How long does a cake of Soap, last in your house?

[Tightwad Kitty]

I use both unwrapped & wrapped soaps but my soap is left to dry out between use. I use soap savers in all places that you can find a cake of soap, which helps dried the soap between uses. I store soap in cupboards to keep clothes moths at bay. Life of cake of soap in my house is over four months when used but it very dry to start with. Some of it is years old. Yes, very old 20 years plus & counting! What stories they could tell too!

So the questions are:
How long does a cake of soap, last in your house?
What are your tricks to stop it melting away?

[zakity]

Depends on the bar of soap. If I don't like it, it lasts forever!! **snickers**

Actually, it does depend on the bar of soap. I buy whatever is cheap and we hardly ever have the same brand. I use the slivers to make liquid hand soap (put the slivers in a old shampoo bottle and add water and shake every once in a while). Ours last quite a while, but nothing near your record.

[coffeebreak]

If you unwrap a bar of Ivory soap and let it sit for a month before using it, it will last longer. Also, keep the soap out of the shower stream when you're showering. Put it up high or off to the side.

If you have a lot of little scraps, you can melt them down and make soap balls. Put an empty coffee can with the soap bits in a pot of water and heat it on the stove. Let it cool a little then roll it into balls. I'll see if I can find the recipe. I think you add water to the soap bits.

[coffeebreak]

Well that didn't take long.

Here's Dotti's recipe:

Be sure all the slivers are the same kind of soap (either deodorant or face soap). Grate into a large can (like a coffee can), add a little water, and place the can in a medium-size saucepan of water on the stove over medium heat. When soap has melted, remove the can, using potholders; carefully pour onto a cookie sheet lined with waxed paper or aluminum foil. When soap is cool enough to handle, roll into small balls, let harden.

[thriftymom]

We use Dove soap in our home due to sensitive skin. When the bar gets small and thin, I stick it to the new bar so it doesn't go to waste. As long as it's thin enough and both bars are wet, it stick pretty well. I've found that it stays together the best if the stuck bars are allowed to dry before they are used again. After a couple of showers, they become one bar! We go through about a bar per week. Dove soap melts down pretty quickly.

[thriftymom]

Originally Posted by Tightwad Kitty

I use soap savers in all places that you can find a cake of soap, which helps dried the soap between uses.

What is a "soap saver"? Sounds like I need one of those!

[coffeebreak]

Originally Posted by thriftymom

What is a "soap saver"? Sounds like I need one of those!

It's a rubber pad with spines that stick up to hold the soap bar out of the water.

[thriftymom]

Oh, OK- thanks! We have a soapdish that drains out the bottom into another dish to sort of keep the soap from sitting in a puddle. Not sure if it works as well as what you've got.

[Tightwad Kitty]

Originally Posted by coffeebreak

It's a rubber pad with spines that stick up to hold the soap bar out of the water.

The ones that we have here have spines on both sides of plastic pad. You could put on top of your soap dish.

My soaps don't know what it’s like to be left in water. You would think they are people, by the sounds of that statement but I have been using soap savers longer than I have lived in this house now in 35th year. Other people who pasted away 15 years bought some of the cakes of soap. Other's are from hotel soaps from oversea trips in the 1970's. I still have 5 cakes of soap that were bought on special over 25 years ago to use up, each one last 6 months as they are large Italian bars glycerin of soap, 89c each at the time! I just put one cake of soap on the scales, it was 300g when made now it’s 246g and still is wrapped.

[contrary1]

Bar soap lasts forever in my house. I can't remember buying soap.
I unwrap all my new bar soap & let it age & air dry.... If you think about soap making, people used to age their soap prior to using it, or it would virtually "melt" away.
When you look at bar soap today, manufacturers are wrapping it air tight, so the minute you start to use it, that's right............it begins to melt. No matter if you've got it set on something dry or not. The whole bar needs to dry out prior to using it and getting it wet.

I use all the open bars here in peoples drawers and closet shelves. Helps to keep things smelling great.

[katwoman]

I had absolutely no idea that if you unwrap soap and let it "age" it would last longer! Now I'll be sure to unwrap every bar.

As for a soap saver I thought you meant a type of nylon sock that the soap goes in. It's like those nylon loofahs they sell to help lather up. That's what I've been using till it finally got a tear in it. Now I can't seem to find another one. This really extends the life of a bar of soap!

[Thrifty Ray]

Well....it lasts quite a while unless DD3 takes a tub and forgets to put the soap back up on the rack...when this happens, it often turns to mush in the tub....grrr...thankfully, she is getting much better at remembering!! DH, who is frugal challenged, uses the bottled old spice stuff...(expensive!) and has no desire to give it up...DD3 and I can go a long time on one bar of soap.

[Ima saver]

I just let my dog lick me!!

[goodhome]

When my grandmother died a few years ago, we had to clean out her house. We found thousands of tiny soap chips in jars. Whenever a bar of soap was too small to use, she put it in a jar and saved it. There must have been bits that were 50 years old or more. I still wonder what she planned to do with them, or if she used them to keep her cupboards and attic fresh.

[debtfreeme]

about 4 months.

[PrincessPerky]

we had been using zest, which I hate but if only DH used it it lasted two or three months (I used gel) when we both use it it lasts a month. I think cause the bar has less chance to dry between showers.

I just stuck some unwrapped to 'age' We shall see if it makes a difference next month (when the current bar runs out)

[CJsoccerchic]

WOW - I just stuck some unwrapped bars in my clothes drawer to dry until the soap using now runs out - I'm so amazed that by aging them making them last longer. WOW
Does this also work with Dial? My husband LOVES that stuff...

[Tightwad Kitty]

For those who are not reading 'Re-reading Tightwad Gazette' thread. This is part of last Sunday post from that thread.

You may like to read this article ‘Wrapping versus Unwrapping, the slippery truth’ - Vol 2 (p373 CTG)

Theme-: Cake of soap, to use unwrapped & storage or wrapped & fresh cake of soap.

TG – Quote “ But I suspected a conspiracy on the part of soap manufacturers to suppress this vital soap saving strategy after all, they stand to sell more soap if dissolves at a accelerated rate.”
~~~ *~~~* ~~~

Put a few cakes of soap in the back of your linen cupboard area, and leave there for a few months. You find it will dry out.

Here is one way of doing this!
Would be trying to be 3 months ahead in your soap buying. If you wish to dry the cakes of soap out before using! Build your stock up to four months worth of soap, then keep the supply at two - three month worth in your stockpile to allow for drying. Over time you should be using less. A month or two months may work too! Testing is the key here.

[contrary1]

I would think the ageing bit needs to be longer than a month for sure. My old bars (unused) have been in closets & drawers now for years. No one needs a new bar of soap!!! They get hard enough I can't poke my fingernail in them...........and when some of them are brand new, I can make a fingerprint in them!!!

I can just imagine the creative marketing session when someone came up with srink wrapping the bars of soap, air tight!!! They must have thought they were brilliant...........and look what it got them. People used up bars of soap in weeks instead of months!!

Works with absolutely any kind of soap.

[Tightwad Kitty]

Yes, I do think that you would need bit longer than a month or two! But you have to start somewhere for stockpiling all this soap; this is expensive exercise too!

Using this Formula: bathrooms x soap x time = stockpile amount.
Math Example: A household with two bathrooms using 4 cakes of new soap per week now.
Would need to stockpile 68 cakes of soap or more over four months just to start drying it out and keep up with current use at the same time and keep buying each time special comes on soap too! Well into the future. Overtime you will need to buy less. Do you use that much soap in four months?

So to a new question. ‘How many cakes of new soap are used in your household per week?’