safe brand names, and insect repellents under the Cutter and Repel brand names. Spectrum owns several pet care companies, both in the aquarium supply and companion animal trades. In the aquarium business, Spectrum owns Tetra, Whisper, Marineland, Perfecto, Jungle, Instant Ocean, Visi-Therm, and other product lines. Companion animal lines consist of Dingo, Nature's Miracle, Lazy Pet, Wonderbox, Furminator, IAMS, Eukanuba and others. Both aquarium lines and companion lines are concentrated into Spectrum's United Pet Group based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Spectrum's Hardware & Home Improvement division includes brands such as Kwikset, Baldwin, National Hardware, Pfister, and more.
context_section_description: In 1906, the French Battery Company was founded in Chicago by James Bowen Ramsay (1869–1952). Its first president was German-born chemist, Alfred Landau. He had been making batteries in Europe. The Ramsay collective invested in Landau's functioning low profile Columbia Dry Battery Company which had been halted by copyright issues regarding the adopted name "Columbia". The re-started and re-named assembly plant soon relocated to Wisconsin where Landau's efforts to advance the French company too quickly, combined with a bad run of batteries, led to virtual bankruptcy and he was sacked. He moved on to Toronto, and set up a factory making X-Cell brand batteries for Canada.
  Ramsay, nor the other shareholders, knew how to make batteries but Ramsay's leadership kept the enterprise alive by having assembly line staff make the "Fleur de lis" branded batteries to a lower standard. Ramsay's fiery self-belief in the industry led him to contract a university chemist C.F. Burgess to concoct a battery to rival those made in America and Europe. Burgess actually succeeded to his own financial cost and the company survived with him becoming a shareholder, but after a fire destroyed the plant in 1915, he left to found his own successful battery company. French battery production accelerated through World War I, and by 1920, the French Battery Company had US$2.74 million in sales and 600 employees, and 1000 employees in 1931.
  
  In 1930, the company name was changed to Ray-O-Vac, an allusion to the then-new technology of vacuum tubes and electron rays. In 1933, the company patented the first wearable vacuum tube hearing aid. During World War II, Rayovac supplied the United States military with nearly 500 million batteries. As a result of this, they were awarded eight Army-Navy "E" awards for major contributions to victory. 
  During its ownership by the parent company of ESB Industrials, a British subsidiary was established to manufacture and market batteries in the United Kingdom under the Ray-O-Vac name. This operation ceased in 1972; Ray-O-Vac batteries continued to be marketed, although they were manufactured by the British Ever Ready company. In 1988, the name was simplified to Rayovac.
caption: Ray-O-Vac Advertisement USA 1949
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