air wick was first introduced in 1943 in the united states. in 1973, air wick had sales of $33.5 million, and earnings of $2.7 million dollars prompting the swiss pharmaceutical company ciba geigy (now novartis) to investigate purchasing them. ciba geigy took brief control of the company in 1974, before selling it to the british household products company reckitt & colman (now reckitt benckiser) in december 1984. the sale was partly motivated due to a perceived image problem of top management with their product line.