Thursday, December 29, 2011

Homemade Laundry Soap

I just made some laundry soap.  I've had all the indgredients to make this for a long time. I just needed to exhaust my supply of store bought soap.  Today was the day. 


I grated a bar of Fels-Naptha and set aside 1 1/3 cup for another batch. I used my food processor for this. I add this to a kettle on the stove to 4 cups water.  Heat to dissolve the soap.  Meanwhile, measure out 1/2 cup each of soda and borax.  


Add 4 cups hot water to a storage container.  Add melted mixture to the storage container plus 1 gallon and 6 cups water.  Mix.  


This container is huge.  I will more than likely put it in a smaller container plus I have a milk jug I will put some into for daily use.

The information below I got from another blog.  She also had a video tutorial, if anyone is interested.  I didn't keep tract of my prices.  Next time I will and give you an update.

Price comparisons
All calculations are based on the national avg. of 400 loads of laundry per family per year, or 7.69 loads per week

Tide $12.99/64 loads .20/load=$80/yr   
Gain $5.99/32 loads .19/load=$76/yr
All $4.29/32 loads .13/load=$52/yr
Trend $2.49/38 loads .7/load=$28/yr
(generic brand)

Fels Naptha soap $1.19/bar
Arm&Hammer Super Washing Soda $2.99/55oz box
20 Mule Team Borax $4.49/76 oz box
One box of the washing soda will make just under 7 batches of soap, and the borax will make exactly 19 batches. 

One batch of soap calculates out to:
$1.19/Fels Naptha 
.49/Washing soda
.24/Borax
$1.92 per 10 gallons

10 gal (64oz) divided by 2 oz./load=320 loads/batch=.006/load

Final cost per year=$2.40!!!!!!!!!!


Now that's a great bottom line!  Please post a comment and let me know if you try this and what you think.  

2 comments:

  1. It's on my list of things to do!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I've been using this laundry soap since I posted. I find that I'm trying small quantity of soap each time. I think I'm about down to 1 tablespoon per load. Have you made it yet?

    ReplyDelete