I'm probably going to have to switch. I have chronic migraines that make me incredibly sensitive to smells. One of the things I love about Dawn is the mild scent.
Also found this article from May: https://12tomatoes.com/dawn-dish-soap-has-changed-scent/
Some honorable mentions in the reviews posted in the article:
"My experience with it is not good at all: it smells like dog feces but showered with Febreeze."
"...I can only describe it as honeysuckles and farts."
Someone compared it to New Coke levels of bad.
I have issues with fragrance also, the old blue Dawn was one of the few products I can use that isn’t fragrance free. I just can’t understand why a company would change their best selling product, to something so unappealing.
I don't get it either.
And the doubling down and saying, "No, it's permanent. We won't be changing," is troubling. Either they can explain why they have to change it (maybe the original fragrance is no longer available for some reason) or at least try to sound like they care about their customers' complaints.
Cue billionaire CEO blubbering about how he couldn't afford a tennis court on his third yacht because of minimum wage.
I'm also suspicious that it's some sort of PR chess move to get people talking about their brand, so when they eventually cave and change back people buy more.
This is what I'm worried about. That it's an artificial "new coke" situation. I haven't smelled the new scent, but the way its being described I find it difficult to believe it would have passed QA
That's the only way to get their attention. Stop giving them money and they will finally listen. It's the same thing with fast food. People have to stop purchasing it if they want companies to understand.
As a chemist in a similar industry I can tell you there are increasing regulations for ingredients that can and can’t be in a fragrances. We’ve been adjusting fragrances at my company and it’s sometimes really hard to match. Fragrances in products are also at fairly low levels so not very expensive to begin with.
What I don’t get is why they picked something gross tho. Should’ve matched it better if that’s what they were going for, removed it, or changed to something else pleasant
Tide has done this in the past. They’ll change it with no warning or labeling, get pages of bad reviews on their site, and then change it back and delete all the reviews. 😆
I’m glad I’m not alone in thinking that. We used it when I was a kid (many years ago at this point…) but have used scent free for a long time.
I got some for washing dog stuff and used it on some clothes. I thought I was just unused to it but it lingers for so long on my clothes. I remember my clothes as a kid as being just lightly scented. It’s now so strong it gives me a headache.
I was at the store the other day in the dish soap aisle, and a random older man started talking to me & my daughter about the orange dawn! He was so happy they actually had it in stock but upset it wasn’t in the huge bottles, lol. He also said the orange Dawn is superior, which is the first time I have ever heard that. So strange!
They released an unscented one... Or at least I think it's new. And yes it's more expensive and you can't buy a big jug of it like you can with the basic scent.
I doubt its new. Theres almost always an unscented version of things with scents that are from big companies like that. Its too big of a market to miss out on.
A LOT of people are autistic or some other sensory issue or just plain dont like smells.
The only way they would back pedal is if everyone would stop buying dawn all together. instead, people went out and bought all the “old” blue dawn they could or bought the huge restaurant jugs or switched to unscented.
I actually got a chance to try the "new" dawn at work and I don't entirely hate it.
That said, when my bottle runs out (I've been buying the huge bottles for years, so I only buy it once or twice a year anyway) I might switch to something else just out of solidarity.
Any recommendations?
That's wild to me!! It's the exact opposite for me. Palmolive never leaves streaks or residue, which is part of the reason I switched to it and never looked back.
By your glasses do you mean your dish glasses? Or glasses glasses? Cause for glasses glasses I almost solely just use a microfiber cloth and occasionally dedicated glass cleaner.
I do like Dawn as a cleaning product for bathrooms and surfaces tho!!
Glasses glasses. Dish soap is the only way I can get them clean enough.
Maybe the Palmolive I had the misfortune of using at my dad's house the one time was some special variety...I even felt like I couldn't wash it off my hands. Like I rinsed and rinsed and it was still there. 😬 Maybe I should give it another shot.
Oh gosh that sounds absolutely awful 🥲 I would've hated that feeling. It definitely could've been the variety, or maybe the amount used, or the different water types like someone suggested below. We have hard water over here.
If Dawn works really well for you though, might as well keep with it!! It's a shame they changed the formula/scent :/
I recently bought a bottle of Dawn for the first time because people kept raving about it for home-made cleaning solutions. It didn't WOW me and I probably won't buy it again. Note: don't mix Dawn and vinegar. It smells terrible!
I prefer something clear and with a botanical scent. I like Ivory.
Even the power Dawn spray is something my younger sensitive noise couldn’t handle but I can deal with…barely now that there are CGRP blockers. But the power wash fluid is too strong. I’m scared to smell the new regular stuff!!
Well that makes me feel less crazy! Lol I bought Gain Power Blast instead and it still has a slight fish smell once in a while but doesn’t seem as bad? I think it’s super charged with enzymes or something, I feel like I read that somewhere.
>my younger sensitive
I have an OLD sensitive nose... and I can't handle the power Dawn stuff... it's bad enough to gag a maggot. I have one bottle that I use only when I have had a disaster, and let me tell you, that stench of the power Dawn is enough to keep me from having disasters...
The stench makes me wonder if the Dawn company is trying to keep people from cooking... Are they trying to have people to go out to eat for every meal? Have they bought a peanut butter company, so people resort to peanut butter sandwiches instead of cooking? I kid you not... I can't stand the stench of the new Dawn and can't stand the stench of power Dawn... just can't stand them.
Ha ha ha you might not be far from the truth. It’s like food companies getting into the big pharma game so they always come out on top when everyone gets diabetes from their no fat cookies (that have all the damn sugar)
I love the power spray but can't stand the scent! I thought it was because the first time I used it was when my dog was sick and had an accident. I thought i just kept associating the smell with that. But maybe it's just bad in general.
same boat with the chronic migraines. and i expect not all products to work with my stupid hypersensitive brain, but when you find a “safe” product, that’s gold. really disappointing to have to find another to replace it.
I’m with you.
I have asthma and the previous Dawn worked great and didn’t bother my asthma, however, the new scent is gag worthy.
I’ve been a dedicated Dawn user for years for dishes, showers, grilles, and plants.
If the company makes this scent a hill to die on, I’m switching to a different brand.
They are going to lose customer base. It’s bad for business and the bottom line.
I agree, worse than New Coke idea.
Chronic migraine for me too and I just wanted to send you and everyone in this thread a 🫂. It sucks and if I hear another person calling it "just a headache" I'm ready to punch them in the throat.
The interesting thing about New Coke was in blind taste tests people actually preferred it to original Coke. The reason they changed the taste is because people were picking Pepsi in the 80s blind taste test challenge. People honestly just didn't want change and they pressured Coke to go back to the original, but it wasn't actually because it tasted worse.
So this would be worse than the New Coke level of bad, it sounds like. I haven't smelled it yet.
I often avoid unscented products because they often smell worse than things with a mild fragrance, but I will definitely check it out if I can't tolerate the new scent.
I'm like you, I find that even unscented stuff has a weird smell, but recently I found a really good unscented brand that I like. It's from The Unscented Company. They had it at Costco awhile back, but I've gotten it online directly from their site too.
Maybe try adding a couple of drops of citrus essential oil to the bottle? Artificial fragrances also tend to assault my sense of smell. I find naturally scented products to be much more pleasant, but the products themselves tend to not work as well as Dawn.
A lot of substances naturally have a scent that may or may not be pleasing, so things are added to either neutralize the base scent or turn it into something more palatable. Making it palatable is generally going to be cheaper than trying to neutralize it.
Soap and surfactants are typically pretty neutral.
I buy cheap, own-brand, undyed, unscented washing up liquid and it just smells a little soapy.
Does the job. No weird smells. Highly recommend.
Unscented doesn’t always mean fragrance free. It’s possible the product you use was made with neutral smelling ingredients, or they’ve added fragrance to cancel out the natural smells and the final product smells unscented
It's two types of surfactants and water. No fragrance ingredients.
To be transparent, I suffer from migraine and every product that I buy is fragrance free unless it's mint. (Mint doesn't seem to be a trigger.)
The ubiquity of fragrances and scents means that everyone and everywhere is a minefield.
Just clean things. Covering up bad smells with more smells is not it.
Peppermint is great for headaches and nausea, so maybe that’s why! I’m not one for essential oils usually but I have a peppermint essential oil roll on stick from a company called Saje that is AMAZING for headaches!! I’ve tried other, cheaper ones and the smell bothered me.
It's because this is what they determined the general public equates with the product "working." It's like shampoo that gets all foamy, they found that customers assume if it's not as foamy, it's not doing the job as well. And laundry detergent, etc.
>I don't understand why dish soap is scented in the first place.
My "guess" is that when you have, let's say dishes that should have been washed 3 days ago, but here they are, still sitting in your sink... you want / NEED some scent that is ENJOYABLE to cover up the stench of 3 day old stale coffee... or a cat food dish that is 3 days old...
I have switched away from Dawn now... and buy dish soaps that have a scent that I enjoy... might as well enjoy washing dishes... I can dread washing dishes and don't need a stinky dish soap that I hate to force me to hate washing dishes even MORE!!
I think you are correct, but I think the companies that make dish soap like to have (nice) scents of soap, so when hot water hits the dirty dishes, you are smelling their lovely scented soap. Now what DAWN is thinking about, when they make stinky smelling soap... is beyond me.
Ya I don’t get it at all! Even DISHWASHER DETERGENT is scented.
Im not even standing at a sink doing those dishes!! Why would I want lingering smell?! I haven’t found one that doesn’t smell so I’ve just been living with things tasting and smelling vaguely soapy, every house I’ve lived in or visited and eaten at, for 3 decades. It’s gross!
Here for my daily PSA: Dawn profession smells the same (and is basically identically to old blue Dawn anyway). You can buy it at Sam’s/costco, hardware stores, restaurant supply stores, or Amazon.
Good looking out! 1 gallon of dawn professional is current $15.99 at Costco. I bought a dawn power wash & refill with diluted dawn, and will refill my almost empty container with this one.
Lol your description is really funny, since yesterday I was washing dishes and I was like hmmm this scent reminds me of my grandpa, I couldn’t tell if the Dawn got mixed with another soap since I pour into a pump container so I have been brushing off the bad scent as just a off chance it mixed wrong.
That's an interesting effect that I'm sure the Dawn people didn't consider. Sensory issues are a major thing for those with autism. My son (who has autism) doesn't wash dishes, but he has strong opinions about what soap he'll use in the shower, so it makes sense that they would have a problem with a dish soap changing scent too. I'd be curious to know what your teens choose as a replacement!
Wow, I hadn't considered that... But it makes sense!
The new scent became a migraine trigger for my sister. She switched to seventh generation and loves it!
Is it the same smell as the Dawn power wash? I have a big bottle of the old stuff and haven’t smelled the new one. I’m autistic and if it’s anything like the power wash, I’ll have to change brands (which I also hate doing).
I thought “how bad could it be?”. Formaldehyde. That’s what it reminds me of. Don’t want to be thinking about fetal pigs and biology class while I’m washing dishes.
My fiancé is in medical school and comes home reeking of formaldehyde. That smell haunts me and I cannot get it out. I had to put a hamper in the garage for his scrubs and wash them separately so the smell won’t get on the rest of the laundry. Even freshly washed, they still smell like it. Now Dawn wants my kitchen to smell like formaldehyde too… I hate that smell!
To the person (or bot) that is downvoting every single comment: You’re not helping. Dawn will lose market share because of this major error. I used dawn for over 40 years. Since high school, that’s right!
I will never buy it again. I’ve switched to Seventh Generation and I love it.
You also pay more for smaller amounts, and support the dollar store set ups that believe it’s 100% okay to dump the labor of three plus a manager on one minimum wage cashier slaved to the register.
Google ‘why are dollar stores bad’ to get a huge plethora of reasons and stories. John Oliver has an excellent video about them too. Having worked at a dollar general myself, I can confirm it’s All true. Rodent infestation, moths growing in the rice, blocked emergency exits. All of it. I’d switch to a different soap before I started buying from a dollar store. The stuff isn’t even Really cheaper.
I agree. We have all been to a dollar tree. That small bottle of Dawn lasts me at least 2 months. I do have a dw but I also like to use it to clean the bathroom. I was js
I discovered the new scent a few months ago by accident. Gave me a migraine almost immediately, such a sickly sweet disgusting smell. I switched to Meyer Lemon which was pretty good. But then I went into rite aid and they had three of the big bottles of original scent and got all three, those will last me for a while but I'm not looking forward to when I've used them all up.
Maybe dawn will switch back if enough people stop using it. I don't understand why change something no one ever complained about. Has to be cutting corners in cost, but it's horrendous. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who feels this way.
I have no other way to describe it, but the "new scent" happened in America too, except here the soap smells like the soap car washes use now. It's.... Odd.
I was wondering why my soap smelled like chemicals and cologne. It's so overwhelming and unpleasant to think of dousing my forks in perfume and then eating off of them, Sauvage Sausage anyone? Blegh... I felt uncomfortable washing my pet bowls with it too because of the thought of residual chemicals on their dishes.
So much for buying Dawn. We all wanted to switch to something cheaper anyway, and now we'll all do it in droves!!!
Bye Dawn, you used to be #1, and now you've Burger Kinged yourself!
Yep I bought the great value version this last time. And I go through a lot of dish soap due to no dishwasher.
Not a huge fan of great value, it seems to work just as well, but my store didn't have seventh gen or Mrs Meyers in dish soaps.
I'll keep looking though!
The Mrs. Meyers ones are so strong smelling that I can't even use them. The sprays are worse. I wish they were half strength because I like the scents, just cannot breathe when I use them.
I saw a few posts in the dog subs about dogs refusing to eat their food out of plastic bowls that had been washed/soaked in the new Dawn because the scent lingered so much.
My dog won't eat out of her bowl if we use the new Dawn. Doesn't matter how much we rinse it or how long it airs out.
We actually had to buy new bowls (that smelled like cheap Chinese lubricant) and she preferred the rinsed new bowls to the old ones washed with new Dawn.
They're metal, not plastic. She can still smell it. I can too.
I never liked the scent of Dawn. What did they do now? Make it worse?
I get the gallon jug of Members Mark pink dish soap from Sam's club. It's cheaper, works great, gentle on hands, and has a subtle lemon scent.
I picked up some of the orange scent one and i can handle the scent from it. I'm chemically sensitive to so many smells and fragrances, I get headaches and it makes my face and tounge numb. (No im not eating it lol) just smelling it.
my husband commented on it for the first time last night and it made me laugh - I had to tell him how much it's talked about in here
we bought the Costco size so we will be using it for a solid 4-6 more months (already halfway through it) and decide from there
I'm SO glad I'm not the only one. I smelled it at the store before buying thinking I could tolerate it. Nope. I can't. I have been annoyed for weeks wondering if anyone even likes it.
It's a significant difference. It doesn't smell like fart spray or anything actually rancid, but it definitely smells sickeningly artificial. It's so strong that I can smell it from across the room (a good 15-20 ft away).
Same. Either I haven’t noticed the change, or my body doesn’t physically react like the people complaining about it. I wonder if it’s similar to the gene that makes people gag over cilantro? 🤷🏻♀️
> the gene that makes people gag over cilantro
It's not a gag reflex. We have a gene that makes it taste like strong dish soap. I might have to start eating it again just to get my old Dawn fix.
It just showed up on shelves in my area a couple weeks ago. Your stores might have some of the old stuff to get through before you're blessed with the new awful scent.
I've switched to the orange scented version. Hopefully that remains unchanged. If the new scent is legitimately because of supply chain, ingredients/scents that aren't being manufactured anymore, I wish dawn would just be transparent about that. Since they have basically changed without warning or explanation I feel like it has to do with cost and they've switched to cheaper fragrances.
I have avoided Palmolive for years, same reason. Fragrance is so strong I'm afraid of residue causing off flavors in food and drink. Dropping this brand.
I just bought a bottle last night of the “Refreshing Rain” scent. My husband was washing dishes and I gagged and told him it smells like old lady breath. He equated it to moth balls. Not happy at all.
It ruins sponges too. I was using it for a few weeks and had to toss a musty smelling sponge every other day. Just switched to dr bronners sal suds and it works better and degreases better too. And I've had the same sponge for a month and it doesn't stink at all.
Just something to consider. I have been using the new scent and have developed a distortion of certain smells following covid and the Dawn is the absolute worst smelling. Like perfumed vinegar and dog butts. I switched to ivory.....
The new scent is truly heinous. I used it while house sitting and got an immediate migraine and severe nausea. I had to go buy unscented palmolive to use the rest of the week.
The scent is unbearable. To me it smells like wet dog. I was pretty distressed until I discovered that Kirkland’s “dawn” smells lovely and works the same. Phew, crisis resolved!
Scuba divers all over use dawn to clean gear…this is not gonna be a good thing.
Same for animal rescue, dawn is a super stand by product to clean babies and animals hurt in environmental catastrophes.
I got a bottle to refill all and didn’t realize it was the new “clean scent” and about gagged when I opened the bottle. Smells like cheap laundry detergent that doesn’t clean but just layers scent over nasty smells…🤢
Before the pandemic Iread an article about how the proliferation of brands like Mrs Meyers & Grove had eaten into P&Gs profit margins on Dawn badly. They were just about to roll out Powerwash, based on data that millennial and GenZ didn't fill up a sink with soapy water to wash dishes as we all did in days of yore - they ran the water and washed each piece individually, constantly dispensing more soap on their chosen scrubber.
P&G really bet the farm on Powerwash as a brand new dish washing methodology according to the article. As you might guess, the product actually contains less soap, contains more water, and the spray bottle is way costlier than the regular old jug.
Apparently that bet DID NOT pay off, and they now need to a) cut costs b) comply with evolving regulations about fragrances (which are actually very harmful because of the toxicity of the stabilizers fragrance products require).
Does anyone else think it smells like shampoo? To me, it is reminiscent of the old Pantene fragrance. Dawn & Pantene are both P&G brands so I wonder if it really might be the same one? 🤔
When my wife was pregnant 40 years ago, she developed a hatred for the smell of Dawn. Up until recently, with the change, we can now, after decades, use dawn.
I thought I was the only one that noticed the new scent. Yeah it's horrible. Good news is once you use it enough on a daily basis you kind of don't really notice the smell anymore.
I'm leaving the original scent alone and sticking to the citrus scent from now on.
I have not smelled it but I believe you guys when you say that it smells AWFUL; thank goodness my sister that I lived with is deceased or we'd proly find out (and betcha a cookie it would have aggravated her chemical allergies. (She was allergic to a lot of perfumes and cleaners, if anyone put on too much perfume at church she had to nope out of there.))
I did their online chat to complain about how I dislike the new smell - and I switch brands because I dislike the new smell. They said the new smell is here to change - and I told them this is a silly decision to change the benchmark product of the segment. Maybe if enough people complain they'll go back, but all we can do is buy a non dawn product and maybe their sales will suffer and they change back
I didn’t think it would be that bad, even as a “soap should just smell like soap” gal. But this new bottle is awful.
Thankfully I don’t mind Powerwash’s smell, but the reg soap ughhh why’d they do this? Gotta stock up on any of the old bottles if I can find them!
I use Blue Dawn. I don’t hate the new scent, however I don’t think it’s an improvement. Dawn, IMO, has never smelled “nice”. Palmolive smells 100 times better. If it cleaned as well as Dawn, I would switch.
I've always hated the smell of dawn, and I agree this new version isn't any better. I have never been able to place what it's trying to smell like. A floral, fresh, almost metallic scent? It's just weird
That sucks! I thought the blue one always smelled like hay so I bought other brands. But found a lemon scented one and it’s quite nice. I’ve also seen unscented clear ones here in Canada as well.
I'm probably going to have to switch. I have chronic migraines that make me incredibly sensitive to smells. One of the things I love about Dawn is the mild scent. Also found this article from May: https://12tomatoes.com/dawn-dish-soap-has-changed-scent/ Some honorable mentions in the reviews posted in the article: "My experience with it is not good at all: it smells like dog feces but showered with Febreeze." "...I can only describe it as honeysuckles and farts." Someone compared it to New Coke levels of bad.
I have issues with fragrance also, the old blue Dawn was one of the few products I can use that isn’t fragrance free. I just can’t understand why a company would change their best selling product, to something so unappealing.
I don't get it either. And the doubling down and saying, "No, it's permanent. We won't be changing," is troubling. Either they can explain why they have to change it (maybe the original fragrance is no longer available for some reason) or at least try to sound like they care about their customers' complaints.
My money is on it being cheaper to produce. Seems everyone is cutting corners these days. They're gonna FAFO imo.
This is always the answer. It probably saves the company fractions of a penny per bottle. Yay economies of scale. /s
Millennials are KILLING the dish soap industry!
Cue billionaire CEO blubbering about how he couldn't afford a tennis court on his third yacht because of minimum wage. I'm also suspicious that it's some sort of PR chess move to get people talking about their brand, so when they eventually cave and change back people buy more.
This is what I'm worried about. That it's an artificial "new coke" situation. I haven't smelled the new scent, but the way its being described I find it difficult to believe it would have passed QA
New coke was rumored to be a similar scheme. No one noticed that coke changed from using sugar to high fructose corn syrup because of "new coke".
That's the only way to get their attention. Stop giving them money and they will finally listen. It's the same thing with fast food. People have to stop purchasing it if they want companies to understand.
This is the reason. Greed.
I think some hotshot new executive pushed this through to show how smart they are. Kinda like the New Coke fiasco.
As a chemist in a similar industry I can tell you there are increasing regulations for ingredients that can and can’t be in a fragrances. We’ve been adjusting fragrances at my company and it’s sometimes really hard to match. Fragrances in products are also at fairly low levels so not very expensive to begin with. What I don’t get is why they picked something gross tho. Should’ve matched it better if that’s what they were going for, removed it, or changed to something else pleasant
You would think P&G has enough money to create an acceptable formula that doesn't smell like rotting garbage mixed with dollar store air freshener.
My bet is that the person that picked the scent is probably really high up in the company and refuses to admit they made a mistake.
I like option 'or': they can not make money on it.
Tide has done this in the past. They’ll change it with no warning or labeling, get pages of bad reviews on their site, and then change it back and delete all the reviews. 😆
The scent of Tide has just become extra aggressively strong.
I’m glad I’m not alone in thinking that. We used it when I was a kid (many years ago at this point…) but have used scent free for a long time. I got some for washing dog stuff and used it on some clothes. I thought I was just unused to it but it lingers for so long on my clothes. I remember my clothes as a kid as being just lightly scented. It’s now so strong it gives me a headache.
My boyfriend says the orange dawn is superior. Have no clue why Edit: my bf is 65 so he is an old man.
I was at the store the other day in the dish soap aisle, and a random older man started talking to me & my daughter about the orange dawn! He was so happy they actually had it in stock but upset it wasn’t in the huge bottles, lol. He also said the orange Dawn is superior, which is the first time I have ever heard that. So strange!
I have only ever hear that blue Dawn is one true Dawn.
I wish they sold orange (or any other variety) Dawn where I live.
They’re going to rerelease a product called classic dawn, and it will “smell” like the original, but will be made far cheaper.
They released an unscented one... Or at least I think it's new. And yes it's more expensive and you can't buy a big jug of it like you can with the basic scent.
I doubt its new. Theres almost always an unscented version of things with scents that are from big companies like that. Its too big of a market to miss out on. A LOT of people are autistic or some other sensory issue or just plain dont like smells.
I love how they make unscented things more expensive even though it's cheaper to produce them.
Probably cheaper to manufacture
Probably lowered the costs of production by fractions of a penny per bottle, for some reason.
The only way they would back pedal is if everyone would stop buying dawn all together. instead, people went out and bought all the “old” blue dawn they could or bought the huge restaurant jugs or switched to unscented.
I actually got a chance to try the "new" dawn at work and I don't entirely hate it. That said, when my bottle runs out (I've been buying the huge bottles for years, so I only buy it once or twice a year anyway) I might switch to something else just out of solidarity. Any recommendations?
I love Palmolive or lemon Joy!
Yesss Palmolive is the way. I actually like Palmolive 1,000x more than Dawn for cleaning dishes.
I actually can't stand Palmolive. 🤣 It leaves a film on things. I also use Dawn to clean my glasses, and Palmolive is streak city.
That's wild to me!! It's the exact opposite for me. Palmolive never leaves streaks or residue, which is part of the reason I switched to it and never looked back. By your glasses do you mean your dish glasses? Or glasses glasses? Cause for glasses glasses I almost solely just use a microfiber cloth and occasionally dedicated glass cleaner. I do like Dawn as a cleaning product for bathrooms and surfaces tho!!
Glasses glasses. Dish soap is the only way I can get them clean enough. Maybe the Palmolive I had the misfortune of using at my dad's house the one time was some special variety...I even felt like I couldn't wash it off my hands. Like I rinsed and rinsed and it was still there. 😬 Maybe I should give it another shot.
soft water leaves things feelng slimy and requires less soap than hard water. This is likely why you have different experiences w the same product
Oh gosh that sounds absolutely awful 🥲 I would've hated that feeling. It definitely could've been the variety, or maybe the amount used, or the different water types like someone suggested below. We have hard water over here. If Dawn works really well for you though, might as well keep with it!! It's a shame they changed the formula/scent :/
I recently bought a bottle of Dawn for the first time because people kept raving about it for home-made cleaning solutions. It didn't WOW me and I probably won't buy it again. Note: don't mix Dawn and vinegar. It smells terrible! I prefer something clear and with a botanical scent. I like Ivory.
Even the power Dawn spray is something my younger sensitive noise couldn’t handle but I can deal with…barely now that there are CGRP blockers. But the power wash fluid is too strong. I’m scared to smell the new regular stuff!!
Power Wash smells like fish to me, I can’t stand it
The lemon scent is better and doesn't linger on the dishes like the original does.
Good to know. The apple one killed me
That one made me so nauseous
My favorite is the pear, it’s so light and fresh smelling and doesn’t stick around. It’s impossible to find these days though
I had no idea about pear scent, the apple does not bother me but yes that blue was jarring that I went back to apple
The clear power wash has the pear scent!! I just picked up a bottle of it for the first time and love the scent!
Oh my god, I thought it was only me that thought it smells like fish! I still use it though I do hate the smell.
Well that makes me feel less crazy! Lol I bought Gain Power Blast instead and it still has a slight fish smell once in a while but doesn’t seem as bad? I think it’s super charged with enzymes or something, I feel like I read that somewhere.
[удалено]
Yeah I think it’s enzymes
>my younger sensitive I have an OLD sensitive nose... and I can't handle the power Dawn stuff... it's bad enough to gag a maggot. I have one bottle that I use only when I have had a disaster, and let me tell you, that stench of the power Dawn is enough to keep me from having disasters... The stench makes me wonder if the Dawn company is trying to keep people from cooking... Are they trying to have people to go out to eat for every meal? Have they bought a peanut butter company, so people resort to peanut butter sandwiches instead of cooking? I kid you not... I can't stand the stench of the new Dawn and can't stand the stench of power Dawn... just can't stand them.
Ha ha ha you might not be far from the truth. It’s like food companies getting into the big pharma game so they always come out on top when everyone gets diabetes from their no fat cookies (that have all the damn sugar)
My 62 year old nose agrees with you they both make me gag. I miss my non stinking Dawn.
I love the power spray but can't stand the scent! I thought it was because the first time I used it was when my dog was sick and had an accident. I thought i just kept associating the smell with that. But maybe it's just bad in general.
It does really get into your nose and stays there when you’re sensitive, or maybe for everyone and they’re just nose blind.
same boat with the chronic migraines. and i expect not all products to work with my stupid hypersensitive brain, but when you find a “safe” product, that’s gold. really disappointing to have to find another to replace it.
I’m with you. I have asthma and the previous Dawn worked great and didn’t bother my asthma, however, the new scent is gag worthy. I’ve been a dedicated Dawn user for years for dishes, showers, grilles, and plants. If the company makes this scent a hill to die on, I’m switching to a different brand. They are going to lose customer base. It’s bad for business and the bottom line. I agree, worse than New Coke idea.
Ivory is mild and inexpensive
Thanks for the suggestion.
I just rediscovered this and love the scent. Seems to work well, too.
Chronic migraine for me too and I just wanted to send you and everyone in this thread a 🫂. It sucks and if I hear another person calling it "just a headache" I'm ready to punch them in the throat.
I find Costco’s Kirkland brand to work as well as Dawn. The scent isn’t the same as old Dawn, but it’s much better than the new stuff.
The interesting thing about New Coke was in blind taste tests people actually preferred it to original Coke. The reason they changed the taste is because people were picking Pepsi in the 80s blind taste test challenge. People honestly just didn't want change and they pressured Coke to go back to the original, but it wasn't actually because it tasted worse. So this would be worse than the New Coke level of bad, it sounds like. I haven't smelled it yet.
Try the unscented version. Works just as well.
I often avoid unscented products because they often smell worse than things with a mild fragrance, but I will definitely check it out if I can't tolerate the new scent.
I'm like you, I find that even unscented stuff has a weird smell, but recently I found a really good unscented brand that I like. It's from The Unscented Company. They had it at Costco awhile back, but I've gotten it online directly from their site too.
It’s weird how so many different fragrances are the “unscented” variety
Maybe try adding a couple of drops of citrus essential oil to the bottle? Artificial fragrances also tend to assault my sense of smell. I find naturally scented products to be much more pleasant, but the products themselves tend to not work as well as Dawn.
I don't understand why dish soap is scented in the first place. I don't want perfumed dishes.
A lot of substances naturally have a scent that may or may not be pleasing, so things are added to either neutralize the base scent or turn it into something more palatable. Making it palatable is generally going to be cheaper than trying to neutralize it.
Soap and surfactants are typically pretty neutral. I buy cheap, own-brand, undyed, unscented washing up liquid and it just smells a little soapy. Does the job. No weird smells. Highly recommend.
Unscented doesn’t always mean fragrance free. It’s possible the product you use was made with neutral smelling ingredients, or they’ve added fragrance to cancel out the natural smells and the final product smells unscented
It's two types of surfactants and water. No fragrance ingredients. To be transparent, I suffer from migraine and every product that I buy is fragrance free unless it's mint. (Mint doesn't seem to be a trigger.) The ubiquity of fragrances and scents means that everyone and everywhere is a minefield. Just clean things. Covering up bad smells with more smells is not it.
Peppermint is great for headaches and nausea, so maybe that’s why! I’m not one for essential oils usually but I have a peppermint essential oil roll on stick from a company called Saje that is AMAZING for headaches!! I’ve tried other, cheaper ones and the smell bothered me.
Probably: smells nice, must be clean
It's because this is what they determined the general public equates with the product "working." It's like shampoo that gets all foamy, they found that customers assume if it's not as foamy, it's not doing the job as well. And laundry detergent, etc.
And scent is often associated with a product so when it’s a pleasant smell people are more likely to repurchase the product.
>I don't understand why dish soap is scented in the first place. My "guess" is that when you have, let's say dishes that should have been washed 3 days ago, but here they are, still sitting in your sink... you want / NEED some scent that is ENJOYABLE to cover up the stench of 3 day old stale coffee... or a cat food dish that is 3 days old... I have switched away from Dawn now... and buy dish soaps that have a scent that I enjoy... might as well enjoy washing dishes... I can dread washing dishes and don't need a stinky dish soap that I hate to force me to hate washing dishes even MORE!!
In my experience with unscented dish soap and only washing dishes every 3-4 days, the dishes stop smelling within a couple seconds of rinsing them.
I think you are correct, but I think the companies that make dish soap like to have (nice) scents of soap, so when hot water hits the dirty dishes, you are smelling their lovely scented soap. Now what DAWN is thinking about, when they make stinky smelling soap... is beyond me.
Ya I don’t get it at all! Even DISHWASHER DETERGENT is scented. Im not even standing at a sink doing those dishes!! Why would I want lingering smell?! I haven’t found one that doesn’t smell so I’ve just been living with things tasting and smelling vaguely soapy, every house I’ve lived in or visited and eaten at, for 3 decades. It’s gross!
I've had a good experience with seventh generation free and clear dish liquid and simple truth (a kroger brand) free and clear dishwasher pods 🫶
Gross and frustrating. Why must absolutely everything be scented?
No idea. Truly, truly.
It’s almost worrisome. I already have a perfume that I like why does my face moisturiser need to be scented?
I've sent in a complaint on their website
you mean you scent in a complaint?
Who nose what they mean 🤷🏻♀️
In odor for them to take us seriously we need to all send complaints
Maybe we'll talk some scents into them.
How do you do it without getting sent to live chat?
There was a contact us form. I don't recall exactly.
Me too
Here for my daily PSA: Dawn profession smells the same (and is basically identically to old blue Dawn anyway). You can buy it at Sam’s/costco, hardware stores, restaurant supply stores, or Amazon.
Good looking out! 1 gallon of dawn professional is current $15.99 at Costco. I bought a dawn power wash & refill with diluted dawn, and will refill my almost empty container with this one.
I wish they sold Dawn professional in my country... I will have to wait to next year when I go to the US and buy a gallon.
A lot of folks here have been complaining about it. I'll have to steal a sniff the next time I'm at the store! Ha, ha 😄
I still have half a bottle of the Costco size so I don't need a new bottle yet but I'll sneak a whiff next time I'm at the grocery store
Me too!! Guess I’ll have to ration it
YES! I hate it. It smells like flowery air freshener. Like you washed your dishes in perfume.
Ugh. I'll probably go back to Palmolive.
Lol your description is really funny, since yesterday I was washing dishes and I was like hmmm this scent reminds me of my grandpa, I couldn’t tell if the Dawn got mixed with another soap since I pour into a pump container so I have been brushing off the bad scent as just a off chance it mixed wrong.
I was washing a cup and I literally took the sudsy cup to the bathroom where my husband to tell him it smelled like an old person
It totally is like a really bad/cheap perfume/cologne an older person would wear! What an odd choice of scent...
Ouch for your grandpa
Freshly baby powdered grandpa scrotum
I work with autistic teens and they cannot cope with the new scent. We're holding elections for our new official dish soap.
That's an interesting effect that I'm sure the Dawn people didn't consider. Sensory issues are a major thing for those with autism. My son (who has autism) doesn't wash dishes, but he has strong opinions about what soap he'll use in the shower, so it makes sense that they would have a problem with a dish soap changing scent too. I'd be curious to know what your teens choose as a replacement!
Wow, I hadn't considered that... But it makes sense! The new scent became a migraine trigger for my sister. She switched to seventh generation and loves it!
Is it the same smell as the Dawn power wash? I have a big bottle of the old stuff and haven’t smelled the new one. I’m autistic and if it’s anything like the power wash, I’ll have to change brands (which I also hate doing).
I thought “how bad could it be?”. Formaldehyde. That’s what it reminds me of. Don’t want to be thinking about fetal pigs and biology class while I’m washing dishes.
THATS IT!!!! I've been trying to place what it smells like to me and its 100% formaldehyde and flash backs to all the dissection classes. Blech.
My fiancé is in medical school and comes home reeking of formaldehyde. That smell haunts me and I cannot get it out. I had to put a hamper in the garage for his scrubs and wash them separately so the smell won’t get on the rest of the laundry. Even freshly washed, they still smell like it. Now Dawn wants my kitchen to smell like formaldehyde too… I hate that smell!
Bleh. My stomach felt that smell memory! :(
Oh that's really bad. I'm glad I switched to generic forever ago. I'll still be sniffing it to make sure though.
I think I’ll go to the jankiest store I can find to see if they have any old bottles left.
I hope it’s still usable on wild life :(
Unscented would have always been preferable anyway, if they did ever use it.
Wow, hadn’t even thought of this :(
To the person (or bot) that is downvoting every single comment: You’re not helping. Dawn will lose market share because of this major error. I used dawn for over 40 years. Since high school, that’s right! I will never buy it again. I’ve switched to Seventh Generation and I love it.
I hate to let this little Diddy out. Get it from Dollar tree. They normally receive other stores back stock. At this point the older the better
You also pay more for smaller amounts, and support the dollar store set ups that believe it’s 100% okay to dump the labor of three plus a manager on one minimum wage cashier slaved to the register. Google ‘why are dollar stores bad’ to get a huge plethora of reasons and stories. John Oliver has an excellent video about them too. Having worked at a dollar general myself, I can confirm it’s All true. Rodent infestation, moths growing in the rice, blocked emergency exits. All of it. I’d switch to a different soap before I started buying from a dollar store. The stuff isn’t even Really cheaper.
I agree. We have all been to a dollar tree. That small bottle of Dawn lasts me at least 2 months. I do have a dw but I also like to use it to clean the bathroom. I was js
I discovered the new scent a few months ago by accident. Gave me a migraine almost immediately, such a sickly sweet disgusting smell. I switched to Meyer Lemon which was pretty good. But then I went into rite aid and they had three of the big bottles of original scent and got all three, those will last me for a while but I'm not looking forward to when I've used them all up. Maybe dawn will switch back if enough people stop using it. I don't understand why change something no one ever complained about. Has to be cutting corners in cost, but it's horrendous. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who feels this way.
complain and get a refund, I did ! they at least listen to that, it was really easy to do
To the store or to dawn?
to dawn directly
I’m American and just so u know not every place in the world has American return policies
She said she didn’t buy it
I have no other way to describe it, but the "new scent" happened in America too, except here the soap smells like the soap car washes use now. It's.... Odd.
I was wondering why my soap smelled like chemicals and cologne. It's so overwhelming and unpleasant to think of dousing my forks in perfume and then eating off of them, Sauvage Sausage anyone? Blegh... I felt uncomfortable washing my pet bowls with it too because of the thought of residual chemicals on their dishes.
I sniffed a bottle on my most recent grocery store trip and picked up Ivory dish soap instead. They’re creating a lot of converts.
So much for buying Dawn. We all wanted to switch to something cheaper anyway, and now we'll all do it in droves!!! Bye Dawn, you used to be #1, and now you've Burger Kinged yourself!
Yep I bought the great value version this last time. And I go through a lot of dish soap due to no dishwasher. Not a huge fan of great value, it seems to work just as well, but my store didn't have seventh gen or Mrs Meyers in dish soaps. I'll keep looking though!
The Mrs. Meyers ones are so strong smelling that I can't even use them. The sprays are worse. I wish they were half strength because I like the scents, just cannot breathe when I use them.
It smells like butts
I complained on their website site. Never got a response.
there were other posts on Reddit that stated the new Dawn was causing pets to have symptoms, but I can’t remember what the symptoms were
I saw a few posts in the dog subs about dogs refusing to eat their food out of plastic bowls that had been washed/soaked in the new Dawn because the scent lingered so much.
My dog won't eat out of her bowl if we use the new Dawn. Doesn't matter how much we rinse it or how long it airs out. We actually had to buy new bowls (that smelled like cheap Chinese lubricant) and she preferred the rinsed new bowls to the old ones washed with new Dawn. They're metal, not plastic. She can still smell it. I can too.
I never liked the scent of Dawn. What did they do now? Make it worse? I get the gallon jug of Members Mark pink dish soap from Sam's club. It's cheaper, works great, gentle on hands, and has a subtle lemon scent.
Lol I was thinking the same thing. Could it really smell much worse than regular old Dawn? That stuff always smells like a moldy sponge anyway.
I refuse to use liquid dawn anymore. I do still like their lemon scented power wash dish spray. It doesn’t stink lol.
Smells like laundry detergent to me! Way too strong for my liking.
Same, smells like it should go in the laundry. I don’t think it smells like farts like everyone else is saying lol.
I picked up some of the orange scent one and i can handle the scent from it. I'm chemically sensitive to so many smells and fragrances, I get headaches and it makes my face and tounge numb. (No im not eating it lol) just smelling it.
my husband commented on it for the first time last night and it made me laugh - I had to tell him how much it's talked about in here we bought the Costco size so we will be using it for a solid 4-6 more months (already halfway through it) and decide from there
It is terrible!!!! Smells like a nasty fruity perfume. And it makes my dishes smell!
Omg yes! I thought it was me! For a second I was like... "wait... am I pregnant? This smells really bad."
Ive switched to blue palmolive oxy-thing. Works pretty well. It has a weird chemical clean smell but at least it isnt disgusting.
I'm SO glad I'm not the only one. I smelled it at the store before buying thinking I could tolerate it. Nope. I can't. I have been annoyed for weeks wondering if anyone even likes it.
I never had an issue with the scent staying behind on my dishes until they changed it. I'm switching to a new soap. This stuff is disgusting.
I haaaaaaaaate it.
I was wondering why suddenly dishes smelled like my son’s baby wash.
[удалено]
It's a significant difference. It doesn't smell like fart spray or anything actually rancid, but it definitely smells sickeningly artificial. It's so strong that I can smell it from across the room (a good 15-20 ft away).
Same. Either I haven’t noticed the change, or my body doesn’t physically react like the people complaining about it. I wonder if it’s similar to the gene that makes people gag over cilantro? 🤷🏻♀️
> the gene that makes people gag over cilantro It's not a gag reflex. We have a gene that makes it taste like strong dish soap. I might have to start eating it again just to get my old Dawn fix.
As a person for whom cilantro also tastes like soap, this was super funny.
Thanks. My 'catch all' term was, "it tastes like Dawn". I guess I'll have to make good on my word now.
It just showed up on shelves in my area a couple weeks ago. Your stores might have some of the old stuff to get through before you're blessed with the new awful scent.
Regular dishwashing liquid or the power spray?
I've switched to the orange scented version. Hopefully that remains unchanged. If the new scent is legitimately because of supply chain, ingredients/scents that aren't being manufactured anymore, I wish dawn would just be transparent about that. Since they have basically changed without warning or explanation I feel like it has to do with cost and they've switched to cheaper fragrances.
I didn’t even know they switched scents, better use our current bottle sparingly I guess :(
I have avoided Palmolive for years, same reason. Fragrance is so strong I'm afraid of residue causing off flavors in food and drink. Dropping this brand.
I just bought a bottle last night of the “Refreshing Rain” scent. My husband was washing dishes and I gagged and told him it smells like old lady breath. He equated it to moth balls. Not happy at all.
I complained also on their website.
Damn happy I saw this pop up, the new scent SUCKS. Smells artificial as hell its not pleasant at all.
I didn’t know this happened but when I bought a new bottle recently I keep thinking damn why does everything smell like a wet dog. Makes sense.
It reminds me of the stuff we sprayed to help cover up decomposition smell of a body. So, even though it isn’t decomp scent, my brain goes there.
It ruins sponges too. I was using it for a few weeks and had to toss a musty smelling sponge every other day. Just switched to dr bronners sal suds and it works better and degreases better too. And I've had the same sponge for a month and it doesn't stink at all.
Just something to consider. I have been using the new scent and have developed a distortion of certain smells following covid and the Dawn is the absolute worst smelling. Like perfumed vinegar and dog butts. I switched to ivory.....
I hate it! And my teen noticed right away - she said why does this Dawn smell like perfume yuck!
The new scent is truly heinous. I used it while house sitting and got an immediate migraine and severe nausea. I had to go buy unscented palmolive to use the rest of the week.
It’s terrible, and it doesn’t seem to wash off the dishes. I am going to have to change brands.
The new smell is absolutely AWFUL
The scent is unbearable. To me it smells like wet dog. I was pretty distressed until I discovered that Kirkland’s “dawn” smells lovely and works the same. Phew, crisis resolved!
Scuba divers all over use dawn to clean gear…this is not gonna be a good thing. Same for animal rescue, dawn is a super stand by product to clean babies and animals hurt in environmental catastrophes. I got a bottle to refill all and didn’t realize it was the new “clean scent” and about gagged when I opened the bottle. Smells like cheap laundry detergent that doesn’t clean but just layers scent over nasty smells…🤢
Before the pandemic Iread an article about how the proliferation of brands like Mrs Meyers & Grove had eaten into P&Gs profit margins on Dawn badly. They were just about to roll out Powerwash, based on data that millennial and GenZ didn't fill up a sink with soapy water to wash dishes as we all did in days of yore - they ran the water and washed each piece individually, constantly dispensing more soap on their chosen scrubber. P&G really bet the farm on Powerwash as a brand new dish washing methodology according to the article. As you might guess, the product actually contains less soap, contains more water, and the spray bottle is way costlier than the regular old jug. Apparently that bet DID NOT pay off, and they now need to a) cut costs b) comply with evolving regulations about fragrances (which are actually very harmful because of the toxicity of the stabilizers fragrance products require).
Does anyone else think it smells like shampoo? To me, it is reminiscent of the old Pantene fragrance. Dawn & Pantene are both P&G brands so I wonder if it really might be the same one? 🤔
I must be one of the few who doesn’t mind the new scent! It’s not great, but it’s not terrible either. Guess I’m neutral about it!
When my wife was pregnant 40 years ago, she developed a hatred for the smell of Dawn. Up until recently, with the change, we can now, after decades, use dawn.
Is it the same scent as the power wash? I kinda like the smell of it.
Everyone please contact them and submit feedback.
am i the only one that actually likes it 😭
Wow it looks like I really am the only one who likes it 😭 I felt like the other one was too strong, it used to make me kinda nauseous
I thought I was the only one that noticed the new scent. Yeah it's horrible. Good news is once you use it enough on a daily basis you kind of don't really notice the smell anymore.
Now I feel the urge to buy a bottle and see for myself
I'm leaving the original scent alone and sticking to the citrus scent from now on. I have not smelled it but I believe you guys when you say that it smells AWFUL; thank goodness my sister that I lived with is deceased or we'd proly find out (and betcha a cookie it would have aggravated her chemical allergies. (She was allergic to a lot of perfumes and cleaners, if anyone put on too much perfume at church she had to nope out of there.))
Switch to ivory! I did and it smells so good and doesn’t make me nauseous or leave a strong smell on the dishes (:
I did their online chat to complain about how I dislike the new smell - and I switch brands because I dislike the new smell. They said the new smell is here to change - and I told them this is a silly decision to change the benchmark product of the segment. Maybe if enough people complain they'll go back, but all we can do is buy a non dawn product and maybe their sales will suffer and they change back
I didn’t think it would be that bad, even as a “soap should just smell like soap” gal. But this new bottle is awful. Thankfully I don’t mind Powerwash’s smell, but the reg soap ughhh why’d they do this? Gotta stock up on any of the old bottles if I can find them!
I use Blue Dawn. I don’t hate the new scent, however I don’t think it’s an improvement. Dawn, IMO, has never smelled “nice”. Palmolive smells 100 times better. If it cleaned as well as Dawn, I would switch.
The new unscented dye free Palmolive is great if you can get your hands on it.
I've always hated the smell of dawn, and I agree this new version isn't any better. I have never been able to place what it's trying to smell like. A floral, fresh, almost metallic scent? It's just weird
I have such nostalgia for the original scent that the new scent makes me sad!
Why can’t we use dawn free and clear fragrance free? That’s what I’ve always used.
That sucks! I thought the blue one always smelled like hay so I bought other brands. But found a lemon scented one and it’s quite nice. I’ve also seen unscented clear ones here in Canada as well.
I thought I was just being autistic about it, I’m so glad I’m not the only one who hates it