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Will It All Come Out in the Wash?Sussing out the best stain removers.

By Dan Crane
Posted Thursday, June 28, 2007, at 7:10 AM ET

(Continued from page 1)

I had high hopes for Ecover, the environmentally friendly stain fighter. According to the label, Ecover "uses the most natural (95 to 100 percent) and least toxic ingredients available," and it's the only one I tested that lists its ingredients: "water, vegetable-based soap, sugar based surfactant, glycerin, natural acids and salts derived from sugar." Unfortunately, Ecover lost significant points in the ease of use category. When I tilted the bottle to apply it, a deluge of liquid promptly poured out of the plastic scrub-brush top, rendering the brush useless—I couldn't stop the liquid from coming out fast enough to bother with any scrubbing. The results were poor as well: Ecover earned only one point for blood removal and two for barbecue sauce.

Ease of use: 0
Effectiveness: 8
Total: 8

Tide to Go, $3.99

Claims to clean: "Works well on fresh food and drink stains, including tomato juice, ketchup, BBQ sauce, grape juice, coffee, wine, tea, chocolate syrup. (It does not work well on greasy stains.)"

As its name suggests, the Tide to Go stain pen is an on-the-spot stain treatment (rather than something applied to laundry before washing) meant to be carried on one's person at all times and used immediately after stains occur. Like an invisible ink pen, Tide to Go is supposed to magically draw your stain away. But I quickly discovered it was virtually useless on blood, coffee, mustard, and lipstick. Also, after going to work on just a few stain adversaries, the pen tip quickly became dirty and discolored. Then the hard felt tip dropped out of the pen, disappearing on my apartment floor. Its greatest victory was against the salad dressing, and, of course, whatever that mysterious liquid was at the dinner party.

Ease of use: 1
Effectiveness: 7
Total: 8

Schweppes Club Soda, $1.59

Claims to clean: This article in Scientific American discusses club soda's efficacy on red wine.

Like me, you've probably heard that club soda can get stains out. Since club soda doesn't come in a spray bottle, I tried mounting a sprayer gun on top of my 1-liter bottle. This turned out to be—much like the club soda was at fighting stains—not so effective. It was, however, better than nothing in fighting the barbecue sauce (2 points). Based on the Scientific American article, it seems that club soda is best on wine stains, and best when used quickly and in somewhat large quantities; hence, I'll admit that my spray-and-wash methodology was probably faulty.

Ease of use: 1
Effectiveness: 8
Total: 9

Shout Wipes, $3.29

Claims to clean: Consult the Shout Web site's interactive and very fun to use Stain Solver.

I like Shout Wipes. They make sense. Similar to the wet-naps you receive after a big lobster dinner, Shout Wipes are individually wrapped, and like the Tide to Go stick, are meant to be carried by reckless eaters like me at all times. I was, however, surprised and disappointed to find the wipes had little luck with coffee, mustard, or lipstick (to be fair, no product was successful against the mustard or the lipstick), and they had very limited success with the blood (1 point) and the barbecue sauce (2 points).

Ease of use: 2
Effectiveness: 8
Total: 10

OxiClean, $4.19

Claims to clean: "wine, blood, dirt, tomato, grass—even set-in stains."

OxiClean "starts to work before your eyes," reads the bottle. It's true! When I sprayed it on my blood stain, the formula's hydrogen peroxide fizzed away—giving the impression that serious stain eradication was in progress. As it bubbled, I imagined the peroxide erasing the blood away, but in fact, it barely eliminated it (earning only 1 point).

Ease of use: 2
Effectiveness: 9
Total: 11

Spray 'n Wash, $3.49

Claims to clean: "Greasy foods, grass, tomato sauce and a wide variety of others."

Spray 'n Wash was the stain remover of my childhood. I can recall my mom drawing it like a gun from a holster against the multifarious messes I'd make on my clothing. Its packaging declares Spray 'n Wash has "powerful stain fighting ingredients that penetrate, loosen, and eliminate the toughest stains." It earned 3 points for nearly removing the barbecue sauce, and also a 2 for ease of use. What's easier than spraying and washing?

Ease of use: 2
Effectiveness: 9
Total: 11

Shout, $4.99

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Dan Crane is a writer and musician living in New York. He is currently completing a book about his experience as a competitive air guitarist.
Music for video by Russel Fong.
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Remarks from the Fray:

I've had the same results with the Shout Wipes (which also come in cheapie travel-size packets for $0.99 at my local Target) ... but they require immediate treatment of the spot-in-question. Allowing a stain to sit renders spot-treaters useless.

A product that was not tested was the Carbona line of stain-specific treatments...I've had decent success with a couple of these, but they're a pain in the bum to use, even when you do have the time.

OxyClean is OK, but I usually use it in my warm-water laundry to boost my detergent instead of bleach, which I am allergic to (and would also ruin 98% of my wardrobe)... OxyClean does NOT work well in cold water.

Lastly, on Spray 'n' Wash ... the Spray 'n' Wash stick is far superior to the spray because it doesn't run. Even on set-in stains, especially if you swab some on before tossing your item into the hamper and it sits until you're ready to do laundry ...or you run out of socks, whichever comes first.

--Thebazile78

(To reply, click here.)

The stain removers which do the best job on almost all clothing stains are the "degreaser" stain removers found in the automotive departments of many stores. They remove many other stains other than grease.

There are several brands, often labeled with a "color" such as purple stuff, green stuff. The brand on my laundry shelf at this time is "Super Clean" which is a gallon size so it will last for many months; however, any of the brands I have tried work equally well. You can buy huge jugs of the "stuff" for a few dollars. Pour some into a good, reliable spray bottle and set to work.

I find old stains are removed well too, almost all the time. I keep it handy as I load the washer, squirting here and there on stains I find on clothing and almost all of them have set for several days since I am rarely prompt with such mundane chores. Rarely have I had an item come from the wash with any stains remaining and I suspect when that happens I have likely missed a spot when spraying---spray again, wash again normally will do the trick.

Our household has lots of grease stains from food spills and dirt and grass stains from backyard playtimes. Most of these products have information on the labels for using in the laundry. I discovered these products by recommendation a few years ago; it is not where most people would shop for laundry stain removers.

The same products work wonderfully on other household cleaning chores.....dirt and grease on kitchen appliances, for example. It works for mopping too but I do not prefer it because it takes up any shine you have put on the floor with a wax or floor shine but for occasional use, it gets floors clean.

The products are great in the workshop too and that is where they are used most often since the automotive department is where it is sold. Dollar stores also sell an inexpensive product (Awesome) which works about the same but comes in a smaller bottle. (I did do one "test" once. I tried one of the products on a delicate fabric on a clothing item which was to be discarded (silk). The stain came out and the fabric completely unharmed so I do not hesitate to use these products on all fabrics and have never had a problem.

--oxmont

(To reply, click here.)

You didn't test White Magic - it's easy, and works quite well. But, your big mistake with OxyClean was following the directions - OxyClean will get any stain out of anything if you mix it with water (kind of a paste), apply it to the stain and LET IT DRY. Then put the item through the wash. Not the easiest way, but the most effective.

--judyinm

(To reply, click here.)

May I humbly suggest you'd have significantly better luck removing stains if you didn't wash in hot water. it will set most protein-based stains and doesn't really help the others. Hot water is effective if you are washing whites with bleach. Beyond that, it does more harm than good.

--MacAdvisor

(To reply, click here.)

My solution to stains has been cheap, readily available, and quite satisfactory. I keep a dish detergent bottle (the kind with the pull up top) in which I put about 1 ounce of my favorite liquid laundry detergent. I then half fill the bottle with plain ordinary ammonia and top up the other half with tap water. All stains get a little squirt of this liquid.

It's especially effective on blood (even older stains will come out), coffee, some grease, and most other drips and spots that I accumulate in a day. Grease/oil, especially on polyester or mixed blend fabric is more problematic. On white fabrics, a quick squirt of the above mix, plus a few swipes with a damp corner of a bar of Don Maximo works well.

On colors, usually I spray with Spot Shot Carpet Stain Remover, then cover that with my mix. Please note, I usually do not scrub the spots or even just rub the fabric together. Ammonia is great stuff but be careful not to mix it with anything that contains chlorine bleach. The combination and the fumes it gives off can be deadly.

One last little trick. I keep a small plastic syringe (sans needle) for those stains on white tee shirts that just don't come out. Suck up a little bleach into the syringe and then, very carefully, squeeze it onto the stain. Gee - my own little stain pen. Carefully roll up the tee shirt so that the bleached spot doesn't touch any colored material. Push it into the wash water still rolled up so that the bleach will be diluted before it has a chance to damage other colored clothing. I learned about the power of ammonia reading a WWI navy corpsman handbook back when I was a teenager. It's cheap, available, but you may have to look for it since it's gone out of style (very top shelf or very bottom shelf at the grocery store).

--jerseygirl

(To reply, click here.)

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