Producer
Sonneborn LLC
Leading US manufacturer of USP/EP white petrolatum and pharmaceutical mineral oils; owned by HollyFrontier (now HF Sinclair); refines petroleum-derived waxes and soft solids used as ointment bases, excipients, and cosmetic raw materials. Sonneborn's Carnation® white petrolatum is the benchmark pharmaceutical-grade reference standard.
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White Petrolatum (Pharmaceutical & Cosmetic)
40%Pharmaceutical Mineral Oils
25%Technical White Oils & Waxes
25%Specialty Petroleum Products
10%
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Did you know2023
The same white petrolatum refined by Sonneborn from crude oil serves four entirely separate industries from the same petroleum refining process: it is the ointment base in pharmaceutical corticosteroid creams and antibiotic ointments (healthcare); it is the active moisturizing ingredient in Vaseline and baby products (cosmetics); food-grade mineral oil from the same process is sprayed on fresh produce (apples, citrus) in grocery stores to maintain appearance (food industry); and technical white oil from the same refinery lubricates food-contact machinery at bakeries and bottling plants. A single Sonneborn refining unit in Petrolia, Pennsylvania or East Liverpool, Ohio produces petroleum fractions that end up simultaneously in hospital wound care, baby skin products, the coating on fresh apples in Walmart, and the lubrication system of a Pepsi bottling line. None of these end users know they share a raw material origin.
Sonneborn LLC (HF Sinclair) ↗Origin2023
Sonneborn LLC traces its roots to the early petroleum refining industry of the late 19th century, when Pennsylvania crude oil refiners discovered that highly refined petroleum residues could be used as ointment bases. Robert Chesebrough, who would found Chesebrough-Ponds (maker of Vaseline), and later Sonneborn developed similar white petroleum jelly products. Sonneborn's Carnation brand of pharmaceutical-grade white petrolatum became the USP (US Pharmacopeia) reference standard -- meaning the federal government uses Carnation petrolatum as the official benchmark against which all other pharmaceutical petrolatum products are measured. HollyFrontier (now HF Sinclair), a fuel refiner in Texas, acquired Sonneborn because its petroleum specialty chemicals represent higher-margin downstream uses of crude oil than gasoline production.
Sonneborn LLC (HF Sinclair) ↗