Detergent news

[jt1985]

Well,

I was on ocado.com and noticed what looks like the new P&G concentrated powders, gels, tabs, etc. are coming soon. ASDA is selling Fairy Gel and Sainsbury's has larger sizes of Excel Gel. Wal-Mart Americas (Canada and Mexico) is trying to phase out 70% of phosphates (That applies to Viva, Roma and Ariel) and P&G is phasing out "Regular" format detergent in Canada. Could it lead to a powder concentration here? I think that our powder detergents are concentrated, but I think that it could be concentrated a little more. But as powder sales tank, it may not happen.

 

[frontloader812]

I went and checked it out and it seems that the new Ariel powders etc are a new formula which is turn to cool. But over here in Australia we are getting 2x ultra powders currently our dose is about 100gr which is about 3.50oz to 50gr to 1.75oz it should be interesting to see what they do here, what sizes will become available currently we have 1kg, 2kg and 3kg boxes of detergent. I have a feeling that the 500gr will only make the launch then eventually be fazed out forcing us to spend more. Time will tell

 

[whirlcool]

I was at Wal Mart t he other day and noticed that Foca and Roma and Ariel were all gone from the shelf. There wasn't even an empty spot where they were located!
Stock up now, if you can still find the stuff!

 

[ronhic]

I am not...

....looking forward to it...

I have always felt that the current range of concentrates were good...though I prefer a big box powder if possible (and I can still get 3/4 cup dose OMOmatic)...

The issue I have, and many people will find is that it is much harder to get the dose right....the smaller the dose, the easier it is to use too much or too little when things are not that dirty...

Next thing you know, we'll be using a syringe!

But I have to admit to being curious as to how effective they will be and more importantly, how well they will rinse out...

 

[jt1985]

Mexican Detergents

I noticed that the Walmart that I work at still carries Foca and Roma. Ariel hasn't been restocked in a while, but I saw a lonely bag of Ariel, and it's a new Ariel with red rings on it. I know what the name is, but I think it means Oxy Rings.

 

[MrX]

Concentrated fabric softeners.

In Ireland only the largest format supermarkets are stocking non-concentrated fabric softeners at this stage. It also seems that the manufacturers are no longer offering the full range of fragrances in 'original' dilute format.

I've also noticed that some new machines, including the Hotpoint (Ariston) Aqualtis do not accomodate old-format fabric conditioner. The dispenser is clearly designed to cope with one dose of Comfort Concentrate or Lenor Concentrate etc!

Clearly the compact formula softeners have been an outstanding success. I really cannot understand why anyone would need to use the old formats. They just bulky and take up more space in your cupboard.

The siphon dispenser in the drawer of standard European front loaders ensures they get diluted and mixed with plenty of water before they come into contact with the clothes. So, there's really zero risk of any problems.

(Interestingly, how do traditional US machines cope with conditioner ? I remember having disasters with downey dosing balls causing stains on clothes when I was in the states for a semester... I gave up and started using dryer sheets instead, it's not quite the same though!)

Staying on topic though - concentrating the detergent powders and liquids saves manufacturers a lot of money in terms of transport and distribution i.e. you can quite easily stock twice or three times as much product on the same shelf.

If they are going to encourage adoption this time around, they would be better off not trying to differentiate it as "Ariel Ultra" or "Persil Micro" as they did last time. They also charged premium prices for the concentrated products which discouraged uptake.

Finally, I would also hope that they don't require dosing devices. That is the one thing that puts a LOT of people off. The drawer on your washing machine is convenient. There's really no need for all these damn balls and bags! They are anything but convenient.

I gave up on Persil tablets after finding that the net sometimes lodges on the door seal of many machines !

Also, I found that Ariel tablets have one huge drawback - pointed out to me by a lady who runs some self-catering holiday cottages.
She had been supplying guests with a small selection of Ariel standard and colour tablets as she just found them convenient to distribute to each house. A few tablets was plenty to cover most people's laundry needs for a week or two.

Anyway, she started to have serious machine problems which were caused by people opening the tablets directly into the drawer and dropping bits of foil packaging in too!

This ended up clogging the filters of the machines, or in one case stuffing up the inlet pipe (from the drawer to the drum) and causing a flood!

Since then she's just gone back to providing guests with a box of washing powder and a scoop.

There's a lot to be said for simplicity!!

 

[spoodles]

Here's a look at the new Fairy Gel and new larger size Ariel Excel Gel

 

[jt1985]

The new Ariel that replaces OxiAzul is...

Ariel Oxianillos. That's what the new formula is. We just finally got it back on shelves at work.

 

[spoodles]

And here are the new (filler free) P&G tablets. They are thinner than the old ones - the blue packet in the photo is an old packet, not sure if you can see the difference with the new thinner orange pack in my photo!

They now come in boxes of 15 or 28 instead of 12 or 24, and the boxes are also a little bit smaller despite having more tablets in. This new flavour Bold replaces the green 'lime zest and apple blossom' one.

 

[jt1985]

Orange Blossom and Pomegranate

How does it smell? It sounds like a very interesting fragrance.

 

[spoodles]

It smells...zesty! Actually, it's not unlike the lime and apple blossom that it has replaced - strange!

There's lots of new detergent action going on in the UK at the moment. 2 new flavours of Surf - "Carnival burst and tangerine" and "Tempting nature and rainflower" and 2 new flavours of Daz - "Mandarin and lime" and "Summer flower power". My local Sainsbury's has now pretty much replaced all old style P&G products with the new ones too.

 

[nickuk]

Hmmm. This is, supposedly, PandG trying to help the environment. Help their own pockets more like! The price of 56 tablets has risen inproportionately to the old price of 48. The tablets are thinner, sure, but do we believe they have less fillers or are they just less of a tablet?

Saw about 2 kilos of Ariel powder (new formula concentrate) today for £6.89. Hang on a minute, this is only a bit more concentrated than the old stuff! Ariel Future this is not. Yest Ariel future was £6.99 for 2.5kg, and a thimble full would do the job.

This new Ariel still says to use 165ml for a Hard water normal soil....I would never use that much with even a non concentrate powder like Lidl Formil Active - £5.89 for over 5kg! Sorry, not convinced......is Ariel really twice as good as Formil, as it is now over twice the cost.

TO futher illustrate this, P and G are now putting the highest dose first and the box so it's the first number Mr Average sees rather than the last. I keep smelling rats with regards PandG these days and it's really turning me off their products. What about helping us all during the economic crisis? They will only help themselves. This isn't me whingeing on some ridiculous socialist crusade, I'm a realist and it some ways don't blame them. But I ain't gonna fall for it myself and will continue to buy honstly priced and marketed products.

 

[spoodles]

Oh they all do it. Finish Quantum tabs mysteriously had the pack sizes shrink from 24 to 20 while the price went up 60p. Less product AND a price hike.

New and Improved = a price increase for anything these days. I'm sure Unilever will be the same when they bring out their more concentrated powders. Small & Mighty liquid was around 80p more than regular liquid, (although they have now put the original liquids up by around £1). You got the same number of "standard washes" but without the option of dosing less for soft water/light soiling, it's actually less washes per bottle for those with soft water, 20 instead of 30 with the old liquid - P&G then did the same with their concentrates.

As soon as one does it they all follow. Sadly, I like all these overpriced premium things. I think that Unilever and P&G stuff is far better than anything else, so I'm shafted! Detergents are yet another thing seeing prices increased just like most other things right now.

Well, so far I have found that these new P&G tabs don't produce anything like the amount of foam the previous ones did - I tested them out on a load of towels and didn't have the usual 'drum full to the brim with suds within 5 minutes' that you would expect. I hope it wasn't a fluke!

 

[nickuk]

Thanks Spoodles. Am interested about the new style of tablets, as I thought that the OP of this thread or one of the others knocking about at the moment said that tablets were being phased out in favour of the concentrate powders?

Perhaps they've had a rethink and have, as you say, removed the fillers or something to tick an enviro box. If this is the case nobody will be more pleased than me. Really like PG tablets despite previous whinge about pricing.

PS - a very minor point, anyone else found that after a hot wash / fast spin the Ariel Excel doser is permenently misshapen and won't fit on the bottle?

 

[spoodles]

They say that tablets and liquids will go in the next 3-5 years. I can imagine liquids going as gel is P&G's thing now, not so sure that tablets will be so quick to disappear though. If people are still buying them they'd be stupid to get rid of them and a look at supermarket shelves, that are heaving with tablets, shows they obviously still sell very well even if the sales are declining. I remember Unilever saying that they would phase out regular liquids within a year of launching S&M but they are still going, so I just can't see tablets disappearing that quickly - unless they start upping the price even more to put people off buying them.

The thing about P&G removing fillers was mentioned in various news articles when they announced they were reducing the formats. Liquitabs are also lighter I noticed, although they look the same size. I was surprised that powder only seems slightly lighter - seems like it isn't the real concentrated stuff after all. Maybe they are wary of doing that again as it wasn't too successful back in the 90s.

My Excel Gel doser went through the dryer with some bedding by accident (!) and came out the other end in perfect shape, even the soft bit, thankfully!

 

[chestermikeuk]

Powders

All will be vying for position and to gain more market saturation in an ever intensifying field.....I remember in the 80`s using an AEG Lavalux washer with ever decreasing amounts of big box Persil and we got it down to a tablespoon to wash clean a full load....more powder always = more money for the makers...

bring back the 80`s formulations in Ultra formula and they will have cracked it!!!