Naugahyde is an American

brand A brand is a name, term, design, symbol or any other feature that distinguishes one seller's good or service from those of other sellers. Brands are used in business, marketing, and advertising for recognition and, importantly, to create an ...

of artificial leather. Naugahyde is a composite knit fabric backing and expanded polyvinyl chloride (PVC) coating. It was developed by Byron A. Hunter, senior chemist at the

United States Rubber Company The company formerly known as the United States Rubber Company, now Uniroyal, is an American manufacturer of tires and other synthetic rubber-related products, as well as variety of items for military use, such as ammunition, explosives, chemic ...

, and is now manufactured and sold by the

corporate spin-off A corporate spin-off, also known as a spin-out, or starburst or hive-off, is a type of corporate action where a company "splits off" a section as a separate business or creates a second incarnation, even if the first is still active. Charact ...

Uniroyal Engineered Products, LLC. Its name, first used as a trademark in 1936, comes from the name of Naugatuck, Connecticut, where it was first produced. It is now manufactured in

Stoughton, Wisconsin Stoughton is a city in Dane County, Wisconsin, United States. It straddles the Yahara River about 20 miles southeast of the state capital, Madison. Stoughton is part of the Madison Metropolitan Statistical Area. As of the 2020 census, the popula ...

Uses

The primary use for Naugahyde is as a substitute for leather in

upholstery Upholstery is the work of providing furniture, especially seats, with padding, springs, webbing, and fabric or leather covers. The word also refers to the materials used to upholster something. ''Upholstery'' comes from the Middle English ...

. In this application it is very durable and can be easily maintained by wiping with a damp sponge or cloth. Being a synthetic product, it is supplied in long rolls, allowing large sections of furniture to be covered seamlessly, unlike

animal hides A hide or skin is an animal skin treated for human use. The word "hide" is related to the German word "Haut" which means skin. The industry defines hides as "skins" of large animals ''e.g''. cow, buffalo; while skins refer to "skins" of smaller an ...

. General Motors for several decades used the material in several of its vehicles, with the term "Cordaveen" and later "Madrid-grain vinyl" for Buick, "Morocceen" for Oldsmobile, "Morrokide" for Pontiac vehicles while Chevrolet didn't use a brand name and simply listed it in sales brochures as "vinyl interior".

Marketing

A marketing campaign of the 1960s and 1970s asserted humorously that Naugahyde was obtained from the skin of an animal called a "Nauga". The claim became an

urban myth An urban legend (sometimes contemporary legend, modern legend, urban myth, or urban tale) is a genre of folklore comprising stories or fallacious claims circulated as true, especially as having happened to a "friend of a friend" or a family m ...

. The campaign emphasized that, unlike other animals, which must typically be slaughtered to obtain their hides, Naugas can shed their skin without harm to themselves. The Nauga doll, a squat, horned monster with a wide, toothy grin, became popular in the 1960s and is still sold today.Nauga dolls
Uniroyal website.

References

External links

The Naugahyde Company
{{leather Artificial leather