Clorox Green Works

Oakland-based Clorox has been quite the hot topic of late within green circles with its recent acquisition of Burt's Bees.  The company most well known for producing bleach is working on crafting a greener image with consumers.  Using its strong brand recognition and fueled by tremendous growth and interest in greener more eco-friendly household products Clorox has introduced a new product line called Green Works.  Green Works combines the strong trustworthy image of "clean" the Clorox brand enjoys with new product formulations that are 99% natural. 

Green Works is made from plant-based ingredients derived from coconuts and lemon oil, one of the products in the line, the Glass & Surface Cleaner also uses corn-based ethanol.  The ingredients used in Green Works products are sustainable, non-allergenic and biodegradable. "We worked with our suppliers to ensure that they were providing natural, plant- or mineral-based raw materials and asked them to show us their entire supply chain to prove the ingredients were natural. What we have with Green Works products are cleaners with the most natural profile available in today's market: Our products are all at least 99 percent natural and we will not be satisfied until we can get our formulas to be 100 percent natural," said Suzanne Thompson, Vice President of Research & Development, Cleaning Division.   

All Green Works packaging is currently stock packaging according to Mary Seltzer with Ketchum, a PR firm handling the Green Works product line.  The packaging is easily recyclable.  Creative design for the packaging and labeling was done by Clorox's in-house design team. 

"Our brand marketing team wanted a label design that would create shelf-pop versus traditional cleaners and communicate the brand promise of powerful cleaning done naturally. We wanted something that was clean, simple and yet still powerful. Something that would stand out from what we typically see in the cleaning aisles, which is how we came up with the Gerbera Daisy design. The daisy is a visual icon for what Green Works is about. Natural, Simple and It Works."

Clorox Green Works hasn't officially launched nationwide though the products are beginning to appear on retailers shelves throughout the month of January.  In preparation for this story, Sustainable is Good found a large display of Green Works natural glass and surface cleaning spray featured at an area Wal-Mart store.  The cleaning spray sold for just under $3 and comes in a large 32 fl oz clear spray bottle made from the highly recyclable PET plastic.

According to Clorox, all the products in the Green Works line will sell nationally for between $2.99 and $3.39.

The Green Works Natural All-Purpose Cleaner, Natural Glass & Surface Cleaner, Natural Toilet Bowl Cleaner and Natural Dilutable Cleaner products have been granted the “Design for Environment” certification from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Green Works products are not tested on animals.

Comments

[joel h]

I wonder if "99% natural" includes the 98% that is water.