Household Products Start to Come Clean on Ingredients

• APRIL 2, 2009

By ANJALI ATHAVALEY

You can read a label to find out what's in your food. And a quick look inside a collar or hem tells you what your clothes are made of. Now, the same is happening with the stuff you use to clean your kitchen and bathroom.

A few manufacturers of household cleaning products have begun disclosing the chemicals in some of their products. S.C. Johnson & Son Inc. last month rolled out Web site WhatsInsideSCJohnson.com to describe most of the ingredients for its Windex, Glade, and Shout brands. Clorox Co. lists ingredients for its Formula 409 and other products at TheCloroxCompany.com.

Seventh Generation Inc., which has long disclosed most of the ingredients for its eco-friendly cleaning products, last year started explaining chemical names in terms that consumers can better understand on its labels. And Procter & Gamble Co. plans to list its ingredients online and describe them in consumer friendly terms.

These efforts are receiving a boost from industry trade groups that recently set up joint guidelines to encourage use of a standardized format for presenting the technical information. "Consumers want to know more to ensure the safety of their family," says a Procter & Gamble spokesman. "The industry is changing along with that."

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