So I've now received two shipments of Melaleuca supplies. First package consisted of cleaning products. Second shipment consisted of body washes, lotions, tooth paste, mouth wash, hand sanitizers, lip balms, shampoo and conditioner. I also got a candle warmer for a Christmas gift. Total cost for cleaning pack was $162. Total cost for second package was $166.
I've tried many of the cleaning products now. I received the pack yesterday and went absolutely crazy cleaning the house! For those of you who don't know about the home conversion cleaning pack it comes with about a dozen or so cleaners and disinfectants, wipes, and a bunch of laundry supplies. It was a pretty big and heavy box. I have to say it was kind of fun opening it and seeing what everything was. Most of the things are concentrated so you have to dilute them and put them into spray bottles. They give you all the spray bottles already labeled, and pumps if needed. So that was kind of fun too, making all my new spray bottles.
Though upon closer examination today, I realize that the spray bottles are actually half the size of normal bottles you get in the store. So in terms of value, it isn't necessarily cheaper than buying stuff from the store.
I can see why the products and company can be so addictive and why people love them so much. First off, receiving a big box full of new products feels like Christmas! You feel like you are getting something fun and special. Also, if you aren't obsessive about reading labels and researching products to find out how green they are, you could be totally swayed into thinking that Melaleuca is amazing because all the stuff smells great, looks great, and works - and best of all it's supposedly healthier for your home!!!
The key word here is "healthier". It doesn't say "healthy" or "non toxic" or harmless to the environment. First of all, with environmentally friendly companies there is usually a lot more transparency in terms of listing all of the ingredients. Companies can use the word "natural" on their products and not have to back up the claim. It's just a word. Most of their products have fragrances in them, and they do not state what they consist of. Usually it's petroleum based, not particularly natural.
However, after all is said and done, the prices are not significantly more expensive and most of them are concentrated. So while a product might not be non toxic, it does gain points by being more environmentally friendly by using less water and plastic, as well as less gas to distribute the product. Particularly the laundry detergent and fabric softener. They both come in smallish containers and have 96 loads. The price is about $20. So realistically, that is very comparable to Tide, for example. Big difference being, that the smell of the Melaleuca one is nicer.
Anyway, so after cleaning my whole house (yes, I really went nuts trying everything!) these are my results.
Rustic Touch Furniture Polish: Amazing. Really. I have this table in the corner of my dining room that is often neglected for cleaning. It's solid wood, but old and second hand. We just use the whole thing to store junk really. Anyway, I took everything off of it and polished it with this stuff, and holy cow! It honestly brought the old thing back to life! I had only wiped it with water before, so I have nothing to compare it to, but it left a really nice glossy finish. It wasn't oily, and it smelled great! Very easy to use to, just a nice little spritzer bottle. So much better than using Pledge (I've used that crap at other peoples houses and I hate it).
Tough and Tender All Purpose Cleaner: I have actually used it before at someones house who is a member. As I clean houses for extra money now and again, I have used a lot of products. This product doesn't smell amazing in my opinion. It's clean smelling, but really nothing special. It works well, but not really better or worse than other things I've tried.
Tub and Tile: When I first used the stuff I was actually overwhelmed by the fragrance of it. I think I used quite a lot, and combined with all of the other products I'd used in the same area, it was all smelling very strongly. It did take a bit of getting used to the smell, it's kind of lemony and it does smell strong. However, it does work very well and after using the product a few times I grew to actually quite like the smell. In fact, several years later it's one of my favourite Melaleuca products.
Sol-U-Mel: It's a stain remover, cleaner and deodorizer. I used it on a chair (one of my cats had an accident on a chair). I sprayed the chair, and wiped it with this stuff. It got everything fresh and clean again.
Melamagic: It's a heavy duty cleaner of industrial strength. I only used it to wash my floors. It did a great job in the kitchen. I used it for half the house on the parquet floors. However, later when I checked the label I noticed that it says it's not recommended for hard wood floors. Oops! Oh well, those parquet floors are already old and damaged (from the 70's). It seemed to clean them well anyway.
Clear Power: It's a glass cleaner. It worked well, no harsh smells. I first started using ammonia free cleaners a couple of years ago and I like this one the best.
No Work: It's a spray for your shower. You spray it after each shower and apparently it dissolves soap scum so you don't have to clean it as often. There's very little work involved, just spray it on and leave it. No rinsing or wiping. There are other products like it on the market, and I haven't ever tried any of them so I can't compare. I have been using it for two days so far and I have to say, it does seem to work. I gave the tiles a good scrub before hand so I would notice any new soap scum. So far there is none. **Update** While I did like the product, ultimately I'm lazy and did not like spraying so much after each shower. Plus the perfume smell was too strong just after a shower, so I stopped using it. But it is a good product.
Sol-U-Guard: It's a disinfectant. It smells like thyme and lemon. I like it. Though I am a bit torn, because I'm not sure if it's made of that anti-bacterial stuff which I am quite against. ***Update***While I did really like the product, I've started making my own gentle multi purpose cleaner for my kitchen counters (as a gentle daily clean).
Melapower (laundry detergent): This works well, and smells very nice too. Though I've never had a laundry detergent that I hated! Not sure how tough it is on stains though.
Melasoft (fabric softener): This is the nicest stuff I've ever used. It smells amazing, and makes things really soft. I've had complements on my blankets smelling so nice. I love it! ***update*** Three years later and I still use it! I love that it's so concentrated, you need so little to do a wonderful job! I've been using the same bottle for a year and a half and still have some left. I also have another bottle waiting unopened that I bought through a friend at the reduced price.
Melabrite: It's an optical brightener. I think it's supposed to be used instead of bleach (maybe?) but it did not seem to do anything to my clothes at all. Also, after doing research on optical brighteners I'm not so sure that adding those kind of chemicals to your clothes is necessary. Therefore, three years later I still have some left in the bottle!
There were many other products, I could spend days talking about all of them. The bottom line though is that some of the products are pretty good, overall I like the stuff. It's hard not to really. I don't like that they don't disclose a full ingredient list for things. Apparently in the U.S there isn't any law that says a company has to. Also, there aren't any strict laws that govern criteria for a company to call itself green. Therefore, I do believe that a lot of companies call themselves green and charge accordingly even though they aren't. I think that some companies are less green than others. Like that Comet stuff, gross green detergent powder to clean bathrooms. So disgusting. It only costs a dollar and the stuff will last ages. I do not think that stuff is good for the environment or a persons health, but they don't pretend to be green either. Something like Chlorox Green Works though, pretends to be green, has green in it's name, but is it really green? Well, it's colour is green so it isn't lying there. But is it just a play on words? It does not list it's ingredients and does not claim to be non toxic. Therefore, I would say it probably isn't really the safest product.
My favourite company is Method. I like their packaging, their prices are a little bit high but I really do like the products. They all smell amazing. Really. Every time I clean someones house they always comment on how nice everything smells. One of the all purpose cleaners smells like lavender. The glass cleaner smells like mint. The floor cleaner comes in almond scent or lemon. All very nice pleasant smells. They list all of their ingredients, and on each bottle it says that it's non toxic. A company can't just say that they are non toxic if they aren't. Melaleuca products do not claim to be non toxic.
What annoys me about Melaleuca is that you have to be a preferred customer to buy things at sane prices. Even then, the prices are still a bit on the expensive side but only slightly so. So you pay a little bit extra to get something you really like and then it's delivered to you (which means you are paying more for shipping). But at the regular prices it just feels like robbery. Take the furniture polish for example. That is a product that I would love to buy again. Regardless of how safe it is, it smells amazing and does a really good job. I've never seen a wood cleaner so easy to use that smells so nice. However, they charge $11.50 at the regular price, plus tax and shipping. So it comes to almost $15 for 237 ml! It costs $31.50 for 1.4 liters of laundry soap. Enough for 96 loads apparently. But after tax and shipping that is close to $40! I'm sorry, but I can buy the same thing for $20 at the health food store.
I cancelled my membership. I can still order things at the regular price, which I don't think I will as it's too expensive. I can sign up again at no cost within six months and become a preferred customer so I can buy things at the reduced rate and then I can cancel again with no hassles or charges. Though, let's face it, it IS a hassle to have to sign up and cancel (all the time and paperwork or phone calls involved) just to order some products!
As for the employment aspect of it all, I didn't try to make money. I don't think it's very easy to make a lot of money though. The person who signed me up has at least 10 people on her team that she has recruited via ads and facebook and the money she earns covers half of the cost of what she spends each month. That's a racket. I mean you have to be a preferred customer in order to recruit people and make money. Which means that you have to spend 35 points each month, which as I've mentioned works out to about $80 a month. Then you have to spend about 15 hours a week a month so that you can earn about $40 a month? What?
***Update***
Two and a half years later and I'm still using some of the products. I was lucky and managed to get my friend to order things for me so I got the preferred customer price on things.
Therefore I still use the fabric softener, laundry brightener (two and a half years later there is still some left!) furniture polish, glass cleaner, tub and tile cleaner, and I still have a couple of bottles of Melamagic - which because it is so concentrated lasts forever!
However, looking to the future I won't be able to order from my friend again as we don't live local to each other and therefore it is not convenient. So I will have to decide whether I will pay the full price for things.
Ultimately, I can use Method products for most of my cleaning needs. I also now make my own cleaning products that I know are environmentally friendly because all they have in them liquid castille soap, water, and some essential oils. They freshen up my kitchen nicely without the extra cost and chemicals.
I've tried many of the cleaning products now. I received the pack yesterday and went absolutely crazy cleaning the house! For those of you who don't know about the home conversion cleaning pack it comes with about a dozen or so cleaners and disinfectants, wipes, and a bunch of laundry supplies. It was a pretty big and heavy box. I have to say it was kind of fun opening it and seeing what everything was. Most of the things are concentrated so you have to dilute them and put them into spray bottles. They give you all the spray bottles already labeled, and pumps if needed. So that was kind of fun too, making all my new spray bottles.
Though upon closer examination today, I realize that the spray bottles are actually half the size of normal bottles you get in the store. So in terms of value, it isn't necessarily cheaper than buying stuff from the store.
I can see why the products and company can be so addictive and why people love them so much. First off, receiving a big box full of new products feels like Christmas! You feel like you are getting something fun and special. Also, if you aren't obsessive about reading labels and researching products to find out how green they are, you could be totally swayed into thinking that Melaleuca is amazing because all the stuff smells great, looks great, and works - and best of all it's supposedly healthier for your home!!!
The key word here is "healthier". It doesn't say "healthy" or "non toxic" or harmless to the environment. First of all, with environmentally friendly companies there is usually a lot more transparency in terms of listing all of the ingredients. Companies can use the word "natural" on their products and not have to back up the claim. It's just a word. Most of their products have fragrances in them, and they do not state what they consist of. Usually it's petroleum based, not particularly natural.
However, after all is said and done, the prices are not significantly more expensive and most of them are concentrated. So while a product might not be non toxic, it does gain points by being more environmentally friendly by using less water and plastic, as well as less gas to distribute the product. Particularly the laundry detergent and fabric softener. They both come in smallish containers and have 96 loads. The price is about $20. So realistically, that is very comparable to Tide, for example. Big difference being, that the smell of the Melaleuca one is nicer.
Anyway, so after cleaning my whole house (yes, I really went nuts trying everything!) these are my results.
Rustic Touch Furniture Polish: Amazing. Really. I have this table in the corner of my dining room that is often neglected for cleaning. It's solid wood, but old and second hand. We just use the whole thing to store junk really. Anyway, I took everything off of it and polished it with this stuff, and holy cow! It honestly brought the old thing back to life! I had only wiped it with water before, so I have nothing to compare it to, but it left a really nice glossy finish. It wasn't oily, and it smelled great! Very easy to use to, just a nice little spritzer bottle. So much better than using Pledge (I've used that crap at other peoples houses and I hate it).
Tough and Tender All Purpose Cleaner: I have actually used it before at someones house who is a member. As I clean houses for extra money now and again, I have used a lot of products. This product doesn't smell amazing in my opinion. It's clean smelling, but really nothing special. It works well, but not really better or worse than other things I've tried.
Tub and Tile: When I first used the stuff I was actually overwhelmed by the fragrance of it. I think I used quite a lot, and combined with all of the other products I'd used in the same area, it was all smelling very strongly. It did take a bit of getting used to the smell, it's kind of lemony and it does smell strong. However, it does work very well and after using the product a few times I grew to actually quite like the smell. In fact, several years later it's one of my favourite Melaleuca products.
Sol-U-Mel: It's a stain remover, cleaner and deodorizer. I used it on a chair (one of my cats had an accident on a chair). I sprayed the chair, and wiped it with this stuff. It got everything fresh and clean again.
Melamagic: It's a heavy duty cleaner of industrial strength. I only used it to wash my floors. It did a great job in the kitchen. I used it for half the house on the parquet floors. However, later when I checked the label I noticed that it says it's not recommended for hard wood floors. Oops! Oh well, those parquet floors are already old and damaged (from the 70's). It seemed to clean them well anyway.
Clear Power: It's a glass cleaner. It worked well, no harsh smells. I first started using ammonia free cleaners a couple of years ago and I like this one the best.
No Work: It's a spray for your shower. You spray it after each shower and apparently it dissolves soap scum so you don't have to clean it as often. There's very little work involved, just spray it on and leave it. No rinsing or wiping. There are other products like it on the market, and I haven't ever tried any of them so I can't compare. I have been using it for two days so far and I have to say, it does seem to work. I gave the tiles a good scrub before hand so I would notice any new soap scum. So far there is none. **Update** While I did like the product, ultimately I'm lazy and did not like spraying so much after each shower. Plus the perfume smell was too strong just after a shower, so I stopped using it. But it is a good product.
Sol-U-Guard: It's a disinfectant. It smells like thyme and lemon. I like it. Though I am a bit torn, because I'm not sure if it's made of that anti-bacterial stuff which I am quite against. ***Update***While I did really like the product, I've started making my own gentle multi purpose cleaner for my kitchen counters (as a gentle daily clean).
Melapower (laundry detergent): This works well, and smells very nice too. Though I've never had a laundry detergent that I hated! Not sure how tough it is on stains though.
Melasoft (fabric softener): This is the nicest stuff I've ever used. It smells amazing, and makes things really soft. I've had complements on my blankets smelling so nice. I love it! ***update*** Three years later and I still use it! I love that it's so concentrated, you need so little to do a wonderful job! I've been using the same bottle for a year and a half and still have some left. I also have another bottle waiting unopened that I bought through a friend at the reduced price.
Melabrite: It's an optical brightener. I think it's supposed to be used instead of bleach (maybe?) but it did not seem to do anything to my clothes at all. Also, after doing research on optical brighteners I'm not so sure that adding those kind of chemicals to your clothes is necessary. Therefore, three years later I still have some left in the bottle!
There were many other products, I could spend days talking about all of them. The bottom line though is that some of the products are pretty good, overall I like the stuff. It's hard not to really. I don't like that they don't disclose a full ingredient list for things. Apparently in the U.S there isn't any law that says a company has to. Also, there aren't any strict laws that govern criteria for a company to call itself green. Therefore, I do believe that a lot of companies call themselves green and charge accordingly even though they aren't. I think that some companies are less green than others. Like that Comet stuff, gross green detergent powder to clean bathrooms. So disgusting. It only costs a dollar and the stuff will last ages. I do not think that stuff is good for the environment or a persons health, but they don't pretend to be green either. Something like Chlorox Green Works though, pretends to be green, has green in it's name, but is it really green? Well, it's colour is green so it isn't lying there. But is it just a play on words? It does not list it's ingredients and does not claim to be non toxic. Therefore, I would say it probably isn't really the safest product.
My favourite company is Method. I like their packaging, their prices are a little bit high but I really do like the products. They all smell amazing. Really. Every time I clean someones house they always comment on how nice everything smells. One of the all purpose cleaners smells like lavender. The glass cleaner smells like mint. The floor cleaner comes in almond scent or lemon. All very nice pleasant smells. They list all of their ingredients, and on each bottle it says that it's non toxic. A company can't just say that they are non toxic if they aren't. Melaleuca products do not claim to be non toxic.
What annoys me about Melaleuca is that you have to be a preferred customer to buy things at sane prices. Even then, the prices are still a bit on the expensive side but only slightly so. So you pay a little bit extra to get something you really like and then it's delivered to you (which means you are paying more for shipping). But at the regular prices it just feels like robbery. Take the furniture polish for example. That is a product that I would love to buy again. Regardless of how safe it is, it smells amazing and does a really good job. I've never seen a wood cleaner so easy to use that smells so nice. However, they charge $11.50 at the regular price, plus tax and shipping. So it comes to almost $15 for 237 ml! It costs $31.50 for 1.4 liters of laundry soap. Enough for 96 loads apparently. But after tax and shipping that is close to $40! I'm sorry, but I can buy the same thing for $20 at the health food store.
I cancelled my membership. I can still order things at the regular price, which I don't think I will as it's too expensive. I can sign up again at no cost within six months and become a preferred customer so I can buy things at the reduced rate and then I can cancel again with no hassles or charges. Though, let's face it, it IS a hassle to have to sign up and cancel (all the time and paperwork or phone calls involved) just to order some products!
As for the employment aspect of it all, I didn't try to make money. I don't think it's very easy to make a lot of money though. The person who signed me up has at least 10 people on her team that she has recruited via ads and facebook and the money she earns covers half of the cost of what she spends each month. That's a racket. I mean you have to be a preferred customer in order to recruit people and make money. Which means that you have to spend 35 points each month, which as I've mentioned works out to about $80 a month. Then you have to spend about 15 hours a week a month so that you can earn about $40 a month? What?
***Update***
Two and a half years later and I'm still using some of the products. I was lucky and managed to get my friend to order things for me so I got the preferred customer price on things.
Therefore I still use the fabric softener, laundry brightener (two and a half years later there is still some left!) furniture polish, glass cleaner, tub and tile cleaner, and I still have a couple of bottles of Melamagic - which because it is so concentrated lasts forever!
However, looking to the future I won't be able to order from my friend again as we don't live local to each other and therefore it is not convenient. So I will have to decide whether I will pay the full price for things.
Ultimately, I can use Method products for most of my cleaning needs. I also now make my own cleaning products that I know are environmentally friendly because all they have in them liquid castille soap, water, and some essential oils. They freshen up my kitchen nicely without the extra cost and chemicals.
