At Soap & Glory, we sell an awful lot of Shower Gel.
So when – in a ‘Greening’ meeting last year – A Sustainability Specialist told us that the big problem we’d all be facing in the not too distant future was water shortage, it hit home that we should try to get people thinking about showering responsibly.
So we got out a stopwatch, and worked out that you only need about one hundred and twenty seconds of running water to get washed, shampooed, conditioned and rinsed. Then we gave the concept a catchy name -
Code name: the 2-minute rinse.
And while a good number of Soap & Glory loyal has been ‘rinsing’ religiously since we first introduced the idea last September, we thought it was time to officially open it up to everybody.
You can do it too. All you need is 2 minutes.
Here’s an easy ‘technique’ from Alex, our in-house 2-minute rinse expert. She does it like this:
1) 40 seconds of running water to warm up and get ‘All over watered’. Then turn off the tap.
2 )Scrub on a handful of shampoo, then your shower gel. Rinse for 40 seconds. Tap off again!
3) Massage on your hair conditioner (If you use it). Scrub your feet with a brush.
4) Rinse for 40 seconds. Tap off.
5) You’ve done it!
Join our Facebook Page where from early June we’re going to log a running tally of completed 2-minute rinses, and get yourself, your friends and family showering shorter, and saving water.
To win a fab 2 minute timer please comment with a time saving tip. For an extra entry please like Soap and Glory on Facebook and leave an additional comment below.
We have 5 to giveaway. All winners will be picked randomly on 30th July and winners announced shortly after.
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Oh! I know this competition finished yesterday but seeing as you have 5 prizes I thought I should still enter! My time saving tip is to do the housework twice as fast - it’s the equivalent of a workout and saves you half the time!
My time saving tip is to only fill the kettle with the water you need! Tea in a flash!
Saving time especially when you have children vying for your attention is a real benefit. Save time at tea time by batch cooking child-size portions of food in plastic or foil containers, that way you can just take a portion out of the freezer in the morning, let it defrost and by tea time you’ve got something you can throw in the oven or microwave.
Mornings are stressful and if you can save time by making sandwiches and packing up lunchboxes the evening before - that way you’re not rushing breakfast, trying to make lunch and get your little one off to nursery or school!
When it comes to washing, I always use my separated washing hamper so washing can go straight into the washing machine without having to sort light and dark washing just before I wash it.
And I’m all for a quick shower, we live in a water metered property and quick showers are economical and environmentally friendly too. 2 minutes sounds just about perfect!
I’m all for saving water! I turn the tap off when I brush my teeth and it drives me crazy when people don’t. Here are a few of my favourite time tips anyway:
When I load the cutlery holder in the dishwasher I put spoons in one partition, knives in another, etc. It takes no more effort to load really, but this way when you unload you don’t need to sort them – you can just grab them all at once to put them in the right bit of your cutlery drawer. (I now have my parents and even in-laws doing this, which is no mean feat and shows it’s a worthwhile tip!)
If you have a V+, Sky+ or other TV recorder box, then use it instead of watching things when they are broadcast. This way, you will probably watch higher quality but less TV, you can watch things when it suits you and you can fast forward through any adverts/ boring bits which will save you around 15 mins on an hour long programme. You’ll also save money by recording films and watching them rather than hiring or downloading a DVD.
The best one for me though is probably turning off email alerts at work. I no longer have a constant stream of interruptions and can get a lot more done – I just check it once an hour or so. Try it! If people expect you to respond immediately, just put an out of office message on saying you have limited access to emails and to call you if urgent.
This is really helpful - I’m going to start trying to cut down my shower time to just a few minutes. Annoyingly, I can’t switch off in between, because the water coming through the electric shower takes 2-3 minutes to heat up to a bearable temperature each time. But at present, I can easily wallow for 10-15 minutes, especially if shaving my legs! I reckon, though, that if I shave my legs afterwards using a small sink full of water, and practice the techniques above in the shower, I should be able to get down to 4 or 5 mins.