Ingredient Analysis: Melaleuca All-Purpose Cleaner

Melaleuca is often hailed as a non-toxic alternative for a wide range of products. It's frequently referred to at the "wellness store" or "wellness boxes."

However, the company is also often accused of "greenwashing" – or "cleanwashing" as I prefer to call it.

The truth is always found in the ingredients, so let's take a look at the ingredient label of one Melaleuca product – their household cleaner, the Tough & Tender 12x All-Purpose Cleaner.

A Note on Labeling Methods

I have a love-hate relationship with the labels of Melaleuca products. I love when companies say what an ingredient does or its purpose, but I prefer that they list the ingredient first and then put the purpose in parentheses behind it – "ingredient (purpose)." Melaleuca does it the other way – "purpose (ingredient)" – and it feels a little misleading when there are multiple ingredients listed under a single purpose. I'm not sure whether the ingredients are still listed in order of how much of each one is in the product, or if they're just grouped together by purpose.

Ingredient Analysis

Normally, I don't necessarily analyze every ingredient in a product in order to make a decision on whether I would use it, but since there aren't many ingredients in this one, I will list every one.

To help you visualize, I will mark each ingredient:

Red – A toxic ingredient that automatically disqualifies the product for my consideration
Orange – An ingredient that isn't great but might be a cleaner alternative to something even more toxic
Yellow – A more neutral ingredient OR one that could be either good or bad, depending on its sourcing
Green – An ingredient that is natural, beneficial, or has no known effects (like water)

Plant-Derived Cleaners (C12-16 alketh-7, C12-16 alketh-9)

These function as surfactants and emulsifiers, which reduce the surface tension of water and help it combine with oils, allowing the cleaner to lift d

irt and grease away from the surface.

In this case, both of these ingredients are also PEGs – or polyethylene glycols. You may have heard of them if you've been in the toxin reduction world for a while. While they "officially" are of low concern for human health, PEGs are made with ethylene oxide, a petroleum derivative that is highly toxic and classified as a carcinogen. It is commonly used to produce other chemicals, such as antifreeze.

PEGs are known to irritate skin and are not easily biodegradable.

I consider these red ingredients.

Sodium Xylene Sulfonate

This ingredient is another surfactant, and according to the label, its purpose is to reduce streaking. The production of sodium xylene sulfonate involves xylene – known to cause neurological and skin irritation – and sulfuric acid – a highly corrosive acid that will burn any human tissue it contacts. The sulfonating process makes it more water soluble, and it's officially considered low risk, but it is known to irritate skin, eyes, and lungs.

I'm calling this ingredient orange because though I don't like how it's made, the finished product doesn't seem overly harmful.

Citric Acid and Sodium Citrate

The one thing you should know about citric acid is it can either come from citrus fruits or, more commonly, it is artificially produced through a fermentation process that uses black mold, and it is possible that residual amounts of the mold can remain in the finished product. If you have any sensitivity or existing mold toxicity, that can create problems.

Since 99% of the world's citric acid is artificial, I tend to assume that is the source, unless a company explicitly states otherwise. However, since I don't know for sure, I will not pass harsh judgment on this ingredient in the list.

Sodium citrate is a product of citric acid, and I don't have any concerns about it beyond my concerns about the black mold in the citric acid.

I'm calling these yellow since I don't know the origin.

Fragrance Containing Essential Oils

This is a prime example of cleanwashed or greenwashed wording on a label.

The term "fragrance" covers more than 3,600 individual ingredients, a large portion of which are toxic. There's no way of knowing which of those ingredients are included in a fragrance blend because it's protected by proprietary laws.

In this case, Melaleuca tries to make this sound better by adding "containing essential oils" at the end. Essential oils are among the 3,600 ingredients that can be used in fragrance blends, but the key word here is "containing." It's like claiming soda is healthy by saying it "contains water." Anything else can be included in the formula. The fragrance blend could be 95% toxins and 5% essential oils, and they could still use this term.

Reputable clean companies don't use the term "fragrance." They list out the individual components, so we can see what's in the product. The attempt at deception just makes me like the use of this term even less.

Fragrance is always a red ingredient to me because it's completely unnecessary.

Methylchloroisothiazolinone and Methylisothiazolinone

Both of these ingredients are preservatives. The first is widely known as a severe skin sensitizer and allergen. It is allowed in rinse-off product but mostly prohibited in leave-on products. If you wash your surfaces with water after using this cleaner, that would rinse it off, but if you're just using this cleaner and then touching or putting food on the surface (which is what I usually do), that isn't rinsed off, and residue of this toxin surely remains.

The second is an antimicrobial biocide, meaning it is toxic to aquatic organisms, so this is something we want to keep out of our water sources. Other concerns are lung toxicity and possible neurotoxicity.

Since this cleaner contains water, some sort of preservative is required, but in my opinion, there are better options than these two.

While the first ingredient could maybe lean more toward orange if the surface is rinsed after use, I still wouldn't choose a product that contains it, and the second is definitely red.

Water

Obviously, not much concern about water in a product, but it does lead to the need for a preservative, as I mentioned above.

I mark water green because it has no real effect on health.

Is Tough & Tender 12x All-Purpose Cleaner Non-Toxic?

I think you can easily see from the amount of re

d on this label that this product is nowhere near non-toxic. It's not even low toxin and is not any better than other cleaners found in stores, except in maybe one point – it doesn't contain artificial dyes while many other cleaners do.

Other than the water, every ingredient in this product is toxic or most likely toxic. You can do far better if you're looking for a non-toxic cleaner.

Do you need help finding good options for household cleaners and other products? You can find some on my list of favorite things.