Dial is a brand of hand soap and related products. It was the world's first antibacterial soap. It is manufactured by the Dial Corporation, an Arizona-based subsidiary of Henkel AG & Co. KGaA (Henkel Consumer Goods Inc).
Dial soap was developed by chemists from Armour and Company, the meat-packing company, and introduced in the Chicago market in 1948. Armour had produced soap since 1888; its laundry soap was made from tallow, a by-product of Armour's meat production processes. Dial was made antibacterial by the addition of hexachlorophene, referred to by the company as AT-7. The name Dial was chosen because the soap promised "round-the-clock" protection against the odor caused by perspiration.
The brand was introduced nationally in 1949. It was advertised as "the first active, really effective deodorant soap in all history [because it] removes skin bacteria that cause perspiration odor". Although researchers had never established a link between hexachlorophene and germ protection, Armour's early advertisements graphically depicted germs and microbes before and after use of Dial soap. Dial became the leading deodorant soap brand in the U.S. From 1953 until the mid-1990s, Dial soap was advertised under the slogan Aren't you glad you use Dial? (Don't you wish everybody did?) which became a popular catchphrase.