Should You Buy Name-Brand OxiClean Or Does Generic Work Just As Well?
At many dollar stores, you can buy LA's Awesome brand oxygen cleaner for $1/lb. OxiClean normally sell for about $7.50 for a 3-pound tub, so that works out to $2.50/lb. The dollar store version is significantly cheaper, but does it work? That's what I wanted to find out.
First, I added some blue gel food coloring into a jar of water and mixed it until the gel was completely dissolved. I filled two glasses with 50 g each of the blue water. Next, I added 2 g of OxiClean to the glass on the right and 2 g of LA's Awesome to the glass on the left. I stirred both mixtures for one minute, and then I waited to see which one neutralized the food coloring fastest. Below are my results.
*Please excuse the inconsistent photography. I know the mixtures seem to change color from one photo to another, but my main focus was just to show the comparative lightness of each mixture. Also, I'm a crap photographer. Sue me.
0 min:
1 min: stirring completed
8 min: It's hard to see in this photo, but the OxiClean mixture is slightly lighter than the LA's Awesome.
10 min: OxiClean is now significantly lighter than LA's Awesome
19 min:
32 minutes: OxiClean mixture is now completely transparent.
60 min:
75 min:
90 min:
105 min: LA's Awesome mixture is now (almost) completely transparent.
Conslusion: OxiClean took about 30 minutes to bleach the dye. And although the generic brand did get the job done, it took three times as long. Regarding price, OxiClean costs 2.5 times as much as the generic so very roughly, 1 pound of OxiClean ($2.50) works about as well as 3 pounds of LA's Awesome ($3.00). OxiClean wins.
Something else to consider: You can find OxiClean regularly on sale, and OxiClean coupons are fairly plentiful. If you buy your OxiClean at a discount, you're getting an even better value. On the other hand, LA's Awesome doesn't go on sale, and they don't publish coupons. So that price is basically set in stone.
Furthermore, if manufacturing costs go up, OxiClean has the flexibility to raise its price or lower its per-unit volume instead of adjusting its formulation. Because LA's Awesome is sold primarily at dollar stores at a $1/lb price point, it has little ability to change its price or its unit volume. So as manufacturing costs inevitably grow, LA's Awesome's only option will be to decrease the active ingredient in it's formulation. And that's something you won't find out about until you've already bought the product and realize it doesn't work anymore. So due to the way the products are marketed, not only is OxiClean clearly the better value, it's also the more reliable brand.
Bottom Line: Without question, OxiClean is a better value than generic - ESPECIALLY if you use a coupon or find it on sale.
First, I added some blue gel food coloring into a jar of water and mixed it until the gel was completely dissolved. I filled two glasses with 50 g each of the blue water. Next, I added 2 g of OxiClean to the glass on the right and 2 g of LA's Awesome to the glass on the left. I stirred both mixtures for one minute, and then I waited to see which one neutralized the food coloring fastest. Below are my results.
*Please excuse the inconsistent photography. I know the mixtures seem to change color from one photo to another, but my main focus was just to show the comparative lightness of each mixture. Also, I'm a crap photographer. Sue me.
0 min:
1 min: stirring completed
8 min: It's hard to see in this photo, but the OxiClean mixture is slightly lighter than the LA's Awesome.
10 min: OxiClean is now significantly lighter than LA's Awesome
19 min:
32 minutes: OxiClean mixture is now completely transparent.
60 min:
75 min:
90 min:
105 min: LA's Awesome mixture is now (almost) completely transparent.
Conslusion: OxiClean took about 30 minutes to bleach the dye. And although the generic brand did get the job done, it took three times as long. Regarding price, OxiClean costs 2.5 times as much as the generic so very roughly, 1 pound of OxiClean ($2.50) works about as well as 3 pounds of LA's Awesome ($3.00). OxiClean wins.
Something else to consider: You can find OxiClean regularly on sale, and OxiClean coupons are fairly plentiful. If you buy your OxiClean at a discount, you're getting an even better value. On the other hand, LA's Awesome doesn't go on sale, and they don't publish coupons. So that price is basically set in stone.
Furthermore, if manufacturing costs go up, OxiClean has the flexibility to raise its price or lower its per-unit volume instead of adjusting its formulation. Because LA's Awesome is sold primarily at dollar stores at a $1/lb price point, it has little ability to change its price or its unit volume. So as manufacturing costs inevitably grow, LA's Awesome's only option will be to decrease the active ingredient in it's formulation. And that's something you won't find out about until you've already bought the product and realize it doesn't work anymore. So due to the way the products are marketed, not only is OxiClean clearly the better value, it's also the more reliable brand.
Bottom Line: Without question, OxiClean is a better value than generic - ESPECIALLY if you use a coupon or find it on sale.
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