Every year we spend more than $6 billion on cleaning products. That’s a lot of money, even for a country as well off as the US. Most of us go for the easy option, grab a product off the shelf at the supermarket, and be done with it. But have you ever wondered how you might save a bit of money on your household maintenance bill? Here’s how.
Give Your Freezer A Boost
Your freezer uses quite a bit of electricity to stay cold. Far more, in fact, than your fridge. That’s why manufacturers put thick plastic seals around the edge to stop the cold from escaping. They want to make sure that they do their bit to keep your electricity bills down.
But you can take this a bit further. The biggest problem you’ve got with your freezer right now is that it’s being opened and closed all the time. Every time it’s opened, warm air gets drawn into the gaps between your food. And then the freezer has to work really hard to cool this warm air down. The solution is to scrunch up bits of paper and put them in the gaps between your food. This will help insulate the food and stop so much warm air from getting into the freezer.
Spruce Up Your Carpet
The vacuum cleaner market is always innovating and looking for new ways to make cleaning carpets easier. If you’ve got a drab carpet, how about trying this out? Get some baking soda and sprinkle it liberally over your carpet. Leave it for a few minutes while it reacts with the other compounds in the carpet fibers. Then vacuum it all up. Your carpet should be much fresher as a result.
Erase Grubby Marks
Take a look at your plug sockets and light switches. Notice any grime?
Plug sockets and light switches are a magnet for grime, being constantly touched by everybody in your household. The problem is that cleaning electrical outlets the traditional way is dangerous.
There’s a quick and simple solution that gets rid of socket grime that’s cheap and effective: it’s called the pencil eraser. The rubber end of a pencil is surprisingly good at lifting grease from plug sockets and light switches. It’s also really good at removing stains from remote controls and other fiddly electrical devices.
Whiten Up Your Grouting
If the grouting in your shower is starting to look a little dull, it can ruin the look of your bathroom. Don’t settle for anything less that totally sparkling.
Here’s what to do: grab an old toothbrush and dunk in in bleach. Then scrub all the grouting between your tiles and around your shower. You’ll get amazing results in a jiffy.
Pour Cola Down The Toilet
Don’t buy expensive, branded cola. Instead, go to your store and pick up a bottle of the generic stuff that costs just a few cents. Then pour a couple of pints into the bowl of the toilet and wait for a few hours. Cola contains acid that will lift grime and limescale and leave your bathroom fresh.