In 1957 Procter & Gamble bought Clorox Chemical Company, which at the time made only bleach. The Federal Trade Commission challenged the merger on anticompetitive grounds -- specifically, that ownership by dominant conglomerate that makes soap, detergent, and cleaners, and spends enormous amounts on advertising, would dissuade other entrants to the liquid bleach market, a chemically bland product whose marketshare nonetheless appeared to correlate with advertising -- and ordered them to divest Clorox. A prolonged court battle ensued, eventually decided by the Supreme Court in 1967 [1], which held that they indeed must divest.

The new, but still Oakland-based Clorox then embarked on a plan to be a little brother to P&G, acquiring a diverse array of marketable brands -- many cleaners, but also Hidden Valley Ranch in 1972, at the time still a hometown California phenomenon, and still a dry packet of mix to which consumers had to add buttermilk to make [2].

Clorox first reformulated the dry mix such that it could be made with milk, then in 1983 they began selling a premade, shelf-stable bottle of it [2], which was instrumental in helping it attain the popularity it has today.

Clorox has a very approachable blog entry [3] about Hidden Valley Ranch, where Curtis Stettler, a former longtime product developers for KC Masterpiece and Hidden Valley, recounts the history of the product line from pre-acquision to today, covering some wacky 90s flavors along the way, and insider comments that recount flavors surviving decades of branding renames, and frustrations with bacon bits trying to poke through the packaging.

[1] https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/386/568.html [2] http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/number_1/2005/08/ranch_dr... [3] https://www.thecloroxcompany.com/blog/this-day-in-clorox-his...