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Did you catch my post a few weeks ago? The one where I told you all that I threw out every toxic cleaner in my house and replaced it with safe, toxic-free cleaners?
The most frequently asked question that I get about these “natural” cleaners is, “Yeah, but does it work as good?” Followed (usually) by reservations about wanting to make sure to kill off that bacteria from the toilet.
I get it. My husband was the biggest skeptic and in truth, that’s why it took me a few years to make the switch (my daughter has been using them and been nagging me to switch). I just wasn’t sure if I could trust them to get the job done. I didn’t want to invite sickness into my house by creating an environment for germs to live and thrive. I knew I could trust lysol and bleach to kill those little suckers.
When I really sat down to research and learn all of the harmful chemicals that are in cleaners, compounded with the health issues we’ve faced in our family (asthma, exzema, autoimmune disease), I finally decided that it was worth my family’s health to at least give these safer products a shot. I wasn’t going to make the switch without a little experiment of my own, though.
We’ve done a few science experiments in our day involving petri dishes, so I am no stranger on how to test to bacteria levels. I wanted to test 3 areas, with 3 different products, that seem to raise the biggest issues with bacteria: toilets, door knobs and dishes.
Before starting the test, I labeled 9 petri dishes. I wanted to have a “control” dish, showing that bacteria existed in each place at the get go, so I labeled 3 dishes (1 for each place I was testing) to swab “before” cleaners were applied. Then, I labeled 3 dishes (one for each space I was testing) with name brand cleaners; I used Lysol with bleach for the door knobs, Clorox wipes for the toilet, and Dawn dishsoap for the dishes. I did the same for the chemical free products, labeling them for the toxic-free version of those name brand products.
I set the petri dishes in my dark laundry room with the space heater for 3 days (bacteria grows best in warm, dark places). To be honest, I had my doubts that these cleaners would hold up against Lysol and bleach. I was really just hoping for a close finish. I figured if it was at least close, it would be good enough to justify the switch.
The results were beyond my expectations and I couldn’t be more thrilled! First off, this is what bacteria colonies look like inside a petri dish. This is the bacteria grown from the toilet swab. The amount of colonies is so high, I couldn’t even count them. Can we say disgusting??
Now look at each dish up against the cleaning agent dishes. We’ll start with the toilet dishes. On the top is the swab before cleaners. On the bottom left, I used a Clorox wipe to wipe down half of the toilet and then swabbed and rubbed it inside the petri dish. The bottom right was the same procedure but with the toxic-free cleaning wipe, similar to Clorox wipes but without the harmful chemicals. Look at those dishes! Not a trace of bacteria in them!
Next up are the petri dishes tested on the dishes. I was actually surprised with the amount of bacteria before, although the dishes had been left in the sink overnight (did I just confess that out loud?) You will probably laugh at my method of washing, but I actually put a strip of masking tape dividing the dish and washed one side of the plate with Dawn, and the other side with the non-toxic dish soap. Same set up as the last picture: the “before” picture is on top, Dawn dishsoap is bottom left, and the toxic-free soap is bottom right. If you look closely, there’s actually one tiny colony forming on the Dawn sample (towards the bottom on the right), whereas no colony at all on the toxic-free.
Lastly was the doorknob. I am highly surprised that more bacteria did not grow on the “before dish”, as I thought doorknobs were the worst bacteria breeding grounds ever. Maybe we have good hand washing going on over here. Ha ha. I used my same masking tape method to wash off the doorknob. I wanted to make sure that I was testing the same dirty object to get the most accurate results possible. The top is the before dish, bottom left is using Lysol with bleach, and bottom right is a different natural cleanser which, by the way, advertises that it kills 99.9% of staphylococcus bacteria. If I wasn’t a believer before, I sure am a believer now! Again, if you look closely at the Lysol dish, there are actually 3 colonies growing in the dish. There is one (smaller) colony in the chemical-free cleanser dish as well. I would say that’s 99.9% effective!
You’ve seen the results here for yourself, but don’t take my word for it. Try it out for yourselves! We always buy our petri dishes online. This would make a great science experiment for the science fair. I bet it would even be an award winning project (our petri dish experiments always win the science fair!) You can find the petri dishes here:
Clearly, these cleaners are just as effect as the name brand, bleach products. Why buy toxic, harmful chemicals that have been linked to cancers, respiratory issues, and other serious health problems when you can get the same results from a more natural source? It’s a no-brainer for me! If you are interested in learning more about these chemical free, toxic free cleaners, contact me and I would love to share more with you! Just to note, I am not a distributor for this company and I’m not selling anything, but like I mentioned on my last post, there is a way to shop for the products that benefit The DEANA Foundation (my non-profit) and anytime you can shop and benefit a charity without extra money out of your pocket, it is a shopping win!
Happy Cleaning!
