Odour Neutraliser Spray

Details

Most room fresheners work by putting a smell you like on top of a smell you do not, at a strength that wins the argument, which is why a sprayed bathroom smells like a bathroom and a bouquet at the same time. This one is a neutraliser, and since neutraliser is a word anybody can print, here is the mechanism and the percentages. The two actives are beta-cyclodextrin at 1.2 percent, a ring-shaped glucose oligomer that forms an inclusion complex around small volatile molecules and holds them so they cannot reach your nose, and zinc ricinoleate at 0.5 percent, which binds the sulphur and nitrogen compounds, the thiols and amines that kitchen, shoe and bathroom smells actually consist of. Two actives, both named, both quantified. Now the limits, which matter more than the mechanism. Cyclodextrin traps a molecule it lands on, so this works on fabric and soft furnishing where the mist can reach the odour. It cannot win against a source that is still emitting: if the fish is still in the bin, no spray fixes the room, and any product implying otherwise is selling you a stronger perfume. And the complex needs the fabric to dry to stay held, so on a humid monsoon day some of what was trapped is released again as the fabric takes up moisture.

• Actives named and quantified: beta-cyclodextrin 1.2 percent, zinc ricinoleate 0.5 percent
• Measured pH 5.5 at 27 C, and the preservative pairs to it: sodium benzoate 0.4 percent and potassium sorbate 0.2 percent, which are only effective below about pH 6, so the pH and the preservative are one decision
• Nearly unscented on purpose. There is 0.18 percent essential oil, lemon 0.12 and cedarwood 0.06, enough that the spray does not smell of nothing at all and low enough that the room smells like a room ten minutes later. The declarable allergens are quantified: limonene 0.08 percent and citral under 0.01 percent
• If you actually want a room to smell of something, this is the wrong product and the room mist in this range is the right one
• Not an aerosol. It is a pump spray, so there is no LPG or dimethyl ether propellant, no pressurised steel can to dispose of, and no fine propellant-driven mist to breathe
• No phthalates, no synthetic musk, no formaldehyde donors, no chlorine bleach, no dye, no quats, no MIT or CMIT
• Use it on a sofa, a curtain, a shoe rack, a car interior, a mattress that has been shut up through monsoon, or a kitchen after fish or a heavy tadka. Two to three pumps at the fabric, not at the air, because the air is not where the odour is holding
• Colour fast on upholstery to ISO 105-C06, and still test a hidden seam first, because a hand-dyed cushion cover is not a tested dye
• Safe around children and pets once the mist has settled, about two minutes. Do not spray at anyone
• At about 1 ml for three pumps it is 200 uses from the 200 ml bottle at Rs 1.25, and 500 from the 500 ml refill at Rs 0.90. The refill fills the pump bottle two and a half times