people against dirty

one for our scrapbook

We're blushing.  The nice people at The Grocer just named us launch of the year in the household cleaning category.  Not a bad way to wind down this pre-holiday week.

december clean-o-gram

'Tis the season to be thankful. And we are pretty darn thankful. This time last year, our UK office was the Caffé Nero in Clapham. Now, we not only have a roof over our heads but even a homey Christmas tree (photo at the end of this email).

Our biggest thanks go to you, of course, the nice people who have discovered method and are making the world a cleaner place, one countertop and bath tile at a time.

In this month’s clean-o-gram, we have sticky dishes, a dirty little secret, and a sudsy blast from the past.

the dish on dish

The kitchen, more than any other room, is the heart of the home. You could argue that the kitchen is the new living room, particularly with a hot pudding in the oven and some stuffing to nab when no one’s looking.

But, they don’t call it Sticky Toffee Pudding for nothing. So we have recently added some festive bottles of washing up liquid to bring a little cheer to your sink top. Since your suds do run downstream, you’ll be glad to know these are designed to fully biodegrade to keep you on Santa’s nice list.

(Santa's dirty little secret: he likes pink and purple every bit as much as red and green.  Find them here.) 

dirty little secret of the month

We want everyone to rethink what makes a healthy home, so we like to share dirty little secrets (but only if we can also share a few tips on how to overcome them).

One of our favorite things about this time of year is the varied recipes of turkey and cranberry leftover sandwiches that appear after Christmas. We actually think the leftovers are every bit as good as the original meal.

But before you pop the mashed potatoes in the microwave, give a quick thought to how you microwave.  This is a bit scary, but microwaving some types of plastic with food means that you are essentially radiating a petroleum product that can leach chemicals onto your food. We think plastic makes a poor substitute for Branston pickle. Here’s the full story.

deck the halls with washing up liquid

We’re always tinkering with our designs. Earlier in this clean-o-gram, we introduced our sassy new bottles of washing-up liquid.

Well, while cleaning out our proverbial attic, we just stumbled across a couple boxes of washing-up liquid we stopped making a few years ago (next to Phil’s baby pictures and David’s winning volcano for the science project). How these bottles wound up here, we’re not quite sure. We used some for Christmas decorations (as modeled by our Nicole), but we still have a few remaining vintage samples if you’d like a collector’s item.

We’ll post a free bottle signed by us to everyone who emails us at talkclean@methodproducts.co.uk by Thursday this week with a brief description of their quirkiest Christmas tradition. To get you started, our Louise actually lights real candles on the tree and circles it holding hands with her family singing Danish carols fueled by Schnapps and pickled herring. So, top that.

who got the bag?

Last month, we polled you for clever suggestions for our sassy plastic bag rehab bag. We received quite a few clever answers, you crafty readers you. Some of our favorites are posted here, including this one:

"I will lay it on the floor in the bed room with a little bit of cat nip in the bottom. My cat 'Her ladyship Tibbles van der Snugglebug' will come out from under the bed in a much calmer fashion then normal (ie being poked at with a feather duster until she gives up). I will gather up the bag, tickle her head and then deposit her on the sofa (where she lives when the 'two legs' go out"

all I want for Christmas

We are all busy writing our lists to Father Christmas -- and negotiating our kids' lists too.  We received this picture of lovely Georgia, age 5, from Twickenham while scouting out a John Lewis to prep for her letter to Father Christmas.

random act of method

We try to do our bit to make the world a cleaner place.  So, when we found ourselves on the guest list for an event at the House of Lords at the Palace of Westminster, we smuggled in a few cheery hand washes for the toilets.  Nice leaded windows.

We can't promise that this will lead to cleaner legislation, but we like to think that clean hands make for clean work.  So, if the words "lavender" or "people against dirty" appear on a bill, you'll know why.

Incidentally, the full formal style of the House of Lords is "The Right Honourable and Lords Spiritual and Temporal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled."  Phew, that's a mouthful.  We'd have a bit of trouble fitting that on packaging.

dirty little secret: microwaving plastic

The first commercial microwaves were introduced in the 1940s, weighed in at over 750 pounds, and cost £2,500. They’ve come a long way on the size and weight front, but they’re still in the danger zone.

It’s all about what happens when plastic, heat and food get together and party. You put these all together, and sometimes they don’t stay in the right place. A little food gets bound to the plastic, or, worse, some plastic particles could end up in the food. This is bad because some plastic additives are suspected of having estrogen-mimicking properties when they are present in the body. So if what you actually want to serve up is man-boobs, then no problem, microwaving in plastics and using plastic wrap is a great idea. If not, only use microwave-safe dishes, and never, ever use plastic wrap to microwave oily foods.

plastic
+ heat
+ food
___________
= plastic-y food

Even if you can’t taste it, plastic particles might be there, somewhere. This is not been 100% proven. Do you really want to risk it?

The same goes for plastic wrap.

Look for specially labeled microwave-safe containers. Pyrex and some specially formulated plastics work very well and won’t alter anyone’s, um, figure.

The Solution:

Don’t nuke your food in run-of-the-mill plastic containers.

Unless they’re marked “microwave safe.” And don’t let plastic wrap come into direct contact with oily food when microwaving (good luck with that one).

Use ceramic or glass containers and wax paper, parchment paper or even paper towels instead.

Looking a little better

Our Phil is off soon - to open the first method office in Asia.
For that he needs a Visa  -  and as it happened a passport size photo - without the black eye he acquired over the weekend.. (ostensibly from a High Five Gone Wrong - not sure who he was High Fiving with to catch that shiner!!)

So in best Macgyver style; help was called in - in the form of Phil's fantastic fiancée Penny. Just a moment to share with you all.

make floor love, not floor war

Sometimes our fight against dirty requires a little floor war.  In our San Francisco home office, we're pleased to report that the method ball busters are now #1 in the winter dodgeball league.  Here are team captain, Anna (our grass roots guru) and Drummond (our green giant) in action, with a few more action photos here.  All cleaning and no dodgeball makes method a dull boy.

greenskeeper meets tree hugger

Today our chief greenskeeper Adam had a good long chat with Jess, the resident tree hugger at innocent.  Adam has been comparing notes with lots of sustainability kindred spirits this week, and it was fun to wrap up his trip at the grassy halls of Fruit Towers.  Lots of similar focus around 100% recycled bottles, carbon reduction, and supply chain creativity, etc.  Plus, we had a very lucrative swap.  For a bag of assorted cleaning sprays and hand washes, Jess gave us a few t-shirts, a smoothie recipe book, some innocent knickers, and a grab bag full of smoothies.  Mmmm.

lovely kitchen

Annie from Winchester called us last week on our clean phone, and we had a nice chat.  She was thoughtful enough to send us this picture from her new house with our stainless steel spray and cucumber counter spray standing guard.  Thanks to Annie for letting us know our bottles are safe and happy and not hiding under the kitchen sink.

Adam in town to spread the gospel

Adam Lowry is joining us in London this week from San Francisco for a whole slew of things.  He's the substance half of our founder duo and goes by the title chief greenskeeper (definitely inspired by a lot of viewings of Caddy Shack). 

Adam is an environmental scientist by training, and spent his early career at the Carnegie Institute working on climate change, but he felt he was preaching to the converted there.  He started method as a way to drive change through business instead.  He thought he could reach more people by bringing green to the mainstream rather than bringing the mainstream kicking and screaming to green.

So, Adam spent a jetlagged Tuesday spreading the gospel and sharing a little bit of our substance story to journalists.  This involved a lot of geeky detail on our cradle to cradle design approach, and what not.  But he also covered how we try to use design and style as a Trojan horse so that people may just like us for the ylang ylang fragrance or because they want something to match their pink bathroom.  The environmental profile is carefully considered throughout, but because we don't get preachy about it, we think we're able to reach more people.

Ella from Sustained Magazine and Rikke from smartplanet posted some nice things to their blog after meeting Adam.

We rented a quirky space in London close to the journalists.  Because Adam is 6 feet 6 inches tall, the "mind your head" signs around the building came in very handy.

And, of course, a trip to the UK wouldn't be complete without a little gurning against dirty.

the clean-phone is live!

Little things can be big milestones as we get more established over here.
This afternoon we are very chuffed. Chuffed is our new favourite word, which may have gone out of fashion in the sixties, but to an American spirit chuffed seems to be just of the moment.
And we are chuffed to announce that we can today officially start receiving customer calls here in the office.

Big round of applause...

Up to now our very own Felicia has been delighting UK callers with her Californian accent. But as more and more of our lovely customers are getting active on the phone, we thought it was time to bring it home and let Felicia weave her magic for US customers. We are sending her a Big 'Thank You!'for taking such good care of all our British friends and co-conspirators.

Instead, we give you Phil! recently back from Australia sporting a new floppy hair do.

Here he is taking the first call on the clean-phone from a man called David.

We plan to take turns in answering your calls, so more pictures of the rest of us chatting away to come.

In case you are wondering what the number is - it is the one printed on our super-duper 100% recycled plastic (that's PCR to you) bottles.