Results of Ecover’s stain remover

girl climbing treeYou might remember I’ve been trialling Ecover’s stain remover.

I found the perfect garment to put the stain remover through its paces – a white cotton t-shirt that Little Miss green had fallen over in and was covered in mud!

I explained to Ecover before the trial that I had very hard water and asked for advice so I followed their instructions to the letter.

First I was told to wet the garment, then rub the stain remover into the stain with the attached brush before washing as usual.

The washing product I used was Ecover’s concentrated Biological laundry liquid and I, in a very ‘ungreen’ way, washed this particular item on a 60 degree wash. Not very eco I know, but I rarely do it I promise!

I also had a cream coloured Egyptian cotton sheet to wash. Mr Green had fallen over and cut his knee open. I’m a great one for letting the air get to cuts instead of wrapping in a plaster, but little did I realise that his knee would be stuck to the sheet in the morning!

Following the instructions I made the blood stain wet, rubbed in the Ecover stain remover using the brush provided and washed at 60 degrees along with the t-shirt.

Unfortunately neither item came clean. The mud on the white t-shirt had faded, but was still noticeable. The Egyptian cotton sheet looked the same when it came out of the machine as when it went in which I was very disappointed about.

I will definitely stick with the bio laundry liquid because it’s great for most things and has the added benefit of softening  clothes slightly, but I won’t be buying the Stain Remover as it was ineffective. I think the mud would have faded anyway without pre treating it.

Instead I shall stick to some of my tried and tested methods such as soaking blood in cold salt water before washing. Although I love Ecover’s products; I’m a big fan of their power cleaner for instance, their Stain Remover isn’t a favourite with me…

4 Comments

  1. Mummy Zen on December 17, 2010 at 8:10 pm

    I’ve had the same experience with their stain remover. It works fine with mild stains but for something tough like the two you tested, it is not very effective.



  2. Mrs Green on December 24, 2010 at 6:40 am

    Hi Mummy Zen; great to see you; interesting to see we found the same results. Now I’m unsure what to do with these two grubby items because they’ve been ‘washed in’ at 60 degrees!



  3. Tophe Silver - carpet cleaner, Roseville CA on January 18, 2011 at 6:47 am

    Hi Mrs. Green, the thing you said is true. My wife tried the product and it’s not very effective on heavy stains like spaghetti sauce and pen inks.And now, we still both looking for the best stain remover available in the market.

    I think this product can’t be use on carpets. I’ll just try this out using a stain carpet and give you some updates.

    Thanks for the information and you got a nice video there. Keep it up!!



  4. Mrs Green on January 22, 2011 at 9:35 am

    @Tophe Silver – carpet cleaner, Roseville CA: Let me know if you find a better product and if it works on carpets!