Blog, 2026-11-08

Shipping water is dumb

Short answer: a ready-to-use jug of cleaner is mostly water. You pay for that water to be bottled, stored, trucked and shelved, then you haul it home. Water already comes out of your tap. Dry sticks and pods, and concentrates in general, let you skip shipping the heavy part and add water where you use it. Less weight, less plastic, same job.

The jug problem

Pick up a gallon of anything ready to use. It is heavy. A gallon of water weighs over eight pounds, and most of what is in that jug is water. The active part, the bit that actually does the cleaning, is a small slice of the total.

Now follow that jug backwards. Someone filled it at a plant. It went into a box, onto a pallet, into a truck, into a warehouse, onto another truck, into a store, onto a shelf. At every step someone paid to move eight-plus pounds of something you could have gotten from your garden hose. That cost does not vanish. It shows up in the price.

And then there is the bottle

Every gallon of ready-to-use cleaner comes in a big plastic jug, often with a sprayer bolted on. You use it once or twice, then the jug lives in the garage forever, or it goes in the trash. If you buy a new one every season, that adds up to a lot of jugs.

With a dry format, you buy the spray bottle or sprayer once. A good plastic spray bottle lasts for ages. A plastic pump-up or backpack sprayer lasts for years if you rinse it. The thing you buy again is small and light.

Why liquids that are strong cleaners cost even more to move

Many strong cleaners, rust removers included, are regulated for shipping. They can need special packaging, labels and handling. That adds cost again, and it limits how they can be sent. Our cost per gallon comparison goes through what you are really paying for when you buy different formats, with real retailer prices.

Concentrates are a good idea. Dry is the next step.

Liquid concentrates already cut down on water. You buy a smaller bottle and dilute it. The catch is measuring. Pour too little and the job does not get done. Pour too much and you waste product and can mark the surface. Measuring cups get sticky, labels get smudged, and nobody reads the dilution chart twice.

Pre-measured dry formats fix the measuring problem. The dose is the stick or the pod. You do not need a cup, a scale or a calculator.

• Sticks. One SpraySticks stick in your own 16 to 24 oz spray bottle makes a light mix. Two sticks make a heavy mix for old stains.
• Gallon pods. One pod per gallon of water in a plastic pump-up sprayer. Four pods fill a backpack sprayer.

See the full picture on how it works.

What dry does not change

Dry does not mean gentle. When a stick or pod dissolves, you have a strong rust stain remover in your bottle, and it deserves the same respect as any other one.

• Wear chemical-resistant gloves and sealed eye protection when you mix and when you spray.
• Never mix it with bleach or other cleaners.
• Wet and rinse plants before and after.
• Test a hidden spot first.
• Do not use it on marble, limestone or other natural stone.
• Store sticks and pods dry, sealed and out of reach of kids and pets.

The small extra step

Being honest, dry formats ask one thing of you. You have to add water and wait a moment for the stick or pod to dissolve. Most people do this at the hose, and it takes about as long as finding where you put the gloves. If you want to open a bottle and spray right this second, a ready-to-use jug is fine and we will not judge.

But if you clean rust more than once a year, or you have a long fence, a big driveway, a boat, or a couple of trucks, carrying light little sticks and pods beats carrying jugs of water every single time.

Storage is easier too

Jugs take up a shelf. They tip over, the caps crust up, and the sprayer heads leak onto whatever sits below them. A box of dry sticks or pods tucks into a bin or a drawer. Keep them sealed, dry and out of reach of kids and pets, and they wait patiently until the next orange stripe shows up. If you keep supplies in a truck, a boat bag or a rental property closet, small and light is a real advantage.

Where the water should come from

Your hose. Your sink. The tap at the boat ramp. Water is already where you are. It does not need a road trip.

That is the whole idea behind SpraySticks. We make it in Merritt Island, Florida, ship it dry, and let you add the water. Pick your line, MARINE, HOME or AUTO, in the shop. If you want to see it in use, start with the concrete guide or the pump sprayer guide, and find more on the blog.

Spinach check: SpraySticks shares a compound with spinach. That does not make it food or gentle. Gloves, eye protection, keep kids and pets away, never mix with bleach, and read the SDS.

Common questions

Is a dry product as strong as a liquid one?

Strength depends on how much product ends up in the water, not on whether it shipped wet or dry. A dry stick or pod is pre-measured, so when it dissolves in the right amount of water you get a consistent mix every time. One {BRAND} stick in a 16 to 24 oz bottle gives a light mix, two give a heavy mix, and gallon pods do the same for sprayers.

Why don't all cleaning companies sell dry products?

Habit, mostly, plus shelf economics. Big retail is built around liquid jugs, and customers are used to grabbing a bottle that is ready to go. Dry formats ask you to add your own water, which is one small extra step. Some formulas are also easier to sell as liquids. But for many cleaning jobs, dry and concentrated formats are a sensible way to stop paying for water and plastic.

How should I store dry sticks and pods?

Keep them in their packaging, in a dry place, away from kids and pets, and away from heat. Moisture is the enemy of anything designed to dissolve, so a sealed bin in the garage or a cabinet works well. Do not store them next to bleach or other cleaners. Mix only what you plan to use that day and follow the label for any leftover solution.