MYTH: Dye and Preservative-Free Cleaners are safer because dyes and preservatives are unnecessary chemical ingredients within a cleaning products.

FACT – Dyes play an important role as visual cues that you are using the proper product and/or that the cleaner is in fact not just water, and should not be ingested. Preservatives are used to prevent growth of microbes in the product itself.  As cleaning products become milder to surfaces they also can become “milder” to microbes and may even become food for them.  A cleaning product contaminated with growing microbes can develop off odors and lose its ability to clean as the microbes eat the surfactants and other active components of the cleaning product.  Preservatives are used to protect the cleaning product and ensure it remains effective.