Starting today, the supermarket chain Irma will stop selling fabric softener at its 81 stores. The chain said it was dropping the product as part of a clean water initiative.
“Fabric softener is an unnecessary product that increases water pollution,” Irma environmental spokesperson Signe Frese told DR Nyheder. “There are other ways to soften clothes.”
Frese said that sales of softener had been declining in recent years, so Irma made the decision to drop them completely.
Not completely gone
The decision was praised by clean water advocates DANVA.
“Fabric softeners are an unnecessary additive that increases the amount of work required at wastewater treatment plants, which also affect the aquatic environment,” DANVA spokesperson Helle Katrine Andersen told DR Nyheder.
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Irma is a subsidiary of Coop, Denmark’s largest retailer, and although fabric softeners are disappearing from its shelves, Coop will continue to sell them at its other chains, which include Kvickly, Fakta and SuperBrugsen.
“We are not removing them from our other stores because we are not sure that our customers are 100 percent on board yet,” said Frese.
“If Coop completely stops selling fabric softeners, customers who do not understand the environmental impact will jut buy them at another shop.”
