How to keep Your Towel Smelling Fresh
It seems towels are the most frequently used out of all of your laundry. Unlike most of your laundry, towels are usually used to dry off after you’ve made yourself clean. Have you ever wondered how clean water can make a towel smell so bad? Sometimes we blame our washing machine or laundry soap, thinking it must not be strong enough. The real causes of towel odors are usually much simpler to resolve. First, let take a look at what causes towel odour and then steps you can take to prevent it.
The Cause of Towel Odor
Towels are supposed to get wet, right? Yes, but they are not supposed to stay wet. If you throw your wet towel into the hamper or leave it wadded up in a ball on the floor, it’s going to stay wet. And while it is wet, it is going to create the perfect environment for germs and mold to grow.
A warm moist environment is the best for germs. They grow and their presence is noticed by the smell that suddenly takes over our previously clean towels. While occasionally towel odors are caused by a bigger mess, most often it’s just the water they soak up when we dry off that causes a stinky towel.
How to Prevent Wet and Stinky Towels
So now you know what causes towel odours. I’ll bet you’ve figured out a way to prevent them too. Hanging a towel to allow air to circulate and dry it after use is definitely the best way to prevent odours. If you have a family, it may not be likely that every towel gets properly hung up. One trick is to assign each person in the house their own color of towels. Now you know who the culprit is by the color of the towel left in the bathroom or bedroom floor. It won’t take long for them to develop the habit of hanging their towels after each use if they have to put money in a jar for each infraction.
It’s also important to remember to switch towels quickly from the washing machine to the dryer. Be sure to clean your lint filter regularly to make sure that your dryer is running as efficiently as possible. If you notice that it takes a long time to dry towels, you may have a problem with your washing machine leaving too much water in them or with your dryer.
More Towel Odor Solutions
Sometimes even when we are trying to prevent odors, our towels still end up smelling a little off. If this occurs, don’t despair. There are a few sure-fire tricks you can try to get them back to fresh and clean. You can try just one of these tips or to really get the most bang for your buck, try them all back to back.
- Vinegar:Try running your towels through a regular cycle with very warm or hot water, your regular detergent, and a cup of vinegar as a natural fabric softener for the rinse cycle.
- Baking Soda:Next, run the towels through the regular cycle again using only a half cup of baking soda and no detergent or fabric softener. Just the baking soda will do the trick.
- Line Drying: Hang the towels out to dry. When they are dry, toss them in the dryer with 1 or 2 new or very clean tennis balls. The sound of the tennis balls in the dryer may drive you crazy, but it will also fluff up the towels and make them softer. If line drying isn’t an option, you can dry in your dryer with the tennis balls, but skip the dryer sheets.
Knowing the causes of stinky towels, preventing the problem, and using these solutions should make this laundry nightmare a thing of the past.