Local businesses keep things clean – and green

When friends Heather Brown and Ruthanne Eberly decided to enter the workforce after several years as stay-at-home moms, they wanted careers that their kids—ages 2, 3, 5, 6 and 8—could be a part of.

So what are they doing blending cleaning products from scratch inside Eberly’s home?

The women run Maid Naturally, a housecleaning service that manufactures and uses all-natural cleansers. Instead of exposing their clients — and their families — to the toxic ingredients typically found in conventional products, Brown and Eberly use baking soda, essential oils, pumice, and other earth-friendly elements when creating their goods.

Maid Naturally seems to have found a niche in the Spokane market. After just one year in business, the company regularly cleans the homes of more than 50 clients and recently began offering its product line at Rosauers Supermarkets and Yoke’s Fresh Market stores. And, Brown and Eberly can safely run their operation with their families within reach.

“We’re very much a family business,” Eberly says. “I think our husbands are way more involved than they ever thought they would be in a maid service.”

Maid Naturally is one of at least two housecleaning services in the Spokane area that uses nontoxic products. Another is All-Natural Cleaning, run by sisters-in-law Gina Vorpahl and Illa Davis.

“There’s definitely a demand out there for natural cleaning,” Vorpahl says. “Because it’s so new, people are just starting to research it and finding out there are some of us out there.”

Vorpahl and Davis employ two workers and between the four of them handle a full schedule of clients every week.

Sometimes, new clients are skeptical that natural cleaners will work as well as tried-and-true labels such as Pine-Sol and Comet, Vorpahl says. She herself admits to being a Formula 409 junkie before April Gleason, the former owner of her company, turned her onto the alternative.

“(Natural cleaners are) all I use in my own home now,” Vorpahl says. “Having kids and having had a little Yorkie (dog) running around, you can spray whatever you’re going to spray and feel comfortable.”

Both companies say their employees benefit, too, from not being exposed to harmful ingredients day after day.

“It takes a little more elbow grease, but it’s easier on their hands,” Vorpahl says. “And when they’re cleaning showers, in that enclosed space, it doesn’t gag them.”

The companies’ rates are comparable, if not lower than, conventional competitors. Vorpahl laughs, saying that should be the case, since the price of a big bag of baking soda — one of her key cleaning ingredients — is so cheap. The essential oils, some of which disinfect and some of which simply smell good, are more expensive, but a small amount goes a long way. Vorpahl buys her oils from local natural foods stores.

Gleason, who called her business Clean Green before turning it over to Vorpahl and Davis, started the company in 2004 as a way to educate people about safer ways to clean. Clean Green grew quickly — too quickly for Gleason, who wanted to spend more time with her children.

“I was really impressed that Spokane was so receptive,” she says.

Gleason, a longtime environmentalist, researched what people used to clean their homes in the decades before the explosion of products that’s available today. She came up with three mixes that would work well on any surface and called the American Lung Association to ensure that her cleaners were safe.

For Brown and Eberly of Maid Naturally, using natural ingredients became a way of life after they had children and began researching the makeup of vaccinations, which their kids were scheduled to receive. Not liking what they saw, the women turned their backs on chemicals. They started feeding their families organic food and eventually began a business that reflected their lifestyle.

Brown says about 75 percent of their referrals come from people who see their advertisements hanging on the bulletin boards at Huckleberry’s Natural Market, in Spokane.

“We have some referrals from people who are very much interested in all-natural cleaning,” she says. Others, though, are just looking for hard-working housekeepers.

Client Alison Zecha falls into both categories. She began using Maid Naturally’s cleaning service about a year ago when she was pregnant with her son.

“I was comforted when I found out there were two young women starting a business, and they wanted to do something that was good for their families,” the Spokane resident says.

The company cleans her home once a month, and Zecha uses Maid Naturally’s products between appointments.

“The house is just as clean and in many respects cleaner (than before) because we don’t have that residual chemical stuff left over,” she says.