Laundry Experiment - Part 3

I have been asked some questions of why I would make my own laundry detergent...

First and foremost, I had heard about others doing it, and I figured it would be a fun and interesting project to try out.  Simple as that...

Secondly, it saves money.  I spent about $7 on the supplies and $10 for the glass jar which made about 10 batches of detergent.  I am hoping that this will be enough to last us several months.  I would spend more than that on one large bottle of Tide.  And...I felt like I was buying detergent a lot.  I had planned to figure out the cost per load, but knew I probably wouldn't be much good at following through on that.  So...I will refer to Trent, of Simple Dollar, who did a cost analysis who found that the homemade detergent cost 3 cents per load while using Tide costs about 30 cents.

Now, Mark would ask me, have you factored in the opportunity cost?  And, like Sean asked...does the 3 cents include your labor?  No...it doesn't include labor, but please reference the first reason I decided to try this...fun project.  I wanted to :)  And, it really didn't take much time at all, so yes, it was worth it to me to try this out.

Third, from what I have read, it is more environmentally friendly due to less chemicals than store bought detergent, less plastic bottles bought (sorry, dad!), etc.  I wish I knew more details to relay on this, but you wouldn't want to listen to me try to be scientific - trust me.

Will I keep using this in the long run?  Right now I would say...yes.  I will definitely tweak the recipe as I see fit i.e. using more soap, changing out the soap scent I use, etc.  I also made dishwashing detergent so I will post about that soon!