The Cleaning Products We Refuse to Use. And Why.

This is not a lecture. Nobody needs another lecture about cleaning products. But there are some things sitting under your sink right now that are worth knowing about, and we're going to tell you in plain language because the ingredient lists on most cleaning products read like a chemistry exam nobody asked to sit.

We've been doing this since 2019. We've tried a lot of products. Here's what we don't use and why we made that call.

Bleach

Bleach works. Nobody's disputing that. It kills bacteria, it whitens things, it makes a bathroom smell like it's been thoroughly dealt with. The problem is what it leaves behind.

Bleach releases chlorine gas when it comes into contact with other common household products, including some things you'd never think to worry about like certain washing up liquids and even some natural cleaners. It's corrosive. It irritates the lungs, the eyes and the skin. For anyone with asthma, children, or pets breathing at floor level, it's genuinely not ideal.

And here's the thing we keep coming back to. You don't need it. There are non-toxic alternatives that clean just as effectively without any of that. So we use those instead. Simple as that.

Ammonia

Ammonia is in a surprising number of glass and surface cleaners. It's effective on grease and leaves things streak-free, which is why it ended up in so many products to begin with.

It's also a respiratory irritant. Combined with bleach, which a lot of people mix without realising, it produces toxic fumes. Even on its own, in a poorly ventilated space, it's not something you want to be breathing in regularly. We're in and out of homes all day. Our team breathes this stuff too. Ammonia was an easy one to remove.

Synthetic fragrance

This is the one people are most surprised by. Because it's in everything. Surface sprays, floor cleaners, bathroom products, laundry powders, air fresheners. Everything smells like something and we've all just accepted that as normal.

The word fragrance on an ingredient list is legally allowed to cover hundreds of individual chemical compounds without disclosing any of them specifically. It's a catch-all term that gives manufacturers enormous flexibility and gives you essentially no information about what you're actually bringing into your home.

Some of those compounds are endocrine disruptors. Some are linked to respiratory issues. Some are simply irritants that accumulate in the air over time. The research on synthetic fragrance and fertility, hormone function and respiratory health is growing and it's not particularly reassuring.

A home that smells strongly of cleaning products hasn't necessarily been cleaned better than one that smells like nothing. It's just been fragranced. Those are two different things.

Phosphates

Less talked about but worth a mention. Phosphates are used in some cleaning products as water softeners and to help other ingredients work more effectively. When they go down the drain they end up in waterways where they cause algal blooms that deplete oxygen and devastate aquatic ecosystems.

We're an eco cleaning company. Phosphates were never going to make the list.

So what do we use instead

Plant-based, pH-balanced products with transparent ingredient lists. Products we'd be comfortable telling you exactly what's in them because there's nothing in there we'd want to hide.

Fragrance free throughout. Reusable microfibre cloths rather than disposable products. Water-saving techniques that have collectively saved over 300,000 litres since we started.

Non-toxic doesn't mean less effective. It means we made different choices about what effective looks like and what we're comfortable leaving behind in your home.

If you want to know exactly what we use, ask us. We'll tell you. That's rather the point.