Inside the Ultra-Secret Club That Knows WD-40’s Recipe

Membership in one of San Diego’s most exclusive clubs comes with no bar, no restaurant, and just one coveted perk: a peek at the secret recipe for WD-40. Only a select few people worldwide have ever seen the full, handwritten formula for the 70-year-old lubricant, a product used for everything from loosening rusty bolts to removing gum from turtle shells.

According to the Wall Street Journal, gaining access to this inner circle requires signing nondisclosure agreements, obtaining a special key managed by the company’s top lawyer, and visiting a hidden Bank of America vault where the notebook containing the formula is kept. Steve Brass, CEO of WD-40 and a 30-year company veteran, was granted entry roughly 18 months ago. “It was like getting into Fort Knox,” he says.

The notebook holds not only the successful “40th” water-displacement formula but also the 39 failed attempts that came before it, along with at least one plain warning—“Do not smoke,” recalls finance chief Sara Hyzer, who viewed the notebook alongside Brass. Even senior scientists aren’t allowed inside. Meghan Lieb, head of R&D and a company veteran of two decades, has never seen the formula firsthand and works only from a coded version. She jokes that her family likely assumes she knows the ingredients, but she insists she does not. And with the formula penciled into the notebook, no one wants to imagine a giant eraser making its way inside, as the Times of London pointed out a few years ago.

Outside the vault, speculation runs wild. Online forums debate ingredients—fish oil, citrus, coconut, vanilla?—though WD-40 officials dismiss the most popular guesses. A past lab analysis captured broad components, a company spokeswoman said, but never enough to actually recreate the product, which still generates nearly 80% of WD-40’s revenue. Reddit users now focus less on the ingredients and more on inventive uses, sharing thousands of ideas from detangling horsehair to killing wasps.

As for expanding the secret club, Brass says he might invite a few long-serving employees if the company ever hits $1 billion in sales—but he insists that the board itself will remain outside the inner circle.

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