Around the House Tuesday

  By now, almost all of you thrifty mommas have learned how to make your own laundry soap. So let’s take it one step further. Do you know how much it is costing you per load? What is the magic number that store bought detergent would have to reach before it became a good deal? That is the topic of today’s post: Are you getting a good deal?

My calculations are going to be based on this basic recipe using good ole unit analysis.  (And you thought that it had no real application in the real world!)
½ cup washing soda
½ cup borax
1 3oz. Bar of soap

Let’s start with the soap. I pay no more than 50 cents per bar of soap. It is occasionally on sale for 3/$1. So we will use $.50 because it is much more likely.

The Arm & Hammer Washing Soda costs about $2.99 for a 55oz box. So the soda for 1 bucket of detergent costs just $.23!                                                                                          

$2.99 x 4.2oz = $.228

 55oz     ½ cup    ½ cup
The 20 Mule Team Borax costs $3.99 for a 76 oz box. So the borax for 1 bucket costs only $.18.
    
     $3.99 x 3.5oz = $.184
     76oz     ½ cup     ½ cup

Our whole bucket of laundry soap that washes 64 loads of laundry has only costs us $.50 for soap, $.23 for soda, and $.18 for borax; a total of $.91 !

All of that was just a whole lot of number crunching to show you that when you make your own laundry detergent it is only costing about a penny and a half for each load of laundry! I certainly can’t image Tide running a special on a jug of detergent for a dollar. The name-brand cleaners can cost up to 20 cents per load. So by doing just a little extra work, we just got an 97% off discount! Now THAT is a “Liz Price!”



Do I have your attention now? Just in case you have not learned to make your own, there is a picture tutorial at http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/laundrysoap.htm that is very helpful.

There are a few things that I have learned the past year cooking laundry soap.

• Many recipes dilute the mixture until it measures ½ cup per load. I have found that I don’t care for the uneven texture. I’m not really sure that the first load is cleaning the same as the last. So I did the same thing that the manufacturers are doing: cut the water in half. Once half of the water is gone, the mixture is much more homogenous! It is more like a gel and less like egg drop soup.
• Another alteration that I have made in some batches is to add a little bit of commercial detergent. Occasionally and rarely you may be able to find a store brand running a super sale. Just make sure that their version of one load measures your version.