Bondex International (Canada) Ltd.

The Reardon Company of St. Louis, Missouri, wordmarked the Bondex name in Canada in 1929, thirty years before they started using the name in the USA. The product line when the name was registered was listed as paint, varnish and lacquers.

In the early days, their forerunner products were cement paint and cement sealer. Bondex products were marketed to the do-it-yourself market. Advertisements were in Popular Mechanics and Life with phrases like “your basement can be bright and dry” and highlighted how easy they were to mix and apply. They went so far as to use an image of a women applying their products on some of their boxes to emphasize these were products suitable for home use.

Additional to its cement sealers and textured paint line Readon/Bondex manufactured and distributed a lengthy lineup of patching, grouting, sizing, wall finishing products. Reardon opened a facility to manufacture its line of grout and putty products in Montreal, Quebec, close to the source of plentiful raw asbestos from the nearby mines.

Products sold with the Reardon and Bondex labels contained the phrase “contents and container made in Canada” with no mention that Reardon had American ownership. An indication that trade disputes between Canada and the USA are not new.

The powered materials were sold in 1, 5, and 25 pounds containers as no job was too small. The powder was mixed with water to form a soft putty that could then be spread, wiped down and if necessary sanded. Bondex claimed many of its putty products were ideal for hobby work and craft project for children were suggested.

Breathing in asbestos dust was known within the asbestos product manufacturing companies to be dangerous as early as the 1930s yet that information was not only not released to the public it was actively covered up to ensure that profitability was not affected.

The Reardon products line included primers, hydraulic cement, calcimine, patching plaster, water putty, crack filler, spachtling compound, patching cement, tile cement and wall size. They were marked Bondex, Dramex, or Reardon. These were readily available at local hardware and building supply stores across Canada until the early 1980s.

The Reardon Company, together with its Bondex division was purchased by Republic Powdered Metals (RPM) in 1966. RPM is best known for its Rust-Oleum paint line and DAP caulk. In Canada in 1984 the company was re-incorporated as Bondex International (Canada) Ltd.

Bondex declared bankruptcy in May of 2010 citing asbestos liability claims as having cost the company 1.255 Billion dollars to date. What followed was a long dispute between lawyers arguing on behalf of future claimants and Bondex as to what amount of funding it would take to establish a fund to pay compensation to victims who were never warned Bondex, Dramex and Reardon product contained asbestos and were dangerous to use.

To resolve all current and future asbestos injury claims Republic Powdered Metals pledged the sum of $797.5 to establish a trust through which individuals diagnosed with varying levels of asbestos disease can apply for compensation.

The Bondex trust finally opened in 2016 and pays claims for Bondex, Dramex and Reardon exposure caused personal injury.

If you worked with construction materials manufactured by Bondex either occupationally, as a do it yourself home repairer or through second hand exposure, and have been diagnosed with mesothelioma, contact us through our contact page or telephone at 877-430-3383 x 224 to get information about the application process.