We’ve had lots of family in town lately which has been awesome. Right before our guests arrive we go through our place, and tidy up. Part of that process includes refilling the hand soap containers. There’s something about “name brand” hand soap that just feels luxurious or something. It’s got it’s pretty package, it smells good (like, REALLY good), and, oh yeah, it costs like, $7 bucks a bottle (booo).
I always imagine that wealthy people just buy the name brand, great smelling hand soap without thinking twice about it. Which is awesome, IF you want to spend your money on soap. Me? I’d rather spend it on other stuff.
I know this idea isn’t ground-breaking or anything, but this is what I do to still have my good smelling soap but without the cost…
Buy 1 bottle of the fancy hand soap, use it up, and enjoy every last, savory moment of every single hand wash. Then, when the bottle is empty, I refill it with the inexpensive (compartively, speaking) bulk, clear, hand soap (by the way, I wish I had bought a large funnel a long time ago… woulda’ saved me a lot of trouble with balancing bottles on bottles when getting the last drops out of containers), and then put in like a zillion (30-ish) drops of fresh-smelling essential oils, and shake.
It ends up smelling just as good as the legit stuff so no one even thinks anything about it being a homemade knockoff version.
Super cheap, super easy.
Do you have tricks like that? Where you switch out the cheap version and masquerade it as the real version?
I found that sometimes a good delicious smelling shower gel is cheaper than a luxury hand soap, so I fill this into the dispenser. But I like your idea with the essential oils as well. I use those in my self made baking soda shampoo (easy, cheap and ecofriendly).
Ohhhhh, I hadn’t thought of using inexpensive shower gel as hand soap! Good idea!
Ooo fancy! I always wonder about people who have that high-brow hand soap in their bathrooms–is all their money going to soap :)?! But now I know they might be hacking it! I have soap dispensers I got at Bed, Bath & Beyond years ago that I refill with cheap Costco soap. Works pretty well and it smells like honey/oatmeal, which is fine with me. I like your essential oils idea though!
I also do that one, refilling the expensive bottle with inexpensive one. :) Promise, they won’t notice it, they will only notice the brand of the item.
So true! My mother in law even asked me where she can buy the soap because she liked the smell so much. I’d say that was a score!;)
Ah! Such a good idea! Whenever we splurge on fancy stuff for when guests are around, I’m always wondering, “why don’t we deserve to have nice stuff ALL the time?”
We don’t do that around here… I’m so advertising-averse that everything we use gets put into plain containers if it’s going to be displayed. Our dish soap is in a plain glass pump-bottle, for example, and we recently switched from liquid hand soap to bar soap, which lives in a soap dish on the counter, because it’s less expensive.
Liquid hand soap with essential oils sounds really lovely, though…
I would try to do the bar soap but I don’t like the water that pools up under it as it’s drying. Lol. ;P
I often get fancy soaps/shampoo/bath bubbles as little gifts for Christmas or other occasions and it all goes straight to the guest bath. I don’t care about it but it makes the guest bathroom seem very luxurious.
Such a good idea, and I bet your guests like the luxuriousness (? is that a word?!) too.
I do something very similar with hand soap only I skipped buying the fancy bottle and instead bought a fancy glass soap pump.
That’s a great idea too!
I do the same thing with dish soap! I love the cute bottles that the name-brand organic soap comes in, but I hate the price. I buy one maybe two a year and just refill it with the $0.99 dish soap in between.
You’re a girl after my heart. <3
I love soaps like that, so I will purchase a bar or two of the name brand hand soap and use that to make my own liquid soap. MUCH cheaper and still luxurious!
Make your own liquid soap from the bar soap!?! How in the world do you do that?!
Grate 1-2 bars of soap, melt/dissolve it in about a gallon of water (they say distilled, but I use tap), and about a tablespoon of glycerin on the stove. Let it set overnight, then whisk it all up. It has the consistency of snot (spending on what kind of soap you use). There are lots of recipes on Pinterest!
I feel like once you’ve bought the $20 essential oil and the refill soap you’ve spent just as much money. Plus Meyers soap isn’t $7 its around $4 AND you can find it on clearance at Target for $3 OR you can wait, which I did, and get one for $1.50. In the end it’s about getting the things you want but being smart about it. Rich people buy it full price cause they can afford to avoid the “hassle” of waiting.
Okay, so I’m realizing that I bought my Mrs. Meyer’s at the wrong place (Ace Hardware)…:/ It seems everyone else get their’s for around $3.99. I’ve got to say, it is less expensive to buy the bulk soap and oils since you get like a zillion refills/uses out of the supplies once you buy them.
This is a great idea, but I like having little luxuries in my life. They make me happy throughout the day! Plus, a lot of times you can combine coupons and sales to get a super great deal on things like handsoap!
I hear ya. Little luxuries are great every now and then! I think everyone has different ideas about what they deem expense worthy.
We used to do this with kitchen cleaner that smelled like lavender until we found an amazing deal on it in bulk!
ohhhh that’s awesome!
Ha! That would have never, ever occurred to me. I use the refillable style hand soap pumps, so that I can put my 80000 gallon jug from walmart into them.
I totally want to see this 80000 gallon jug now.:)
Great tip! I do the refil thing, but I’ve never added essential oils to make it smell better. So doing that next time!!
Maybe it is where I live (middle of nowhere) but I buy Mrs. Meyers products because they are inexpensive. Their hand soap costs $3.99, next to an supermarket brand Antibacterial handsoap that costs 4.99….
I think I bought mine at the wrong place…:/ I got mine at Ace Hardware… definitely closer to $7 there.:/ boooooooooo
Another way to stretch the delightful-smelling soaps is to use them as refills for foaming hand soap pumps. Fill about 1/4 with the soap, the rest with water, and shake! Foaming dispensers make the soap go so much farther, and there’s less running-water time while waiting to lather up!
Great idea!
I have been obsessing for 6 months over the Mrs. Meyers handsoap! I love the smell and it makes me happy! I consider it to be a small luxury. They were recently on sale at Giant for $3 and I have a $1 coupon on 2. They were out of stock, so I got a raincheck. I would have price-matched at Target, but didn’t want to spend the gas money. I’m going to splurge, since the last handsoap I got was free at CVS with an extrabucks reward!
I’ve been known to keep a bottle of fancy hand soap stashed away while we’re using cheap no-name-brand stuff every day, then swap them over when we have guests. Because I personally prefer unscented hand soap (fragranced ones seem to dry my hands out) – and that way we don’t go through too much of the expensive nice smelling stuff.
I always bought a little more expensive soaps because I can’t stand how I feel after I wash my hands with cheap soap. I have never tried Meyers…I just wait for coupons and buy B&BW soaps
Yep, I do something similar, and I buy liquid soap about once or twice a year. I purchased the foaming hand soap from a well-known body and bath store, and washed the dispensers out when empty. One solid squirt of mild dish soap in the bottom of the bottle does it, then I fill the remainder of the bottle with warm water and shake gently to blend. If you purchase the jumbo size soap when there’s a really good sale, you’re good for about a year.
I also do the dish soap trick. True, that it doesn’t have that uber nice smell, but, I’m already getting dish soap in bulk and it does work really well since I can adjust the water/soap ratio as needed.
Love it. Great tip!
I personally don’t refill my soap – mostly because I never think of it until I’ve already bought more soap. However, my friend works at a very, very snooty home store that sells things like $98 string lights, and they use plain-old softsoap decanted into decorative dispensers and people are constantly asking what it is.
Also, I wanted to ask where in the world you’re buying Mrs. Meyer’s hand soap that it costs $7… I pay 3.99 and I can usually get a coupon. Plus, they sell bulk refills.
I got it at Ace Hardware. That was clearly the wrong place to buy it! Lesson learned!
I honestly thought only my mother & I do this. She’s super frugal for someone who likes quality things but this trick I do love! I like to buy those fancy ones from TJMaxx or Ross & buy a gallon whenever available at Ross or TJ and ugh money saver :)
i need a hand soap name for a project asp!!!
I have never tried Meyers…I just wait for coupons and buy B&BW soaps
Great tip, thank you! :)