Too Much of a Good Thing?

The New York metropolitan area was battered by Hurricane Irene in August. The storm dumped 13 inches of rain in our region, making for severe flooding in northern New Jersey. Just over the border, in New York State, my relatives were hit hard by the deluge. I spent a few days helping out and learned a lesson or two about buying in bulk. For years, I’ve pleaded with my wife to make more trips to the big discount stores like Costco. And for years she’s shot back that we don’t have room to store all that stuff and besides, a lot of it would end up going to waste. Well after I rescued what seemed like 18 bottles of Lysol toilet bowl cleaner from a flooded basement, I realized my wife may just have a point. Americans insatiable appetite for more, more, more, may be skewing actual demand for some of the products in our industry.

The folks at Method would certainly seem to agree. The household cleaning company is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year and co-founder Adam Lowry told Happi.com that one of his proudest accomplishments is getting consumers to use less, not more, laundry detergent by creating a cap to keep product over-dosing to a minimum. Meanwhile, SC Johnson is testing an All-In-One Cleaning System that holds up to three concentrated cleaner cartridges at once in a single hand-held sprayer.Available concentrated cleaner cartridges include Windex Glass, Fantastik Kitchen, Scrubbing Bubbles Bathroom, Pledge Furniture and Shout Carpet.

What if more companies thought more about using less? It could have a radical impact on consumer trends and industry output.

If you’re looking for a manufacturing partner for your laundry detergent, household cleaner or personal care product, be sure to check out our Contract Manufacturing/Private Label Directory on p. 82 in this issue of Happi. We’re sure that you will find a filler to meet your needs. Also this month, we report on the resilient wipes market (p. 61). Although category growth has slowed in recent years, there is still plenty of room for gains. This issue of Happi also includes articles on the ethnic skin care segment (p. 55) and testing services (p. 69).With the FDA’s new rulings for sunscreens, changes for SPF claims will place demands on marketers to reformulate and laboratories to increase testing capabilities.

We hope you enjoy this edition of Happi. As always we welcome your comments and suggestions.

tomb@rodpub.com