Customer Reviews

Seventh Generation Glass & Surface Cleaner, Ruby Grapefruit & Herb Scent, 32-Ounces Bottle (Pack of 8)

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

For reasons unknown, I developed chemical sensitivities over the last few years. All that means, basically, is that the common toxic additives used in so many of the products with which we come in daily contact affect me more now than they did in the past. Chemical fragrance agents, artificial dyes, volatile organic compounds -- all relative dangers to even the most healthy amongst us.

There's value to being green, but "conservation" and "environmentalism" have been reduced to (for reasons good and bad) politically loaded words. I won't spend much time considering the greater environmental footprint of Seventh Generation as a business, or their Ruby Grapefruit & Herb glass cleaner as a product. I just can't speak intelligently to how it is produced, shipped, or even packaged. I can speak to the immediate environment (that of your home, car, work area, etc.) impact, and whether or not it has consequences for someone with chemical sensitivity issues -- I am, on that front, much like a canary in a mine.

I'm ecstatic to report that I have no reaction whatsoever to this product. One more opportunity to replace toxic chemicals in my home with a non-toxic alternative, allowing (literally and figuratively speaking) all of us here to breathe a little easier.

Perhaps the best news is that I don't feel there's any fall-off in the efficacy of the product, as compared to its toxic counterparts. I cleaned half of our back door with the Ruby Grapefruit & Herb, and the other half with what may be the most common brand of 'normal' glass cleaner. Neither side streaked, both cleaned effectively (I have three German Shepherd Dogs, so the glass on our back door gets plenty of nose prints, saliva, and muddy paws), and even as I got right up on top of it after spraying, I had no reaction whatsoever to the Seventh Generation product. It carries a crisp, clean, and vaguely citrus smell. A much better smell, I believe, than the alternative, though certainly this is a subjective area of consideration. It may have been a thinner liquid than the other (which claims to be drip-free), so it did run just a little bit where I had over-sprayed, but I have no complaint there as I was ready to go with a paper towel to wipe it all down.

Forget all the buzzwords: 'Green,' 'VOCs,' and the like. This product represents an opportunity to trade toxic for non-toxic, without sacrificing efficacy, without forcing you to spend more, all the while (perhaps) also helping the greater environment. I'd love to come up with a "but" for the sake of a well-rounded argument, but I just don't have one. Seventh Generation has a new (and appreciative) fan, at least when it comes to this particular product. Five stars without a second thought.

HOW DID IT CLEAN?

- Mirror plastered with toothpaste splotches from kids flinging their spittle while brushing. The dried spots came off without a hitch! Cleaning bathroom mirrors were a snap and no streaks!

- We have floor to ceiling mirrors in the bedroom that get finger-prints upon finger-prints. Again, no streaking and a simple one spray and wipe to clean it all up

- I have no idea if this is one of those cleaners that will strip the anti-glare from a computer monitor, but the kid's monitor plastered in finger-prints and smudges. I sprayed a cloth, wipped the monitor and didn't need to scrub to get the finger-prints off. It left a nice clear monitor screen.

- Used it to clean the toilets. I have three small boys who I'm still training on how to aim right. So it was a great pleasure to see the urine on the toilet and floor were picked up just great.

OTHER FEATURES:
- The fruity scent is a wonderful replacement to the typical chemical smells of all other cleaners. . . .especially in a urine sprayed bathroom that the little boys share

- We don't have allergies, but to know that this product is less harmful to those with allergies is a plus. Also in a day and age where it seems more and more people are having health problems, here is a product/company that strives to not add to all the other "bad" things out there

- I gave a bottle to some co-workers who are VERY environmental safe and they were excited. They told me they love the produts from this company and have always had a good experience

- One of the first products I've found where water wasn't the first ingredient. . .but the last! About time to get a non-watered down product

OVERALL:
Even though the product is touted as a glass/surface cleaner, it cleaned much more than that and did it well. It is a far superior cleaner than Windex in my opinion. I'm a convinced customer who is going to keep my shelf stocked with this product for years to come

With a nice, mild scent, and the power of citrus, Seventh Generation's Glass and Surface cleaner is great for many surfaces in your home. I've used it on windows, baseboards, formica, granite, and porcelain, all with great results and most imporatantly, no streaking. Unlike other cleaners, the fragrance is pleasant and I noticed that my pets don't sneeze when I spray the cleaner, an added bonus for this multiple pet household.

In addition, I used it on the nickel hardware in my shower and managed to erase the water spots that seem to collect there. I'm really happy with the product and keep a spare bottle in my car to clean the windows regularly.

I've been ecologically minded long enough that I gravitate towards "natural" products when possible. Yet in the arena of cleaning products, I'm often afraid such products will not as well as their more toxic conventional counterparts.

So I was pleased to find this Seventh Generation cleaner works just as well on glass as Windex!

It works a little less-well on greasy dirt (such as in the kitchen), and heavily caked bathroom scum that would take 2 passes with Windex may take 3 passes with this cleaner. But for typical cleaning purposes, it works just as well, though I found I had to apply it a little more heavily than Windex.

Its mildly fruity odor fades quickly and doesn't have the artificial pungency of something like the lemon in Pledge. Best of all are no VOCs or anything else nasty in the ingredients. You still wouldn't want to get this stuff in your eyes, but it's pretty harmless otherwise.

It works well, smells good, is better for your health, and is sold by a very ecologically-minded company. So I rate this 5 stars. It's another simple, incremental way to have a smaller eco-footprint without sacrificing quality of life.

I am very much in favor of environmentally safe products, for many reasons. They're safer for us humans. They're safer for our pets. They're safer for our environment! This should be the direction that all of us head in.

I therefore had very high hopes and expectations for the Seventh Generation Glass and Surface Cleaner. People have been cleaning surfaces for thousands of years. You would hope in all of that time that we'd become the experts in how dirt interacts with water, how bacteria work, what is sanitary, what is pleasant smelling.

Unfortunately, there's a reason that some of those modern mysterious substances are in some of the products we use.

First, we compared the Seventh Generation on various glass surfaces against standard other glass cleaners out there (Windex, etc). The Seventh Generation did smell gentle and nice. Its application was more watery and less "slippery" than the other products. No surprise - most commercial glass cleaners contain chemicals which aid in that slipperiness, which helps your rag slide more easily over the surface you are cleaning. You had to rub with a bit more vigor with the Seventh Generation in order to get the same level of shine. It was possible in the end to get the same level of results, just with a little more work on the natural side.

Next, we went onto common household surfaces. Again, we compared the Seventh Generation against other standard commercial products. Again, the gentle aroma was a definite plus in the Seventh Generation favor. The same slidely issue presented itself. The Seventh Generation was more like washing the surface with a wet sponge, vs a sliding cleaner which made the task more easy. It also tends to wear out the paper towels more quickly for the same reason.

The cleaner also does not have the high power of other cleaners. It would move around some types of stains, but not easily lift them. It took a fair amount more work to get a stain up off. In some cases it would not lift it at all, while other cleansers would do the job.

I do want to comment that this cleaner isn't *meant* to take the place of a bleach or ammonia style cleaner. However, you should be trying to minimize your use of those cleaners anyway. Yes, you can have a bottle of that for when it's really needed, but in general for health reasons you should keep your use of these to a minimum.

That being said, you should keep your use of ANY chemical-filled cleansers to a minimum for the same reason :) And for the general clean-up around the home, this product is quite fine. You might use a few more paper towels, but if you're going the environmentally nice route, you'll switch to rags anyway which won't really wear out. It might require a little more elbow grease, but heck, most of us could use a few more calories burned each day. You can keep the more powerful things in the back of the cabinet, but this way you can use them only when you really have to, rather than every single day for typical clean up tasks.

Finally, out of the pack that was shipped to us, two of the bottles leaked. This made the box soaking wet, the invoice a soggy mess, and of course lost a fair amount of product. It seems they need to do a better job sealing up their bottles before they send them out.

Let me first say I'm a cleanaholic. I'll try just about anything that makes an adequate claim to clean more efficiently, thoroughly, or quickly. It doesn't matter to me at all if the chemicals therein could strip the skin off a hog. I'm not chemically sensitive at all; to me, you know a cleaner is really working if your lungs are burning (jes' kidding bout that.) I just put on my hazmat suit, grab the cleaner, and get to work.

So this Seventh Generation cleaner was a complete novelty to me. I tend to avoid "green" cleaning products, mostly because of the little I've experienced them - and heard from friends and relatives - they don't do the job.

I figured I'd start light with the cleaner. I used it to clean the bathroom mirror and sink. Now I don't use bar soap, so I don't have soap scum residue in the sink. There are, though, the usual droplets of toothpaste, etc. that can make cleaning a little more involved than just wiping down the area.

The vanity and faucet were just recently replaced. The faucet is a pewter type, and I've been careful about whatever I used on it to keep the finish.

Surprisingly, the Seventh Generation cleaner worked better than I expected. It took some work, maybe more work than I'd have with Fantastik (the Oxy Fantastic is my favorite general cleaner in a spray bottle), but not that much more work.

The scent was a delightful surprise (I LIKE scented products, so the more the better if the scent's a good one.) The faucet was unharmed by the spray. The sink eventually shone. Even more surprisingly, the mirror cleaned up very nicely, even better than when I use Glass Plus.

The one thing that was odd was that the paper towels shredded much faster and left a lot more paper towel lint behind than usual. I buy two types of paper towels: the cheapies I use in the kitchen for just drying the hands, and the better quality paper towels for cleaning. I accidently picked up the cheapies instead of the higher quality towels for use in the bathroom, so I thought that might be the reason for the lint factor.

My kitchen is fairly grease free at the moment, but I tried the Seventh Generation on the inside of the microwave, which has a few splatters. Sad to say, it took a LOT of scrubbing to get the splatters off. I then tried it on my gas cooktop. It was okay, but did little to get rid of the grease droplet I found, just kind of smeared it around.

I'd say it was a pretty good glass cleaner, and it'd be useful for that. If you have light cleaning to do, it's fine, and it sure smells nice. But heavy cleaning? Greasy stuff? Really dirty mess?

Seventh Generation isn't going to replace your heavy duty cleaners. It's just too lightweight. But for what it does do well, mirrors, lightly dirty surfaces and the like, yeah, it's fine.

Length:: 3:08 Mins

Jean Yates, Vine Voice member, jewelry designer and author of the jewelry design book Links, due out in January 2008, tries this cleaner because she is interested in seeing how efective an all natural, non-toxic spray will work around the house! Will this cleaner make the cut? Check out her conclusion!

Length:: 6:00 Mins

*****
In this video I do three demos with this product. I found it to be equivalent to the leading commercial (toxic) alternative, and quite pleasant smelling. I am a chemically sensitive consumer. I hope that it helps you in making a buying decision!
*****

I'm a guy so I get more excited about tech and tools then I do about cleaning products, but every once in a while a product comes along that is worth getting excited about, and Seventh Generation Ruby Grapefruit and Herb Natural Glass & Surface Cleaner is one of those products. Go Green and save the environment is a powerful theme/movement these days, and by purchasing, I will call it "Ruby" you are more than doing your part, you are doing yourself a favor. The performance is just as great as the cause. It is superior to any other glass cleaner I have ever used. No more fighting streaks. It is the closest thing to streak free glass cleaning I have found. Forget about buying air fresheners, this has such a natural great scent that when you clean the windows, you room will be adorned with a hint of ruby red grapefruit, blended with sweet basil, and geranium essential oils. (That is what is in it) Maybe that is why it does not streak the way solvent/alcohol based cleaners do, because it has geranium essential oils in it. I was wondering why, when I wipe off my CRT monitor, and television set, which attracts dirt because it has a magnetic quality to the surface, it left the monitor surface so clean, and no streaks, or that cloudy film, the way alcohol based cleaners leave. Maybe there is a clear film on monitors that is sensitive to solvents, that is why the manufacturers tell you to just wipe it with water. Well this takes it a step further, without causing any damage to your screens protective layer.
The sprayer is also the max. You know how some sprayers sort of glob the liquid out, not leaving a very even mist, or they spray a mist so fine you have to work like crazy to get enough coverage? Well this sprayer puts out just the right amount of cleaner, and delivers it fine enough to perfectly cover every square millimeter of surface, with nothing left out. When I am finally done using the cleaner, I will keep the sprayer to mist my plants with, it's that good. I just bought a sprayer from Home Depot that puts out like this one, and it cost me $5 just for the sprayer, instead of the $1.99 sprayer they had that puts out like a typical glass cleaner has.
One other item worth mentioning is that it doesn't evaporate anywhere nearly as quickly as alcohol based cleaners. That means you get a lot more yardage out of it. It's a big 32 oz container so their is plenty of it, but a little goes a long way. Once the paper towel gets wet, you can stop spraying, and just start wiping for a while, yet the thin film on the glass still dries very rapidly. Nice blend.
Sometimes I use cleaners and they irritate my lungs. This stuff is so pleasant, it falls into the category of a cross between men and womens cologne, or perfume. Hey who doesn't like the soft scent of ruby grapefruits, blended with just the right type of basil and flowers? It makes me look forward to doing the windows again.
I have to also say that as a glass cleaner it is superior to every other product I have used, but I would not be looking to cut heavy grease with it. A chemical, or alcohol based cleaner would do a better job of that. The citrus is a good cleaner, but for dried grease, I would be looking elsewhere. Although I will be keeping this handy in the kitchen for the usual wipe ups, I wrote the above review using it as a glass cleaner only, and that is why I got so crazy about it. It's nuts. I guess that is why they call it a "Natural Glass Cleaner and (oh by the way)surface cleaner":-)Ok, seriously on the box it is only listed as a glass cleaner, no mention of surface cleaner, but on the sprayer it has glass cleaner first, and surface cleaner listed second.
Like I said, it isn't often I get excited about a cleaning product, but as a glass cleaner, which doubles as a general surface cleaner, this one is worthy. Buy it you won't be sorry.

I used on my stovetop and had to use a little more elbow grease, but it got the job done without harmful, unpleasant chemicals. I did not have the lingering smell or irritation on my hands after using, despite washing them. A nice fresh non-overwhelming smell lingered for a little bit. I highly recommend this product for those who want to be environmentally friendly without sacrificing quality!!