Stain removers, like Zout’s Triple Enzyme Laundry Stain Remover, are designed to prolong the life of your clothes. But some manufacturers make promises their products just can’t keep. To see if Zout could tackle common household stains like pasta sauce and grass marks, we put it to the test in our home. Keep reading for our take on the easy-to-use formula.
Cleaning Power: Not that impressive
If there’s anything that a stain remover should do really well, it removes stains. In our household test, we decided to start first with our toughest stains, since those are the ones that call for stain removers more often. To see how Zout handled a variety of stains, we took a plain white t-shirt and smeared it with five things that seem to show up a lot on our kids’ clothes: grass, mud, pasta sauce, mustard, and butter. While butter isn’t as notorious a stain as others on our list, we were interested in seeing how well Zout handled grease. We stained the shirt and let the spots set for a full hour. After all, if you’ve got kids, what are the chances they’ll tell you they stained their clothes right away? (In our experience, basically never.) Once the stains really set in, we followed the directions on the bottle. This proved simple; you just turn the nozzle, spray the entire stain, rub it in, wait for five minutes, and then launder with your regular detergent. We liked that there weren’t any complicated directions like rubbing and soaking for 20 minutes or rinsing, soaking, and then washing. Unfortunately, the ease of use wasn’t enough to make up for Zout’s lackluster results. After a run through the wash, the only stain that entirely came out was the butter. This isn’t to say that Zout had no effect on the other stains—just that it wasn’t able to completely remove them. While the stains were significantly faded, they were still very obvious. As far as the next-best performances went, Zout did a better job on the grass and pasta sauce than it did with the mud and the mustard. This could be because they were darker stains in the first place, or it could be that the ingredients in the triple action formula were able to better target the starches and proteins in the offending substances (more on that below). Zout hardly affected the mustard at all—which is a problem for families (ours included) with little ones who eat a whole lot of condiment-laden french fries, chicken nuggets, and hamburgers. Suffice it to say if your kids are fond of ketchup and mustard, this isn’t the stain remover for you.
Formula and Scent: Scent works, formula doesn’t
Zout’s triple enzyme formula contains amylase, protease, and lipase enzymes. Each enzyme attacks different substances. The first tackles starches like those found in tomato sauce, while protease goes for proteins like those in grass, and lipase takes on fat- and oil-based stains like butter. We’ll have to say, lipase seems to be the only one that really lived up to its promise. The other enzymes may have helped, but we’d need to further treat the stains for complete removal. As far as scent, some stain removers have a heavy chemical smell, but Zout is nice and subtle. While there’s definitely a scent, it’s not overpowering and part of that stems from the fact that you don’t have to soak the stain at all—just spray it. Plus, after washing and drying our clothes, we couldn’t smell the Zout at all.
Ease of Use: Simple and quick
We tested a variety of stain removers and Zout was by far the easiest to use. It’s basically a three-step process: spray, rub, and wash—so it doesn’t get much easier than that. The only downfall we found was with the lid. Before we even opened our bottle of Zout, we saw that it had leaked in the box it shipped in. We tightened the lid to prevent further leaking, but it still continued to loosen on its own over time so be careful.
Price: Won’t break the bank
Zout is an extremely economical option at roughly $3 for a 22-ounce bottle (or $7 for two bottles). While it certainly won’t break the bank, we think it’s worth investing in a formula that outperforms it.
Zout Triple Enzyme Laundry Stain Remover vs. OxiClean White Revive Laundry Whitener + Stain Remover
As you know by now, Zout’s Triple Enzyme Laundry Stain Remover didn’t impress. What did, though, was OxiClean’s White Revive Laundry Whitener + Stain Remover. The two-in-one whitening and stain-removing formula was able to eliminate all of the same stains Zout failed to eradicate. That said, it is a powder and requires a pre-soak to perform at its best. If you’re looking for an ultra-convenient spray formula, this isn’t it, but it is affordable and powerful. Zout may be easy to use, but other stain removers perform much better.
