My frontloading washer is pretty dang water-efficient, true, and the recommendations for soap aren't huge amounts in the first place. But I only need about a teaspoon of detergent to get stuff clean. A TEAspoon. A quart jug of laundry liquid lasts us months. Now, maybe your washer uses more water than mine and therefore needs more soap. That's fine; My last washer was a behemoth that took a whopping two tablespoons of soap per load. That's one EIGHTH of a cup, contrasted with the half or third of a cup the product bottles recommended. I don't use fabric softener, but I've been told that using half as much of that works fine, and half a dryer sheet at a time too.

I think we all know that you don't need to glob an inch of toothpaste on your brush. Just a tiny smear is fine.

Shampoo and body wash are actually BETTER for your hair and skin (less drying) if you cut them at least half-and-half with water. Keep an old bottle of each so that when the new bottle comes in you can dilute it right away and have it handy. My experience is that the preservatives in the products are plenty to keep even the watered-down version from going bad. If you're worried, mix smaller batches at a time.

(And you know that if you have long hair, you don't shampoo the whole long length of it, right? You need a nickel-to-quarter-sized blob of shampoo for your scalp, which then gets rinsed down through the rest of your hair. You don't need crazy lather to get your hair clean.)

I personally use a mixture of one part Dr Bronner's liquid soap to 6 parts water or so, as body wash. If I use it on my hair, which I sometimes do, it's more like one part soap to twelve parts water.

Aftershave and mouthwash dilute fine too.

Conditioner, sadly, doesn't take kindly to being diluted, but if you prefer to cut down on the cost of it or on the petrochemical ingredients in it, you can mix two parts conditioner to one part honey and/or one part pure aloe juice. This has to be used up right away, as bacteria will breed in the extra sugars.

Storebought house cleaning products work fine diluted half and half or even 2:1. Or, use Dr Bronner's liquid soap or a generic equivalent (Trader Joe's makes one). You only need a teaspoon of soap to a quart of water.

We use so few products here anyway that I'm sure I'm missing at least a few. Any other experiences with products you can routinely use less of than the label calls for? REDUCE does come first in the "reduce, reuse, recycle" triad for a reason, after all.

Kristin

We also use body wash, instead of bar soap only because my kids would leave the soap in the tub and it would melt into a horrible mess. But there too I know that it is reccomended that a dime size portion be used, but I think my husband uses about a quarter size amount.
I am good about using just a bit of toothpaste, but I can't break the habit of letting the water run while I brush.

On the topic of use less products, how about useless products......Swiffer pads, disposable spongy toilet bowl cleaners, clorox wipes....etc....

Jackie

I like both of them a lot and they're extremely handy, but I use them with pieces of old towel I pop in the wash afterwards. I noticed in particular that the Clorox wet-mop pads were absolutely useless! All they did was smear the wet dirt around. The best mopping cloths I've found are old diapers; but not just any diapers, they have to be the diamond/birdseye weave. Something about that weave really scrubs the floor clean.

If you buy the Swiffer type "starter kits" you can wash and reuse the dry-mopping cloths that come with it up to 4 times. You have to air dry them, though, or they melt.

Speaking of conditioner, it's really a pointless waste for short hair. Mine is long, though, and I do use conditioner, but I minimize it by not washing my hair more than twice a week. I also don't need gel, hairspray or mousse and I noticed when I did use them that aside from gluing my hair into place, they usually did the opposite of what I bought them for -- "extra body" products weighed my hair down and made it flatter, so I quit using them.

Kristin

Try vinegar for a hair rinse. Sounds awful, but I've really learned to like the way it makes my hair feel. If you Google "vinegar for hair" you'll find lots of info about the benefits.

K

Gram cut dryer sheets in half (Gosh, when I think of the grief I caused her over stuff like this)...I do that or more often, don't use at all.

I don't use store bought cleaners. I use vinegar, borax, ammonia, bleach (sparingly), water, and baking soda. Works for us. I started looking into this b/c our puppy has allergies. I read up on how cleaners can be a huge issue for allergic dogs. This has really been a great help. (Although, sometimes my husband says the kitchen smells like a salad bowl). Anyways, I dilute it ALL - so a $1 box of baking soda or jug of vinegar lasts forever.

I need to cut down on shampoo/soaps. Good tips on that. My hubby is ultra wasteful in that area. I've read that instead of liquid soap, you can use bubble bath....it's cheaper, so I may try that with him.

Also if it's cheaper, and you feel OK about using your current amount or even more of it because of that, the packaging and transportation waste isn't addressed.

Kristin

Actually, hard water often requires you to use more detergent/soap, because the minerals in the water inhibit some of the ingredients in the detergent/soap. The big secret with modern detergents, though, is that you don't have to see oodles of bubbles to know it's working. In fact, in many washing machines, too many bubbles are a bad thing (it makes the water pump work harder).

These days, there is no one to advocate for you but you. There are mass-market detergents that do not contain (detectable) fragrances or bleaching/softening/coloring additives. Natural-food stores (and better supermarkets in larger metropolitan areas) sell vegetable-based detergents which also come free of fragrances and colors and minimize the use of "strange" ingredients.

If, indeed, the chemicals in the cheap mass-market brands of detergent cause you health problems, you certainly can write the manufacturers of those products and the management of your local store and express your unhappiness. But then you have to do the one thing that everyone in capitalist societies understands: vote with your money. Buy a product that works for you and don't settle for the product that doesn't.

I don't mix detergent in water when I wash the floors, I just pour half a cap on the floor and scrub it around with a damp mop before washing it off. It works better because it's not so dilute, and it uses very little product.

Kristin

A fifty-fifty mix of hydrogen peroxide and water makes a good bacteria killing mouthwash. One can brush teeth with baking soda, or salt, instead of toothpaste. Many toothpastes have sugar in them. How silly is that?!

Hydrogen peroxide helps to clean gunk out of crevices around kitchen counters where the sink attaches to the counter and around faucets. It helps to break down mineral deposits behind the sink where water sprays on my formica counter. It also does a good job on tile around bathroom sinks, and helps to brighten white grout. Pour it on and let it work for about ten minutes, then wipe dry with an old towel. The tiles gleam!

Lorna

Katrs5, I use the same stuff as you do for household cleaning. I'm not much into the bleach either. I have used H2O2 in the laundry for pretty good results. It is better in the environment than bleach.

The best thing of all is that when you make your own stuff and use your own common sense about store bought stuff and all the hype that goes with it, you get such a feeling of independence and freedom. When I first broke away from believing I needed everything "they" said I did, I felt like I discovered a well-kept secret. It was liberating.