I don't believe this for a minute. Have you ever tried to get a grease stain out of a garment with just water? Detergent gets the stain out. In fact, Dawn dishwashing liquid gets those grease stains out very easily. Water only..... no worky.

I really appreciate your wonderful sense of humor. Keep it up! :)

I suspect that what you read was that SOME laundry detergents, especially the supposedly earth friendly ones, are not much better at cleaning than washing with no detergent. I’ve read detailed ratings in Consumer Reports for years, and it comments on which detergents are good at which stains. Some are excellent. Some are great at most but less good at others. Some pretty much don’t work. Target (only) sells liquid Tide ULTRA Stain Release in an UNSCENTED version. It is highly rated. It’s in a white plastic container, not the usual orange. I also like the house brand unscented dryer sheets sold at WalMart. By the way, Consumer Reports says the laundry detergent sheets will clean, but not as well as liquid detergent.

The pods are easy to use too and I feel the clothes are really clean. I have hand washed a cloth that hubby uses to clean the car. Some of the "black" does not come out of the cloth even with my scrubbing by hand using Tide liquid. Put the cloth in my front loader washer and the rest of that black comes out. Those Costco Kirkland laundry pods work great!

I found the same thing. I tried the washing machine sheets and found they did not remove stains as well as the liquid or pods.

Dirt is highly attractive to fabrics and sticks to them. Dirt is slightly attracted to water, so it will stay stuck on the fabric. Eventually water can get most of it off, given enough time and mechanical pounding.

A soap molecule cleans because one end is highly attractive to water, the other end is highly attractive to dirt. Very strong chemical bonds. The water just grabs the soap molecule and the dirt comes stuck to it. Agitation mixes the water, soap, and clothing to allow the soap to contact all the dirt. Agitation itself does not mechanically remove the dirt stuck to the fabric.

Now, that's funny.

Yep, sports are fun. Three in different sports all year round. And don’t let people tell you girls are cleaner. We had 2 volleyballers and the sweat and grime from playing in all day tournaments was, let’s say stifling.

I switched back to powder detergent. Tide is my favorite. Now my clothes are really clean like they used to be, especially white sox! I'll never go back to liquid unless they stop making powder.

"Tide" laundry detergent is the best there is. Aldi sells it under their "Tandil" label for less $$.

Laundry detergent
 

I have using Earth Breeze since moving to TV and have no complaints. The detergent sheets work well for me and the company seems to be environmentally friendly and donates to organizations in need.

We have been using Nellie's Laundry Soda for years. Works great, saves money, good for the environment.

Understand completely! Car ride home after a tournie weekend is almost as bad as picking them up after a week at summer camp!

Even with liquid I used Shout on stains. I like the sheets because they are easier to transport and leave space for other things in the laundry area.

Tandil is NOT Tide.