Designing sustainable ultra-concentrated and tablet product formats for household care applications

Many household cleaning brands are introducing low water, ultra-concentrated product formats such as tablets, powders, capsules and liquid concentrates. Interest in these low water formulations is driven by both their sustainability and convenience benefits over traditional ready-to-use dilute liquid products. Although these formats provide valuable benefits due to their lower volume, reduced packaging and ease of handling, they also can pose significant challenges to formulators. For ultra-concentrated liquids, the primary formulation challenge is keeping all components compatible so that the product will still be flowable, visually appealing, and functional. For powder and tablet formats, a key challenge is formulating a solid, effective cleaning product when many cleaning ingredients are either inherently liquid or supplied as solutions in water. For both liquids and solids, rapid and complete dissolution is also a key feature, whether diluted into a reusable bottle or bucket, or directly into a machine. We will present a range of bio-based, low water ingredients that enable the formulation of ultra-concentrated products that maintain high performance. These ingredients include bio-based surfactants, performance enhancers, tabletting aids and probiotics. Methods for incorporating these ingredients will be covered, including specific formulation examples for both liquid and solid formats. Application areas for these product formats include all-purpose, kitchen and bath cleaners as well as laundry and dishwash detergents. The ingredients presented enable formulators to create high performance and sustainable alternatives to traditional dilute ready-to-use products.