The Clorox Company — a multinational leading manufacturer of top-selling cleaning and personal care products — has announced the launch of its Clorox Preferred Ingredient Calculator. The company has also expanded its Ingredients Inside program — a mobile app that lists and explains all ingredients of Clorox products to shoppers — to include specific fragrance components.The company says both are aimed at showing consumers what goes into their cleaning and care products so they can make informed purchasing decisions, as well as pushing the company to continue making sustainable ingredient choices.
The Clorox Company — a multinational leading manufacturer of top-selling cleaning and personal care products — has announced the launch of its Clorox Preferred Ingredient Calculator. The company has also expanded its Ingredients Inside program — a mobile app that lists and explains all ingredients of Clorox products to shoppers — to include specific fragrance components.
The company says both are aimed at showing consumers what goes into their cleaning and care products so they can make informed purchasing decisions, as well as pushing the company to continue making sustainable ingredient choices.
"We know people are interested in using more sustainable products, and they want to know what's in the products they use in and around their homes," Clorox chairman and CEO Don Knauss said in a statement. "These initiatives are just two examples of how we put consumers at the center of everything we do."
Incorporating multiple metrics — including human health, environmental and sustainability impacts — the Clorox Preferred Ingredient Calculator is designed to help inform the company’s product developers of the sustainability of the formulations and raw materials they use in their products. It’s hoped that with the right information, developers can make more informed decisions about which ingredients to include in their wide product range.
"Since 2008, we have already improved the sustainability profile of nearly 50 percent of our products through formula and packaging changes," said Catharine de Lacy, VP of Global Stewardship. "The Clorox Preferred Ingredient Calculator is yet another resource to help us continue driving sustainability across our global portfolio."
Since 2009, the company has disclosed information on their product mixes and ingredients as part of the Ingredients Inside program. Clorox is now expanding this to include fragrance components used in its U.S. and Canadian cleaning, disinfecting and laundry products that the Scientific Community on Consumer Safety has identified as potential allergens.
This addition is expected to be added in early 2015, and will list ingredients if they’re present in any products at a concentration of more than 0.01 percent. Consumers will have access to this information through the Ingredients Inside program, as well as quick access on the company’s new smartphone app and mobile website (an online database consumers can browse to find the product they’re using).
Clorox made the first leap back in 2009, being the first consumer packaged company to voluntarily disclose information on its product ingredients as part of its communication program. Since then, it has continue to be an industry lead in the disclosure of information about the dyes, preservatives, fragrances it uses in its expanding cornucopia of cleaning and personal care products.
Last month, another chemical manufacturing giant, BASF, unveiled a new sustainability assessment program for its entire portfolio of products. The company’s Sustainable Solutions Steering method is used to systemically evaluate each of the products in their 50,000 relevant applications as part of an external validation process to allow them to assess their sustainability and make targeted steps to improve.
Published Oct 8, 2014 4pm EDT / 1pm PDT / 9pm BST / 10pm CEST