Reader Isreal has made an exciting discovery. Foaming hand soap is basically just less viscous regular, cheaper hand soap. By watering down cheaper hand soap, you can save money.

I’ve been skeptical every since new foaming hand soap dispensers have been popping up next to sinks all across this great land. At first I thought it was a fad, “Ooooo, honey, it foams!” But now I realize that replacing traditional lotion hand soap with foaming hand soap is yet another way manufactures are able to get us to pay higher per unit prices for goods at the grocery store.

We have the Dial foaming dispensers around the house, but a family member accidentally purchased the traditional lotion refills. The original lotion does not work well in the foaming dispensers. I had noticed that the foaming soap was less viscous than the lotion, so I decided to cut the two parts lotion with one part water and, “Voila!” It works perfectly, except for the fact that there’s one third less soap now in the dispenser.

So is the foaming stuff a new fad, or is this a new way to increase revenue for the manufacturers? A 50 oz. refill of the foaming soap retails for about $0.18/oz. compared with $0.16/oz. for a 15 oz. refill of the lotion. Not only does it contain one third less soap, it costs two cents more per ounce? It seems to me that I’m paying more for about one third less soap. I guess we could all buy the original refills and water it down, right?

We think you’re on to something! In fact, we found an Instructable that agrees with you, offering instructions on how to make your hand soap less viscous so it can be used in a foaming hand soap container. This individual recommended using only 1/5 soap, but we suppose it’s a matter of personal preference.

How to Refill a foaming hand-soap container [Instructables]

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