What Does “Non-Toxic” Dish Soap Really Mean?

What I look for before bringing it into my home

Switching to cleaner products was never about making everything in my life perfect. It started with the things my family uses every single day, and one question: do we really need all of these ingredients?

Dish soap is one of those things. We use it on our plates, glasses, silverware, pots and pans, everything our food touches. And for years I never gave a second thought to what was in the bottle sitting next to my sink. It cleaned the dishes. That was about as far as I got.

Then I started reading labels, and I couldn't really stop.

"Non-toxic" can mean a lot of things

The words on the front of a bottle don't tell you much about what's inside it.

Plant-based. Clean. Green. Made with naturally derived ingredients. They all sound good. I still turn the bottle around.

That's a big part of why LakeHouse Naturals exists.

Standing in an aisle Googling an ingredient list on your phone is a miserable way to buy dish soap, and I didn't want anyone to have to do it.

What I avoid

When I'm looking at a dish soap, or really any cleaning product, I want something that works without a long list of ingredients I'd rather not have in my house.

At LakeHouse Naturals, we avoid synthetic fragrance, phthalates, parabens, phosphates, SLS/SLES, EDTA and PEGs.

Fragrance is the one I feel strongest about

I love a house that smells good. I've just never been convinced we need synthetic fragrance to get there. Our scents come from essential oils and naturally derived aromatic ingredients instead.

I want the products to smell beautiful. I also want to feel good about what I'm pouring and spraying around my family all day long.

But does it actually clean?

This is the part people ask about, and they're right to.

A "clean" dish soap is no good to me if I have to use three times as much of it to get through a sink of dishes. It has to cut grease, and it has to be something you'll actually reach for again tomorrow night.

So I'm particular about the formulas that get the LakeHouse Naturals name on them. I don't think you should have to pick between ingredients you feel good about and a product that works.

I also want it to look good sitting there

Choosing cleaner products shouldn't mean giving up how you want your home to look.

Hand soap, dish soap, cleaning spray, these are the things that live out on the counter. They never get put away. So I wanted ours to feel as considered as the rest of your kitchen, and pretty enough that you're happy to leave it out by the sink.

What's inside the bottle matters most to me. But I do love that a product can be both.

Why I started LakeHouse Naturals

I'm a mom and a grandma, and over the years I've become much more aware of how many products we go through in a day. Kitchen, laundry room, shower, on our skin, all over the house.

I wanted a place where the ingredient checking was already done.

Not because I'm trying to scare anybody about what's under their sink. I just think that when there's a simpler option that works well, I'd rather use it.

That's what I'm building. Beautiful, effective products with ingredients you can feel good about bringing home, right down to the soap sitting next to your kitchen sink.

— Jennifer

LakeHouse Naturals

Home • Bath • Beauty