10 ms·

Here's another solution. Next time you run out, buy two bags of dishwasher soap. Then when one bag is done.... wait for it... USE THE SECOND BAG! All that's le

Here's another solution. Next time you run out, buy two bags of dishwasher soap. Then when one bag is done.... wait for it... USE THE SECOND BAG! All that's left is to put one bag of soap on your shopping list and you have 5 to 20 days to manage to buy it before you're back in fish soap and baking powder hell.

cryptoz 6y ago
That trick only works if you have lots of money. And lots of space. Do you apply it to other things too, like garbage bags? Or olive oil? What about hand soap? All of a sudden you're spending 2x normal for a while. Not a lot of people can do that.
- tsm 6y ago
  > All of a sudden you're spending 2x normal for a while. Not a lot of people can do that. Then stagger it—an extra box of dishwasher tablets this paycheck, an extra box of garbage bags next paycheck. Overall consumption doesn't double. The space concerns are very real though and probably harder to solve…that's my bottleneck
  - davidivadavid 6y ago
    Yes, that's the reason why shopping at Costco isn't the solution to everything. I don't want to store 300 toilet paper rolls.
    - rootusrootus 6y ago
      Also, Costco isn't always automatically the best price per unit anyway. Especially for staple items, I find that Fred Meyer (Kroger) is frequently less expensive on a per-unit basis for really common household items. It's deeply ingrained that buying in bulk must be cheaper, but pricing in grocery stores isn't always that intuitive.
      - codetrotter 6y ago
        Don’t know how it is in America but here in Norway, stores are required to list per-unit price on the shelf for all articles. Makes it quite simple to compare stuff. So for example milk has the price for a carton on the shelf along with the price per liter, toilet paper has the price for a pack along with the price per meter, detergent has the price for a box along with the price for the portion required for running one machine, etc etc. This makes it trivial to spot cases where the bigger bag is actually more expensive per-unit when you’re at the store. I guess to compare between different stores you’d still need to make note of the per-unit prices that are listed but still it is helpful even if you went as far as that. I usually buy everything I need at the store closest to my home because they are very competitive on average even if one or two items might be cheaper downtown.
        rootusrootus 6y ago
        I am not certain what the law is, but stores here in the U.S. routinely list the per-unit price on the shelf tag. Costco certainly does, Kroger does, but I don't know if all stores must. I wouldn't be surprised. I don't often look at per-unit when going between stores, I more often use it to gauge the value of upsizing at the same store, or comparing to other brands of the same product that are on the shelf nearby.
      - glxxyz 6y ago
        Costco shoppers know that they don't always get the 'best' price, but it's a good enough price and it's likely to be good quality, so it takes the hassle out of the shopping and decision making process.
- hangonhn 6y ago
  That's a fair point but if you can afford two, buying twice the amount is actually cheaper since you can buy it at Costco, etc. I do have two rolls of garbage bags, etc. but I also recognize it's not doable by everyone. GP's tone is a bit off putting even if it is a valid suggestion for some people.
- colonwqbang 6y ago
  Ah, the garbage bag. This elusive luxury item which throughout history has been reserved only for people who have lots of money.
  - cryptoz 6y ago
    I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic or not. But yes, waste disposal has been done much better for the rich historically than the poor. I listed garbage bags specifically because I've noticed recently that the "good" ones (like, large, or strong) are actually quite pricey and often only are available in large quantities (40 count or something). So the price to buy trash bags might be like $20 or something. Buy 2 at once? $40 on garbage bags while grocery shopping? I mean that's a lot, no? To get the good version of something, twice? Not exactly an item for the poor to double-up on. And suggest the poor buy the less good trash bags that are cheaper? Well then we have shown that garbage bags can indeed be a luxury item even today.
    - Johnny555 6y ago
      If $40 to buy two is a lot of money, then $20 to buy one is also a lot of money (since, after all, it's the same price per unit), are you sure you can afford to spend 50 cents/bag for garbage bags? We buy the big store brand box ($15 - $20 for 200). The box is a bit too big to put under the sink, so we put half in another smaller container under the sink. When we refill that container and the box is empty, then it's time to buy more.
    - colonwqbang 6y ago
      You do realise that your consumption of garbage bags does not double because you buy two rolls at a time. If you are wealthy enough to save up for a one-time investment of 1 roll of garbage bags, you are able to implement the scheme suggested by the original poster.
      - cryptoz 6y ago
        Yes I realize that consumption does not double simply because you buy double. I am not commenting on garbage bags (the topic is detergent); I am commenting on the strategy being used for more than 1 thing. If you use this strategy for 1 item, okay, I get it, the expense is fine. But if the trick is used for other things (as seems logical) then the initial expense of starting to do this could be large.
- davchana 6y ago
  Its not twice always, its just twice once. Its like getting ahead of the usage schedule. When you start, buy one. You assume its good for 20 days. Buy next one on Day 10. Voila, you have the backup now. Now buy next ones, one at a time on 30th, 50th, 70th day. You are 10 days ahead of usage, you always have at least 10 days of runway ahead of you. Yes, I do it for Grocery, Ice cream, Watet, Olive, Garbage Bags, Dryer Sheets & anything I use regularly. The ones in use are required in their place. The spare ones can be stuffed at upper shelves, under the sink, under bed or such. I have seen second toilet roll in many offices & homes, almost every car has a spare tyre, & many other things.
  - PostPlummer 6y ago
    With a little planning like described it gets even better since you can buy stuff when it's on offer, which is never when you suddenly need it.
- loco5niner 6y ago
  I figure I'm buying my time back with very little upfront cost. That also leaves more energy to do things like... earn more money/manage my space better.
- fortran77 6y ago
  Many poor people don't even have dishwashers! Perhaps this whole topic we should refrain from discussing.
  - newforms 6y ago
    Or take it to the other extreme - buy two dishwashers A and B and use A for dirty items whilst using B as storage for clean items. When the dirty one A is full, run it and put dirty items in the formerly clean washer B. This way you save on cupboard space which can be used to store faberge eggs instead.
    - fortran77 6y ago
      Yes!
    - 082349872349872 6y ago
      At which point the frumer-than-thou will need four dishwashers... After the eggs, don't forget space for wind-up travelling salt servers. (We actually have one of the latter. Not as fancy as the ones in the Hermitage by a long shot, but then again, we're intending to come to a better end than the Romanovs, so we're certainly not going to just cargo cult their flexes.) As far as I can tell, this HRE example is so posh a salt cellar that it's even useless for actually holding salt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_Galleon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_Galleon
    - war1025 6y ago
      My father in law had a running gag about wanting to do this for a couple years. Replace all the cabinets with dishwashers and just cycle between them.
- ekianjo 6y ago
  > That trick only works if you have lots of money. And lots of space. No, detergent is cheap nowadays, and detergents are way more compact now (thanks chemistry) than they were 50 years ago. So space should hardly be an issue.
sct202 6y ago
It's also not a surprise when cleaning supplies run out, they're used at a fairly steady rate; like you have weeks of notice if you see the bottle/box is running low.
- Swizec 6y ago
  Yeah resource management is really not that difficult for this kinda stuff. 1. Do dishes 2. Oh there’s fewer than 7 tabs left 3. Buy new pack on your next weekly trip to get groceries You can eyeball the number 7 and you even get a daily reminder.
  - Johnny555 6y ago
    The problem is the gap between 2 and 3 -- unless you keep a list (and follow it when you're at the store), you may still run out. Online shopping has helped me with this -- I usually add it to my online cart as soon as I'm running low. I think this is the problem the Amazon Dash buttons were supposed to solve -- keep a Dash button in the cabinet with the dish detergent, and when you see that you're running low, hit the button to order a new one.
    - jeffrallen 6y ago
      Kitchen chalkboard + mobile phone camera. Bonus points if your wife sends you the picture of the shopping list with a cute emoji. Adulting: it's not that hard, but it's not kid stuff either.
      - Johnny555 6y ago
        Yeah, there are lots of ways to do grocery reminders, I'm just pointing out that when the OP said "resource management for this is easy", he omitted the hard part. "Buy more when you're low" is the easy part, the hard part is how do you go from "I need more" actually buying more.
      - kalleboo 6y ago
        Yeah this is the solution my family has restored to, after trying all kinds of grocery list apps etc.
ascorbic 6y ago
Well done for never running out of any household item
evil-olive 6y ago
A related strategy - always keep a spare of crucial household items like this (dishwasher soap, toothpaste, etc). Don't buy a new one when you run out entirely, buy a new one when you use up your primary and switch to the backup. eg, I'm about to "run out" of toothpaste, in that the tube on my bathroom counter is almost empty. I have a full tube sitting in one of my bathroom drawers. When I pull that one out, I add toothpaste to my shopping list, and the new tube goes into the drawer as the new backup.
- aethertap 6y ago
  Another related strategy: Pay an extra month on any recurring bills at the start (for services that allow you to maintain a credit balance). Then, just pay your bills as normal, except that you have an automatic one month of grace period for everything because you have a credit balance. This has saved me numerous times because of absentmindedness.
  - gruez 6y ago
    >This has saved me numerous times because of absentmindedness. Aren't you costing yourself tens of dollars per year in lost interest by doing this? You're essentially giving them an interest free loan. A calendar/reminder app doesn't have this problem and is more reliable (on the off chance you forgot twice in a row, for instance).
    - _jal 6y ago
      I used to do this until I became competent with that sort of thing. If you're the sort of person for whom this is a bandaid, a calendar won't fix it, and you're also not the sort of person who cares about $15/year. Hell, I haven't missed a bill in well over a decade, and I don't care about $15/year.
    - xwdv 6y ago
      Only worry about lost interest after you have maxed out all your investment and are holding no cash. Once you run out of cash to invest, then you can tap into these reserves. Most people though keep cash on hand anyway, accruing no interest.
renewiltord 6y ago
Literally addressed in the article...
GloriousKoji 6y ago
This technique worked fine for me for decades, until semi recently.
ekianjo 6y ago
Another solution is to stock up on such commodities - most people have enough space to store toilet paper, detergents and the like since you are anyway going to use them sooner or later. You might as well stock them up, just in case, as you never stop needing them.
- rootusrootus 6y ago
  As a bonus, when the next pandemic hits and everyone is panicking for a roll of toilet paper, you can rest easy knowing you have enough for a year or more. Thank you Costco.
  - ekianjo 6y ago
    > As a bonus, when the next pandemic hits and everyone is panicking for a roll of toilet paper, you can rest easy knowing you have enough for a year or more. And make money on Ebay :)
nate 6y ago
> I buy like 4 or 5 packages at a time, just to make sure we don't run out. It sounds like that's how they normally solve this too. But this pandemic has messed with a lot of our supply chains. Things we counted on being there on the next visit or order just aren't there. Automatic Amazon orders that we've been auto piloting for years and years aren't so automatic anymore. So any hack around not having something is still something I think most of us should keep in a back pocket ;) Even for the most prepared of us.
- groby_b 6y ago
  Don't let amazon drive your supply chain. Figure out what you need to operate for 120 days. Buy whenever you're below 90 days.
  - boomboomsubban 6y ago
    Then make zero mistakes in your planning, and have no accidents or unseen needs. Sounds easy for a family.
    - nitrogen 6y ago
      The 90 days is a buffer to handle mistakes, accidents, and unseen needs.
    - groby_b 6y ago
      As nitrogen pointed out, that's what the buffer is for. You're right, you can't individually run a just-in-time supply system for your family. (Well, you could, but it meant a lot of grocery runs every week ;) What I'm saying is that you do not want just-in-time. Neither by yourself, nor by people who are really good at it. Systems are resilient by having built-in slack. Remove the slack, you've optimized the well-lit path. And become much more susceptible to failures. Ask people in the Northeast who just had a week of power loss how redundancy helped them. The ones who have a backup power source will nod vigorously. Ask midwesterners how they prepare for winter (especially in rural areas). Having that buffer is helpful. It doesn't need to be 90 days, that's my personal threshold. And yes, it's easy. "Hey, I need X" -> "Go get it from storage, and put it on the list". It'll take a while to flush out unseen needs, but the same is true for a standing Amazon order. I'm not saying drop ordering/shopping on demand right now - just order a decent supply next time you order, instead of one pack. And sure, you can keep Amazon as your supplier, but we've just proven out that they're a single point of failure. (Remember ordering in April/May and getting delivery dates for August?). Having local alternatives is valuable. Support them even if they aren't immediately necessary.
taftster 6y ago
Do you Kanban? Because that's exactly how kanban works. The signal to purchase is the empty bag/box of detergent.

cryptoz 6y ago

That trick only works if you have lots of money. And lots of space. Do you apply it to other things too, like garbage bags? Or olive oil? What about hand soap? All of a sudden you're spending 2x normal for a while. Not a lot of people can do that.

tsm 6y ago
> All of a sudden you're spending 2x normal for a while. Not a lot of people can do that. Then stagger it—an extra box of dishwasher tablets this paycheck, an extra box of garbage bags next paycheck. Overall consumption doesn't double. The space concerns are very real though and probably harder to solve…that's my bottleneck
- davidivadavid 6y ago
  Yes, that's the reason why shopping at Costco isn't the solution to everything. I don't want to store 300 toilet paper rolls.
  - rootusrootus 6y ago
    Also, Costco isn't always automatically the best price per unit anyway. Especially for staple items, I find that Fred Meyer (Kroger) is frequently less expensive on a per-unit basis for really common household items. It's deeply ingrained that buying in bulk must be cheaper, but pricing in grocery stores isn't always that intuitive.
    - codetrotter 6y ago
      Don’t know how it is in America but here in Norway, stores are required to list per-unit price on the shelf for all articles. Makes it quite simple to compare stuff. So for example milk has the price for a carton on the shelf along with the price per liter, toilet paper has the price for a pack along with the price per meter, detergent has the price for a box along with the price for the portion required for running one machine, etc etc. This makes it trivial to spot cases where the bigger bag is actually more expensive per-unit when you’re at the store. I guess to compare between different stores you’d still need to make note of the per-unit prices that are listed but still it is helpful even if you went as far as that. I usually buy everything I need at the store closest to my home because they are very competitive on average even if one or two items might be cheaper downtown.
      - rootusrootus 6y ago
        I am not certain what the law is, but stores here in the U.S. routinely list the per-unit price on the shelf tag. Costco certainly does, Kroger does, but I don't know if all stores must. I wouldn't be surprised. I don't often look at per-unit when going between stores, I more often use it to gauge the value of upsizing at the same store, or comparing to other brands of the same product that are on the shelf nearby.
    - glxxyz 6y ago
      Costco shoppers know that they don't always get the 'best' price, but it's a good enough price and it's likely to be good quality, so it takes the hassle out of the shopping and decision making process.
hangonhn 6y ago
That's a fair point but if you can afford two, buying twice the amount is actually cheaper since you can buy it at Costco, etc. I do have two rolls of garbage bags, etc. but I also recognize it's not doable by everyone. GP's tone is a bit off putting even if it is a valid suggestion for some people.
colonwqbang 6y ago
Ah, the garbage bag. This elusive luxury item which throughout history has been reserved only for people who have lots of money.
- cryptoz 6y ago
  I'm not sure if you're being sarcastic or not. But yes, waste disposal has been done much better for the rich historically than the poor. I listed garbage bags specifically because I've noticed recently that the "good" ones (like, large, or strong) are actually quite pricey and often only are available in large quantities (40 count or something). So the price to buy trash bags might be like $20 or something. Buy 2 at once? $40 on garbage bags while grocery shopping? I mean that's a lot, no? To get the good version of something, twice? Not exactly an item for the poor to double-up on. And suggest the poor buy the less good trash bags that are cheaper? Well then we have shown that garbage bags can indeed be a luxury item even today.
  - Johnny555 6y ago
    If $40 to buy two is a lot of money, then $20 to buy one is also a lot of money (since, after all, it's the same price per unit), are you sure you can afford to spend 50 cents/bag for garbage bags? We buy the big store brand box ($15 - $20 for 200). The box is a bit too big to put under the sink, so we put half in another smaller container under the sink. When we refill that container and the box is empty, then it's time to buy more.
  - colonwqbang 6y ago
    You do realise that your consumption of garbage bags does not double because you buy two rolls at a time. If you are wealthy enough to save up for a one-time investment of 1 roll of garbage bags, you are able to implement the scheme suggested by the original poster.
    - cryptoz 6y ago
      Yes I realize that consumption does not double simply because you buy double. I am not commenting on garbage bags (the topic is detergent); I am commenting on the strategy being used for more than 1 thing. If you use this strategy for 1 item, okay, I get it, the expense is fine. But if the trick is used for other things (as seems logical) then the initial expense of starting to do this could be large.
davchana 6y ago
Its not twice always, its just twice once. Its like getting ahead of the usage schedule. When you start, buy one. You assume its good for 20 days. Buy next one on Day 10. Voila, you have the backup now. Now buy next ones, one at a time on 30th, 50th, 70th day. You are 10 days ahead of usage, you always have at least 10 days of runway ahead of you. Yes, I do it for Grocery, Ice cream, Watet, Olive, Garbage Bags, Dryer Sheets & anything I use regularly. The ones in use are required in their place. The spare ones can be stuffed at upper shelves, under the sink, under bed or such. I have seen second toilet roll in many offices & homes, almost every car has a spare tyre, & many other things.
- PostPlummer 6y ago
  With a little planning like described it gets even better since you can buy stuff when it's on offer, which is never when you suddenly need it.
loco5niner 6y ago
I figure I'm buying my time back with very little upfront cost. That also leaves more energy to do things like... earn more money/manage my space better.
fortran77 6y ago
Many poor people don't even have dishwashers! Perhaps this whole topic we should refrain from discussing.
- newforms 6y ago
  Or take it to the other extreme - buy two dishwashers A and B and use A for dirty items whilst using B as storage for clean items. When the dirty one A is full, run it and put dirty items in the formerly clean washer B. This way you save on cupboard space which can be used to store faberge eggs instead.
  - fortran77 6y ago
    Yes!
  - 082349872349872 6y ago
    At which point the frumer-than-thou will need four dishwashers... After the eggs, don't forget space for wind-up travelling salt servers. (We actually have one of the latter. Not as fancy as the ones in the Hermitage by a long shot, but then again, we're intending to come to a better end than the Romanovs, so we're certainly not going to just cargo cult their flexes.) As far as I can tell, this HRE example is so posh a salt cellar that it's even useless for actually holding salt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_Galleon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_Galleon
  - war1025 6y ago
    My father in law had a running gag about wanting to do this for a couple years. Replace all the cabinets with dishwashers and just cycle between them.
ekianjo 6y ago
> That trick only works if you have lots of money. And lots of space. No, detergent is cheap nowadays, and detergents are way more compact now (thanks chemistry) than they were 50 years ago. So space should hardly be an issue.

sct202 6y ago

It's also not a surprise when cleaning supplies run out, they're used at a fairly steady rate; like you have weeks of notice if you see the bottle/box is running low.

Swizec 6y ago
Yeah resource management is really not that difficult for this kinda stuff. 1. Do dishes 2. Oh there’s fewer than 7 tabs left 3. Buy new pack on your next weekly trip to get groceries You can eyeball the number 7 and you even get a daily reminder.
- Johnny555 6y ago
  The problem is the gap between 2 and 3 -- unless you keep a list (and follow it when you're at the store), you may still run out. Online shopping has helped me with this -- I usually add it to my online cart as soon as I'm running low. I think this is the problem the Amazon Dash buttons were supposed to solve -- keep a Dash button in the cabinet with the dish detergent, and when you see that you're running low, hit the button to order a new one.
  - jeffrallen 6y ago
    Kitchen chalkboard + mobile phone camera. Bonus points if your wife sends you the picture of the shopping list with a cute emoji. Adulting: it's not that hard, but it's not kid stuff either.
    - Johnny555 6y ago
      Yeah, there are lots of ways to do grocery reminders, I'm just pointing out that when the OP said "resource management for this is easy", he omitted the hard part. "Buy more when you're low" is the easy part, the hard part is how do you go from "I need more" actually buying more.
    - kalleboo 6y ago
      Yeah this is the solution my family has restored to, after trying all kinds of grocery list apps etc.

ascorbic 6y ago

Well done for never running out of any household item

evil-olive 6y ago

A related strategy - always keep a spare of crucial household items like this (dishwasher soap, toothpaste, etc). Don't buy a new one when you run out entirely, buy a new one when you use up your primary and switch to the backup. eg, I'm about to "run out" of toothpaste, in that the tube on my bathroom counter is almost empty. I have a full tube sitting in one of my bathroom drawers. When I pull that one out, I add toothpaste to my shopping list, and the new tube goes into the drawer as the new backup.

aethertap 6y ago
Another related strategy: Pay an extra month on any recurring bills at the start (for services that allow you to maintain a credit balance). Then, just pay your bills as normal, except that you have an automatic one month of grace period for everything because you have a credit balance. This has saved me numerous times because of absentmindedness.
- gruez 6y ago
  >This has saved me numerous times because of absentmindedness. Aren't you costing yourself tens of dollars per year in lost interest by doing this? You're essentially giving them an interest free loan. A calendar/reminder app doesn't have this problem and is more reliable (on the off chance you forgot twice in a row, for instance).
  - _jal 6y ago
    I used to do this until I became competent with that sort of thing. If you're the sort of person for whom this is a bandaid, a calendar won't fix it, and you're also not the sort of person who cares about $15/year. Hell, I haven't missed a bill in well over a decade, and I don't care about $15/year.
  - xwdv 6y ago
    Only worry about lost interest after you have maxed out all your investment and are holding no cash. Once you run out of cash to invest, then you can tap into these reserves. Most people though keep cash on hand anyway, accruing no interest.

renewiltord 6y ago

Literally addressed in the article...

GloriousKoji 6y ago

This technique worked fine for me for decades, until semi recently.

ekianjo 6y ago

Another solution is to stock up on such commodities - most people have enough space to store toilet paper, detergents and the like since you are anyway going to use them sooner or later. You might as well stock them up, just in case, as you never stop needing them.

rootusrootus 6y ago
As a bonus, when the next pandemic hits and everyone is panicking for a roll of toilet paper, you can rest easy knowing you have enough for a year or more. Thank you Costco.
- ekianjo 6y ago
  > As a bonus, when the next pandemic hits and everyone is panicking for a roll of toilet paper, you can rest easy knowing you have enough for a year or more. And make money on Ebay :)

nate 6y ago

> I buy like 4 or 5 packages at a time, just to make sure we don't run out. It sounds like that's how they normally solve this too. But this pandemic has messed with a lot of our supply chains. Things we counted on being there on the next visit or order just aren't there. Automatic Amazon orders that we've been auto piloting for years and years aren't so automatic anymore. So any hack around not having something is still something I think most of us should keep in a back pocket ;) Even for the most prepared of us.

groby_b 6y ago
Don't let amazon drive your supply chain. Figure out what you need to operate for 120 days. Buy whenever you're below 90 days.
- boomboomsubban 6y ago
  Then make zero mistakes in your planning, and have no accidents or unseen needs. Sounds easy for a family.
  - nitrogen 6y ago
    The 90 days is a buffer to handle mistakes, accidents, and unseen needs.
  - groby_b 6y ago
    As nitrogen pointed out, that's what the buffer is for. You're right, you can't individually run a just-in-time supply system for your family. (Well, you could, but it meant a lot of grocery runs every week ;) What I'm saying is that you do not want just-in-time. Neither by yourself, nor by people who are really good at it. Systems are resilient by having built-in slack. Remove the slack, you've optimized the well-lit path. And become much more susceptible to failures. Ask people in the Northeast who just had a week of power loss how redundancy helped them. The ones who have a backup power source will nod vigorously. Ask midwesterners how they prepare for winter (especially in rural areas). Having that buffer is helpful. It doesn't need to be 90 days, that's my personal threshold. And yes, it's easy. "Hey, I need X" -> "Go get it from storage, and put it on the list". It'll take a while to flush out unseen needs, but the same is true for a standing Amazon order. I'm not saying drop ordering/shopping on demand right now - just order a decent supply next time you order, instead of one pack. And sure, you can keep Amazon as your supplier, but we've just proven out that they're a single point of failure. (Remember ordering in April/May and getting delivery dates for August?). Having local alternatives is valuable. Support them even if they aren't immediately necessary.

taftster 6y ago

Do you Kanban? Because that's exactly how kanban works. The signal to purchase is the empty bag/box of detergent.