The 12 Azure Market Household Cleaners were specifically engineered to be sustainable, safe and effective. None of the products include any of the most common harmful chemicals and all are environmentally safe green cleaning products.
But just how did these green cleaning products come to be? What do all those ingredients do and how is the formula so effective without those common, synthetic chemicals?
We went a bit deeper into the making of the Azure Market Household Cleaners line of green cleaning products by talking with a representative of the company we partnered with to make these products. This partnership was ideal because the values we stand for matched well with the production goals.
Michael Harvey has been involved in environmental and sustainable causes since 1970 when he first helped organize Earth Day at the University of Minnesota. He has a law degree with specialization in environmental and natural resources law, and takes every opportunity to do what is right for the good of personal and natural health.
“We all share the same environment, and I am going to operate at the highest level of care possible even though it costs us more and is inconvenient,” he once said.
Q: Why would an Azure customer want to use these green cleaning product(s) and what’s the ultimate benefit for them?
Each of these green cleaning products are designed to do exactly what they say they’re going to do with minimal impact on your health and the environment. They will effectively clean your house, but you (the consumer) don’t have to worry about contaminants, toxic chemicals, or even wearing rubber gloves. It’s worry-free washing, cleaning and scrubbing. In other words, they get the job done well with safety and sustainability in mind.
We made 12 products that are safe and sustainable, and they will continue to evolve and grow. There is no finish line.
Q: Many conventional cleaning products include sodium laurel sulfate (SLS) and sodium laureth sulfate (SLES). Explain what these two chemicals are and why they are used in conventional cleaning products.
SLS and SLES are surfactants, detergents and emulsifiers used in thousands of cosmetic products and cleaners. They are the key ingredients in common household cleaners you see on store shelves today including liquid hand soaps, laundry detergents, and window cleaners.
These chemicals are even found in many so-called “green” products. SLS and SLES go by other names, too, including sodium dodecyl sulfate, sodium salt sulfuric acid and aquarex methyl. They are cheap to make and cheap to use — and they work. It’s also very difficult to engineer these ingredients out of the products. It’s no surprise SLS and SLES are used so often. But, there’s a caveat.
SLS is the sodium salt of lauyrl sulfate, and originates in coconuts, but it is suspected of being contaminated with 1, 4 Dioxane, a carcinogen. While these two chemicals perform well, they have a lasting and detrimental effect on the environment. Numerous studies have linked SLS and SLES to neurotoxicity, organ toxicity, cancer risks, skin irritations and other health concerns.
We made the decision to simply not use these ingredients at all.
Q: Explain how the Azure Market green cleaning products were made and the ingredients that are used. Why do some of the cleaners have a dozen or more ingredients?
It’s not easy to replace SLS and SLES. It took a complex engineering effort to design products that would work effectively without those chemicals.
These plant-based ingredients have to work in balance to have the same or better performance than conventional products, which is why Azure Market cleaners will have a dozen or more ingredients on the label.
So it’s easy to make products that are green. It’s hard to make products that are green and work.
Q: Azure Market’s laundry detergents use specific enzymes to aid performance. What are these enzymes and how do they work?
There are three enzymes that we use in our products, and all of them are highly sustainable and completely plant- and sugar-based.
Amylase enzyme cleans starch-based soils such as chocolate and gravy. Protease enzyme cleans proteins such as blood, milk and most odors. Cellulase enzyme cleans cellulosic stains such as grass stains.
These formulas are extremely effective in both the powder and liquid form. And the reason is because of how these ingredients and the enzymes are balanced. Through trial and error, we created products that use plant-based enzymes in synergy with other sustainable ingredients for high quality performance.
It’s why the laundry detergents have close to 60 ingredients. They were designed to remove stains but also designed not to harm your skin or nature.
Q: You mentioned plant-based, sustainable ingredients. Describe a few of these ingredients and how they work in the product(s).
There are 60 raw, plant-based materials we use in all of these household green cleaning products, and only six are synthetic. The six synthetic ingredients include preservatives to help keep the product shelf-stable. But even the preservatives are safe to use.
We specifically went out and found biodegradable synthetic ingredients that are considered by the Environmental Protection Agency to be the safer choice because we want to have as minimal an impact on the environment as possible, and as little effect to your health as possible. You have to wash your clothes, and you have to clean your house, but if you have to do these things, do it with products that cause the minimal amount of damage. The lighter the footprint, the better off everyone will be.
The labels on these products will signify when an ingredient is plant-based, seed-based or synthetic. But each of the 60 plant-based ingredients in these cleaning formulas serves a purpose and work together to get the job done.
For instance, replacing SLS and SLES in the laundry powder was particularly difficult. We finally found a palm- and coconut-based replacement, Methyl Ester Sulphonate, which was available only from a Japanese company that produces this safe and sustainable material only in Asia.
We hope that by starting to use this Japanese material in place of SLS and SLES that the company will eventually produce this material closer to home. Even though very inconvenient, we are simply not going to use SLS or SLES in our products.
Q: Why are there no dyes or other scents in the Azure Market household cleaner line?
Dyes, when they enter the watershed, cause the rivers to turn brown and increase the color content of the water, which in turn causes algae bloom, destroys fish habitat and so on and so forth. Ecosystems do not exist by themselves; they interact with others and with us, so what we’ve done is taken that negative aspect out of the equation.
Even when dyes are biodegradable, they still damage the Earth. Their life may be shorter and they may degrade faster, but they still cause problems down the line.
Azure Market cleaning products are unscented, but in the future, scented versions can be added to the product line. Essential oils are easy to add to the formula and are, by nature, plant-based.
Q: So let’s dig a bit deeper into the environmental impact of these products. What does it mean to have a “Light Footprint”?
When you walk on the beach, you are likely looking everywhere but behind you. But if you were to look where you’ve been, you will see footprints left behind as you make your way down the coastline.
The same thing happens with the products you use to clean your house and clothes. The goal is to have a light footprint and as minimal an impact. That’s what these cleaners do. They are considered “Light Footprint” in that the ingredients are sustainable, biodegradable and worry-free.
You can confidently use the laundry soap or the dish soap or the stain remover, and feel safe knowing you won’t be leaving any mess behind for future generations. Compared to other green cleaning products out there, these are extremely effective and they are as green as or greener than others.
Q: Are these the only products of their kind on the market today?
If you compare the Azure Market product line with other green cleaning products out there, we are the only ones that have this broad array of highly engineered products that don’t have SLS and SLES. And we are the only ones that are high-performing, safe and sustainable.
Q: What makes the Azure Market line of products unique from other similar cleaning products on the market?
This line of cleaning products are the most congruent to Azure’s core values of any product out there.
Because protecting the environment is essential to Azure, we carry the burden — worrying about sustainability, worrying about safety and worrying about product performance. And because we’re worrying about it, customers don’t have to.
If you grow your own food, that’s the closest you can get to that food source. But if you can’t grow your own food, you do the next best thing — you go to Azure. Now you can feel as comfortable cleaning your house with Azure products as you do feeding your family. That’s the beauty, and the mission, of these 12 green cleaning products. They are worthy of the Azure name.