When it comes to the fragrance or aroma of Melaleuca products, most of them have some level of fragrance ranging from very subtle to borderline bright. For one thing, Melaleuca’s namesake product, pure melaleuca oil, is highly aromatic. But the pleasant fragrances are not merely just for scent appeal, though they do serve that purpose, the fragrances are part of the effectiveness which is derived from pure essential oils and other natural ingredients used in the formulations.
This is not the cheap way to make products but it is the natural (safe) way and it is a vital part of the Melaleuca model, something I emphasize often because it’s an important part of why we are loyal customers. I need to quickly mention a couple other things I also emphasize often: effectiveness since natural is not always effective but effective is a mandate for Melaleuca products, and affordable (another mandate), not always significantly inexpensive like many of their cleaning products but always reasonable and considerably better than competitive products, even those at higher price points.
I don’t need to elaborate extensively on these points since I continually emphasize these qualities in Melaleuca products, plus, you can go to almost any product page and quickly notice the emphasis on plant based derivatives and the benefits they provide. Even Sol-U-Guard, Melaleuca’s botanical disinfectant, gets its power from thyme oil and citric acid (citrus) to eliminate the conventional reliance on toxic chlorine. What I will do is spotlight just one product that was reformulated earlier this year and offer my observations.
It’s been nearly 3 years since I posted about the Lemon Brite dish liquid where I emphasized an unexpected benefit that sponges do not fester into a rancid stench like you would normally experience in rather short order with other products. What I find really interesting is a customer review left on the Melaleuca product page just a few days before this post that matches quite well with what I said here 3 years ago:
Prior to Lemon Brite, I used Dawn. Of course, I was sucked into the advertisement of the duckling that was drenched in oil and that Dawn is used to wash away and return the duckling back to the wild! However, I noticed that the sponge that I used on my dishes would start to smell and stink after a week or so. As a Chemical Engineer, I investigated the 22 ingredients in DAWN and it did have an anti-bacterial compound but how come it was not working? It should have killed the bacteria that was causing the odor. I decided to try Lemon Brite and I noticed that it only had 7 ingredients! After a week, no smell; 2 weeks no smell; 3 weeks no smell; I kept this up for over 6 weeks and there was no odor. That told me that there were no bacteria and/or germs that were causing any odor! Furthermore, it has no Formaldehyde, Phythates, and Parabens! This is WIN-WIN! It would clean that ducking and have no smell, plus safe for the environment!
The reviewer obviously had the older formulation because there are considerably more than 7 ingredients now to make it even more botanical with no loss of performance. Even the colorings and fragrance boosters are entirely plant based. It was safe before but the new formulation demonstrates what had to be a serious R&D enhancement. And yes, our sponges still remain free from stench!