Anyone seen these before?

[mich]

Was helping someone with a move, and stumbled upon these little gem's in a stashed box. I can't say I've ever personally seen any laundry tablet product (in stores) before.. but I know they exist over in Europe. 
 
Anyone know anything about these They look really cool, and advanced (unlike regular Purex).
 
 
 
 

 

[dustin92]

I remember seeing them a LONG time ago, maybe 2002-2003 at the latest? We bought one box, it seems like they were somewhat more expensive than regular liquid Purex at the time. Don't remember the cleaning power at all, the ones we had were individually wrapped. Seems like they didn't dissolve at all in cold water, and barely in warm. Scent was very weak if I remember right.

 

[earthling177]

Tablets were easy to find in the late '90s and early 2000's. I was going to say "popular" but they were obviously not popular enough to survive.

If I remember right, the Purex tabs sold around here were white, no blue speckles. I bought a box or two, they used to dissolve well enough to be practical in the dispenser drawers, unlike Surf, Wisk and Tide, which practically had to be smashed (still inside the plastic pouches) into powder unless you wanted to put the tablets inside the washer drum, as instructed in the boxes.

Wisk and Tide tablets were good enough to clean most stains by themselves, just like their other versions -- some people in fact compared the cleaning power of Wisk with Bleach Tablets to Persil Megaperls. Purex Tabs behaved more like powdered All, in that lots of stains would lift, but you had to add some form of enzyme product (Biz, Clorox 2) to the wash if you wanted better performance -- I don't remember how they compared to standard Purex because I have not tried it in over 20 years, sorry.

Lots of people got very miffed when tabs/tablets disappeared from the market, particularly people who lived in apartments and had to use laundromats, because it was much easier to bring a few pouches with your clothes than large bottles or big boxes of regular detergents.

The other nice thing about the tablets at that time was that it was harder to find HE detergents for the front-loading washers, but despite the fact that none of the tablets said they were HE detergents, they had suds that were controlled enough to be used in the frontloaders if one was careful enough.

In any case, by mid-2000's they basically disappeared from the market.

Cheers,
-- Paulo.

 

[launderess]

Used Some Purex Tablets Last Night

Doing the weekly wash.

Lovely fresh fragrance with great cleaning as long as one juiced things up with an enzyme containing oxygen bleach for whites/stains. I used Spray and Wash "Pink" tabs have been meaning to finish off.

There have been several conversations about Purex tablets here in there group over the years. General consensus is they were great.

Purex along with Wisk and Tide brought out tablets somewhere around the 1990's or so for the American market. Across the pond Persil and others did the same in Europe. Despite warnings that previous unit dosage detergents in such a format (Vim, Salvo, etc...) did not fare well P&G et al pressed ahead with the USA roll out. Within < five years all were gone IIRC. Purex was the last to be discontinued but Tide and Wisk gave up the ghost.

Rather ironic that pods are all the rage just a decade or so later.

At least with tablets one can break them apart to decrease dosage, which one did with Wisk. In fact used to just crumble several packets worth into a Mason jar and use by the tablespoon full in the Miele.

Think what did in tablets is the same killing powders in general; liquids and gels dissolve better in cooler water temps and many reported problems on that score with tablets.

 

[tomturbomatic]

I still have a few left. We saw them sold in boxes of 24 which weighed 2 lbs. 6.9 ounces. On the outside of the box are the statements:
"One Purex Tab is all you need!"
"No other tab dissolves faster. Dissolves completely in seconds, even in cold water."
"Purex Tabs are specially formulated to work in both your high efficiency (front loading) or regular (top loading) machine.

Something I thought was very interesting was that under the DIAL logo on the bottom of the blue box were the words: "Made in Korea DISTRIBUTED BY THE DIAL CORPORATION SCOTTSDALE, AZ 85254. I don't believe that I had ever encountered a detergent made in Korea at the time I bought these more than a decade ago. Are there detergents made in Korea currently being sold here?

The contents list surfactants and enzymes, but many enzyme detergents were great on protein stains and terrible on oily stains so the word "enzymes" does not guarantee great cleaning of everything.

I think tablets were better at delivering controlled sudsing because their compactness dictated that higher quality, low sudsing surfactants had to be used.

 

[westtexman]

I loved these things. I bought a FriGEmore front-loader in late 2001 when I moved here to my current city and lived in a little apartment. I had the waher and dryer stacked in my utility room which was separate from the apartment out on the balcony.

I loved the smell, and the fact that I could use them in my machine without sudsing issues. I was sad to see them go. The smell was great, and it made my entire laundry room smell lovely! I remember using only one for most loads, which was just the right dose in my machine and water conditions. I was surprised to get such great cleaning from a Purex product.

 

[a440]

I used the Purex Tabs all the time.  Loved the smell.  I thought it was a great cleaning product.  I was very annoyed when I could not find them any longer.