...Well, bottle size, that is! Rider Thompson, over on Sustainable Is Good, has a great article on the new Arm & Hammer essential cleaners. Wha? Hold up, Nathan. This is a method blog! I know, I know. Bear with me for a moment. Check out that pic above. What you get is one full-sized empty cleaning bottle, and a small concentrate bottle. Do you see how small that bottle is? Oh, let's let Rider explain it better:
"Arm & Hammer recently launched Arm & Hammer Essentials Cleaners a new line of household cleaning products available in three formulations and smart packaging.
The new products are sold with an empty sprayer bottle made of #1 PET plastic with a bottle of concentrated cleaner attached in a smaller #2 HDPE plastic bottle.
The consumer fills the spray bottle and then affixes the smaller bottle to the top and their special cap system releases the cleaning solution into the spray bottle. The system Arm & Hammer has devised for this product is ingenious it works flawlessly - well done.
By selling the cleaners as concentrates Arm & Hammer makes a significant reduction in packaging waste and carbon footprint related to transportation of the products. The company says their packaging uses 93% less plastic and 83% less packaging than a standard pre-filled 32 oz. cleaner.
I had a chance to try the Cleaner & Degreaser from the line on a glass top stove. The product was easy to prepare just fill up the spray bottle and attach the cleaning solution and it mixes together...
...The different cleaners are all color coded so a consumer who purchased several different ones from the line can easily tell them apart - very smart product design."
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Whoa! Ok, no, I'm not telling you to run out and buy Arm & Hammer. (Shame on you!) But could you not see this working so well for method! This seems very forward thinking, and isn't method all about some forward thinking? It's very similar to selling the aroma pills, or daily shower spray. Except instead of purchasing a larger bottle of shower spray refill, you would purchase this small bottle of refill concentrate. Thereby saving lots of shelf space in the retail store, AND saving plastic, and water (and gasoline, and the environment, and...!)
I do think the first bottle you'd purchase could be full (unlike Arm & Hammer's, where the full sized bottle is empty.) And then for all future purchases, you'd just buy the concentrates! (Until your bottle wore out.)
Now I'll be the first to say, I always think "I don't want my cleaner to be made with Greensboro, NC water! Blah!" But I filter my water, ok? So I bet my water would be just as great as San Francisco water, er, or where ever method gets it's water. It's a mentality thing, that I think I could overcome easily. You're buying their great cleaning concentrate, when you really think about it. Water is just a carrier.
So, what are your thoughts? Couldn't you just see all these concentrates sitting on store shelves, like aroma pill refills. AND I think with all the shelf space saved, this might allow method to play around with additional fragrances! Giving us even more selection to choose from! Comment away!
