Whitehall Services Inc. history

1967: Federal Trade Commission orders AHP to stop making false advertising claims.

A journalist from Business Week, researching a rumor in 1970 that then-AHP Chairman and President William F. LaPorte had reduced the size of the toilet paper in the executive washrooms to save money, discovered that, in fact, the paper was -inch narrower than typical size.

By 1971, AHP had spent more money on the promotion of Anacin than had any other analgesic manufacturer on a comparable product.

In 1972, the FTC charged that AHP and two other analgesic manufacturers were promoting their products through misleading and unsubstantiated claims.

In 1976, Acorn Engineering Company launched the Care-Ware product line.

After several suits and countersuits between AHP and Johnson & Johnson, a federal court judge in 1978 ordered the discontinuance of the advertising of Anacin's anti-inflammatory property as a claim of superiority over Tylenol.

1979 Fourth generation of family management arrives with Hugh and Matthew Patinkin; company has nine stores.

As late as 1980, LaPorte was personally approving any expenditures more than $500, including anything from the purchase of a typewriter to a secretarial pay raise.

The case was finally settled in 1981 and permanent limits were placed on misleading claims in Anacin advertisements.

In 1982, a federal appeals court upheld the FTC ruling after AHP attempted to have it overturned.

AHP's prescription drugs and medical supplies accounted for 47 percent of sales and 62 percent of profits in 1983.

AHP's advertising budget for 1985 was estimated at more than $412 million.

Prior to 1988, infant formula was marketed strictly as a pharmaceutical product.

In 1989, the firm divested its Boyle-Midway division and purchased A.H. Robins Co., an over-the-counter drug manufacturer that complimented the Whitehall laboratories subsidiary.

In response to criticism of its low research and development expenditures, AHP spent a record 11 percent of sales on R&D in 1990.

That subsidiary was supplemented with the 1992 acquisition of Symbiosis Corp., a developer and manufacturer of disposable instruments for minimally invasive laparoscopic and endoscopic surgery.

By 1993, over 60 percent of AHP's global revenues came from pharmaceuticals.

The company initiated a series of acquisitions and divestitures aimed at transforming itself into a major pharmaceutical company in 1994.

1995: AHP sells its oral-care product line.

In 1996, AHP bought the remainder of Genetics Institute.

By the end of fiscal 1997, the company was operating 188 stores in 24 states, all under the names of Whitehall Company Jewellers, Lundstrom Jewelers, and the Marks Brothers Jewelers Company.

1998 Jewel Box chain of 36 stores in the Southeast acquired.

AHP followed this with an attempt to merge with Warner-Lambert in 1999.

Revenues rose 32 percent to $315.4 million in the fiscal year ended January 2000.

2001 Shares move from NASDAQ to the New York Stock Exchange.

The company had launched an e-commerce site around September 2002.

By the end of calendar 2003, Whitehall would be under investigation by both the SEC and federal prosecutors.

One lawsuit and the federal investigations were resolved in September 2004.

Hugh Patinkin died in March 2005 of an apparent heart attack.

Revenues for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2006, were $319.6 million; the company posted a staggering net loss of $84 million (in addition to the $19 million it had lost in the previous two years).

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