We currently live in a complex global environment, facing economic challenges such as inflation and environmental crisis, predominantly the urgent need to address climate change. As such, the detergent industry faces balancing the performance, cost, and environmental footprint of its products, meaning that today’s formulations are undergoing a substantial transformation.  

To manage this balance act, chassis simplification and formulation compaction have become industry standards. Both trends support reduced resource consumption in the detergent itself and of the packaging, resulting in a reduced detergent footprint, while providing the consumer more convenient use of detergents. In parallel consumers are adopting more sustainable washing behavior, including lower temperature cycles, shorter wash durations, and in-between washing to extend garment life. 

These developments present formulators with significant technical hurdles. The reduction of the active ingredients level has become essential for decreasing the product carbon footprint (PCF) of a detergent and controlling the cost. Surfactants significantly contribute to a detergent’s environmental impact, due to their high concentration level, but also additives which don’t contribute to a detergents performance, but are needed to improve their appearance or other properties, enable significant saving potentials. 

This means that remaining ingredients must deliver multiple functions and a higher weight efficiency. Ensuring the compatibility of those often is a major challenge, especially with concentrated detergents. The elimination of non-sustainable additives without cleaning function such as non-biodegradable rheology modifiers is another key challenge, driven by increasing regulatory pressure and growing consumer awareness of the environmental impact of their products.