Tree Hugging Family - Living Green

Review of Method Dish Soap — Go Naked & Cucumber

by Peggy on May 5th, 2008

I was already using a phosphate-free dish soap, but I decided to switch to a more natural brand. I wanted a dish soap that doesn’t contain triclosan, an ingredient in many anti-bacterial dish soaps. Triclosan is ending up in streams, where it upsets the thyroid function in frogs. Not to mention, it’s helping to promote the creation of resistant bacteria.

Just to be clear — I’m talking about the kind of soap you use to hand wash dishes. This stuff isn’t for the dishwasher.

I’m a little bitty bit of a germ freak, so moving away from anti-bacterial dish soap was a big step for me. I’ve been using Method dish soap for several weeks now, and it seems to be cleaning my dishes just fine. I haven’t gotten sick either!

First, I tired Go Naked dish soap from Method. It has zero dyes and perfumes. I loved this clear soap so much I even used it in my hand soap dispenser for a while.

The second Method dish soap I tried is Cucumber. It has a lovely pale green color and the slightest scent of cucumber.

Overall, there were several things I really liked about both soaps and three things that bugged me.

With both soaps, I liked:

•They’re biodegradable, non-toxic, phosphate free and naturally derived with no animal testing.

•The soaps are gentle on the hands, plus cut through grease really well.

•They come in sleek, recyclable bottles I don’t mind leaving on the counter.

•The price is reasonable — $4 for 25 fluid ounces.

With both soaps, I disliked:

•The cute twist top is part of the design, but I found it technically difficult. That doesn’t mean I couldn’t open it, but that it was awkward to open and close. So, I’ve left it open. I just turn it up when I need some. So far, no spills. Maybe you won’t have this problem. I’m a little untalented when it comes to opening things.

•The ingredients are listed on the bottle for Go Naked, but not for Cucumber. This is a big no no. A company claiming to sell a natural product should make all ingredients easily available.

•This isn’t exactly about the soap, but the Method website made me dizzy. There’s such a thing as too creative, but some designer in an ad agency is gonna hate me for saying that. I found the site very difficult to navigate, and there was no search function that I could find. I wish I could tell you if Method lists the ingredients to their Cucumber soap online, but I gave up trying to find out.

I will probably buy the Go Naked soap again, but not the Cucumber. It’s not that the scent or cleaning power was bad, but I want to know what’s in it!

Have you used either of these soaps? What did you think?

Image via Peggy Rowland. So, the lighting was a bit weird in the kitchen. That background is a funky old office chair.

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