Everything You’ve Ever Wanted to Know About Our Gentle Bleach Alternative: Oxygen Brightener!

We recently introduced our stellar new product, the Oxygen Brightener! It’s bleach-free, fragrance-free and plastic-free which makes it a people- and planet-friendly bleach alternative for laundry (and for other items too, like coffee mugs or other items with stains!) 

But how does it work? In short, it’s solid hydrogen peroxide that loosens up dirt and stains from almost any surface.

You might not be familiar with solid hydrogen peroxide, but you can typically find liquid hydrogen peroxide at any supermarket or pharmacy chain. It’s used as an oxidizer, a bleaching agent and sometimes as an antiseptic. Typically these bottles are 3% solutions which means that 3% of the solution (by weight) is made by H2O2 and the rest is H2O. 

When you see liquid hydrogen peroxide, you’ll notice that it’s almost always in a brown plastic bottle. This is important to note because hydrogen peroxide decomposes when it’s in contact with light and/or heat. Light, in particular, can’t get through the brown plastic bottle, so the liquid is protected. 

Why is this packaging important to note? Because it results in a ton of wasted plastic! With our Oxygen Brightener, you’re getting the same kick you’d get from the liquid form but it’s plastic-free and more concentrated and stable, unlike the liquid version.

More importantly, there’s no bleachy smell or byproducts. Bleach has a big effect on nature, especially on how it affects proteins in the wild. When the Meliora Cleaning Products Oxygen Brightener interacts with mold or black gunk in the shower, you can visually see it breaking down - you’ll see bubbles forming as it oxidizes the dirt. And the byproduct is primarily water. It’s not affecting proteins in the same way as chlorine bleach. It’s also gentler on clothes than chlorine bleach. 

These oxidizing components are also typically included automatically in many laundry detergents. We offer it separately so you can pick and choose to suit your cleaning needs. For example, people with septic tanks may not want to use our Oxygen Brightener (or bleach, for that matter) because it can suppress bacterial activity due to the nature of the product - it’s a sanitizer and one of its most popular cleaning tricks is to kill bacteria.

OxyCleanTM, OxiBriteTM and others are very similar to our Oxygen Brightener but they typically include fragrances or dyes. If you have a favorite way to use those other products, try it using our Oxygen Brightener and send us a recipe or photo! Our goal is to make our Oxygen Brightener (and all products) as simple and as transparent as possible. And, of course, our Oxygen Brightener (like all of our products) is certified MADESAFE.