Wandering down the household cleaner aisle at the grocery store is enough to give anyone sticker shock. Should you really pay $7.99 for something that claims to clean your linoleum clear down to the subflooring? Not if you have a few basic and inexpensive ingredients at home.
Cleaning products, no matter how “specially-formulated,” all use the same basic science to get surfaces germ and dirt free. As long as you’re careful not to mix anything you shouldn’t, (namely bleach and ammonia!), you can create safe, effective and green cleaning supplies that work just as well as the exorbitantly-priced name-brand varieties.
Listed below are the supplies that you’ll need:
White Vinegar
Extremely cheap and easy to use, old-fashioned vinegar is a true wonder product. It eliminates odors (oddly enough, since it doesn’t exactly smell like roses), removes coffee stains from ceramics, and makes windows sparkle. It also makes a less-caustic substitute for ammonia, and you can toss a half-cup in with your laundry during the rinse load as a replacement for fabric softener.
Baking Soda
For less than a dollar, a box of baking soda provides effective odor absorption and abrasive scrubbing power, all in one. Sprinkle some on a sponge to scrub away soap scum on your shower, or to scour your countertops after chopping onions. Or, dump a few tablespoons down your sink drains and follow up with a quarter cup of vinegar – let bubble, and rinse with hot water to unplug and deodorize.
Borax
Borax, or sodium borate, is another cheap product with a variety of uses: not only does it clean laundry (see my article, How to Make Homemade Laundry Detergent, for more info), but it can also be used as a scouring agent, a disinfectant, a deodorizer, and even an environmentally-safe roach and ant killer.
Bleach
Bleach is probably the most common ingredient in household cleansers, but many people don’t think to use it beyond whitening their whites. You can dilute it with water and keep in a spray bottle for disinfecting your counters and cutting boards and to kill that nasty mildew that keeps popping up in your shower. Mix in one tablespoon to a gallon of water and decant to a labeled spray bottle. Spray surface, wipe and let air dry.
Dish Soap
Dish soap has a lot more uses than just washing dishes, and to be effective, it doesn’t have to smell like wild apricots and vanilla and cost $5.00 a bottle. One teaspoon added to a bleach-and-water mix can help to mask the bleach odor and works just as well as “special” bleach household cleaners.
You can also save money on cleaning supplies by purchasing a few basic items. For example, round steel wool works great on pots and pans, but won’t rust like the regular stuff (just don’t use it on enameled or non-stick surfaces). In addition, you can pick up empty spray bottles at discount and dollar stores, and they make great containers for holding your homemade cleaning supplies.
With a little classic ingenuity and some run-of-the mill elbow grease, you can save big by replacing most of the common – and expensive – household cleaning products that you normally use with effective, cheap and more environmentally-friendly homemade cleaning supplies.
