I don’t know about you, but our family goes through a lot of laundry. Like seriously, a ton. According to The Spruce the average American family does 8-10 loads of laundry a week! That adds up to a staggering 416-520 loads a year! I don’t know about you, but I’m getting hives just thinking about all that folding! Depending on the size of your family, the age, and general level of cleanliness of your people (small kids = filthy), you may do more or less. With this much laundry being done, it’s wise to consider how much your laundry soap is costing you.
We tested out five cheap laundry soaps against a classic to see which was the most effective at removing tough stains. All of these detergents (or the ingredients to make them) are available for purchase at Walmart stores or online at Amazon. For our purposes, cost per load was based on the pricing at our local Walmart store. Pricing for the homemade detergent was based on the cost of the ingredients to make the recipe, divided by how many loads the recipe made. All of the information below is our opinion alone and is not sponsored content.
MEET THE LAUNDRY DETERGENTS
Here is how we did it:
We took one large white towel and cut it into six strips of the same size. The towels were labelled with the name of the laundry soap that would be used with a permanent marker and numbered 1-8 with space for each of the stains.
We chose some of our most common household stains to put to the test up against these laundry detergents. The stains were rubbed into the towels in equal amounts using a tablespoon measure and left to dry overnight with no pre-treating, rinsing or soaking, because to be honest, I usually don’t get to a stain right away and I wanted to see how these would really fare in a real life setting.
Each stained towel was washed as an individual small load, in our top load (non-fancy) washer on the medium-soil, cotton setting in hot water with a cold water rinse. The same set of six small towels were washed with each of the stained towels for consistency. All of the stained towels were then dried together on the cotton high heat setting in our front load (also non-fancy) dryer.
After the towels were dried, we hung them up in a window to see how the stains fared. We found this was the most effective way to see whether or not the stain was still there as some of the stains were not as visible on the surface but appeared to definitely be there through and through with some back light. We then compared the stains to one another side by side. Some of these were a little more obvious to determine in person so you’ll just have to trust my judgement I guess! The photos don’t necessarily do them justice but we did the best we could.
For each of these stains, the detergents earned a score based on where they fell in line from worst to best, with the goal being to earn the most points possible. If a detergent was worst at removing the ketchup stain, it earned 1 point in that category. If the same detergent was best at removing chocolate, it earned a 6 in that category and so on. The final determination was made based on total score.
Some detergents were really great at removing a certain kind of stain and really bad at others. For this reason, in addition to the overall score, we have listed out which detergents were best and worst at which stains below. We learned that just about every detergent was good at getting the ketchup out but that nothing was good at removing the mustard stain! Surprisingly, mud was rather difficult to remove too. You would think most detergents would work really well on mud and dirt since they are so common…
The homemade recipe we used is the one readily available on Pinterest that uses Borax, Fels Naptha Soap and Washing Soda. You can find the recipe I used here if you’re interested in giving it a try!
Without further ado here is the line up in order from worst, to best overall!
And The Winner Is...
The Free and Clear detergent from ALL placed near the top of all of the categories making it the overall winner. At a price point of only $0.11 per load this is a pretty great bargain too. If you had been doing your 10 loads of laundry a week with Tide and switched to ALL you’d save yourself $52.00 a year in laundry soap! It might not seem like a ton but it all adds up and I don’t know about you but I don’t like wasting money when something else out there works better!
Below is the list of the individual stain winners listed in order of best to worst.
Individual Stain Winners:
#1 Ketchup
- All
- Tide w/ Oxi
- Homemade
- Arm and Hammer
- Simply Tide
- Nellies
#2 Coffee
- Homemade
- All
- Simply Tide
- Tide w/ Oxi
- Arm and Hammer
- Nellies
#3 Mustard
- Homemade
- Nellies
- All
- Arm and Hammer
- Tide w/ Oxi
- Simply Tide
#4 Red Wine
- Homemade
- Tide w/ Oxi
- All
- Simply Tide
- Nellies
- Arm and Hammer
#5 Chocolate
- Tide w/ Oxi
- All
- Simply Tide
- Nellies
- Arm and Hammer
- Homemade
#6 Mud
- Homemade
- Arm and Hammer
- All
- Tide w/ Oxi
- Simply Tide
- Nellies
#7 Grass
- All
- Nellies
- Tide w/ Oxi
- Simply Tide
- Arm and Hammer
- Homemade
#8 Berries
- Homemade
- All
- Tide w/ Oxi
- Simply Tide
- Arm and Hammer
- Nellies
What do you think? Were you surprised by the results at all? Leave us a comment below and let us know!
Interesting! I am down to about 5 loads a week (kid clothes, workout gear, work clothes, towels/sheets). I am a devoted Costco gal, and a big fan of the Kirkland brand free and clear detergent. It works out to between 8 and 9 cents a load. Do yall have a Costco near you? The bulk sizes and Kirkland brand items are great deals, and our membership pays for itself in gas savings alone.
Hi Heidi! We actually don’t have a Costco near by! We are really out in the boonies over here! I’m thinking about doing a second round battle including Purex and a couple others. I might just have to find a friend with membership and make a road trip! Thanks for the suggestion!