Frugal Tip 29: Extreme Bathing

Earlier this year, I started posting a more in depth look at each of the frugal tips. Over the next few weeks I will publish the frugal tips that I have collected. Please note that not every tip will work for everyone. Chose as many of the tips that will work with you and your family and start implementing them. Today we will proceed with Tip #29 extreme bathing.



Only bathe every other day

I know, I know that sounds pretty extreme doesn't it. But these really are extreme tips to save you money. If you think about it, if you only bathed every other day, you would cut your water use in about half. Which ideally would save you about half on your monthly water bill. If you are one of the lucky ones that have a job that doesn't require a lot of physical excretion, this might be a perfect way to say some money on the water bill, plus the heating to heat the water up.




Take a shorter shower

The Frugalista actually suggests this option. Showers use less water then baths and are better for the environment she told me via twitter.
If you already take showers over baths, are you taking to long in the shower? This tip will recommend that you cut your time in the shower. This idea isn't new, in fact a number of frugal blogs have discussed it. But, it is true you can save money by limiting yourself to a 5 minute shower. You could just get a inexpensive kitchen timer and let the ding tell you when it is time to get out or you can buy a timer specifically made for the shower for $4.95. However you do it; I highly encourage you to consider cutting your shower time.
Here is what Crunchy Domestic Goddess said in 2008 about the topic.

My first timed shower, I rushed like a crazy woman to make sure I could do it in under 5 minutes. I got done in about 3 1/2. The next day I took a somewhat more leisurely approach and took the full 5 minutes. You definitely can’t dilly-dally, but 5 minutes is longer than I thought it would be and totally attainable.

So, what do you think? Can you commit to taking 5-minute showers (or shorter) for three months?
- Crunchy Domestic Goddess

Wash your hair only twice a week

Another great way to help reduce water use (not to mention the cost of cleaning products) is to only wash your hair twice a week. If you do this I suggest once on the weekend (Saturday night or Sunday morning before you go to church) and the middle of the week (perhaps Tuesday night or Wednesday morning).
Someone on yahoo answers answered someone asking about this topic with this answer;

I noticed that if i washed it everyday that i would have some serious issues with breakage and other things. I started just washing some days and conditioning everyday. That helped tremendously.

Perhaps the best answer on this topic comes from NPR.

Americans love to shampoo. We lather up an average of 4.59 times a week, twice as much as Italians and Spaniards, according to shampoo-maker Procter & Gamble.

But that's way too often, say hair stylists and dermatologists. Daily washing, they say, strips the hair of beneficial oil (called sebum) and can damage our locks.

The current trend of frequent shampoos may have started on May 10, 1908, when the New York Times published a column advising women that it was OK to wash their hair every two weeks. At that time, once a month was the norm.

Decades later, TV marketing campaigns began to convince us that daily washing was the thing to do. A 1970s Faberge ad for Farrah Fawcett shampoo is one example.
- National Public Radio

If we were to look at other countries we would see that they don't shampoo as often as us Americans. So what do the experts say about this un-American trend? Again we return to the folks at NPR for the answer.

Experts say Haegele's observations are not flaky. As she washed less, her sebaceous glands began producing less sebum oil.

"If you wash your hair every day, you're removing the sebum," explains Michelle Hanjani, a dermatologist at Columbia University. "Then the oil glands compensate by producing more oil," she says.

She recommends that patients wash their hair no more than two or three times a week.

There's also a lot of variation among hair types. African-Americans and people with curly hair can go even longer between washes compared to folks with straight hair.

So, it seems, less is more. And maybe our grandmothers were on to something after all.
- National Public Radio

So what do say, can we cut the washing of our hair to twice a week? Perhaps even once a week? Think of the money saved. Could you do this? Could you do any of these three ideas?

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go ahead share your thoughts with me now, my ears are open. I'm always eager to hear what you think.

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