GRITT Abrasive Hand Soap: grittsoap.com (use code TRACK15 for 15% off your order)
Now that the oil leaks on my project Audi TT are officially sorted, I’m now dealing with the aftermath: years of accumulated road grime and dried-up oil stains in the engine bay and undercarriage. I usually use the typical liquid hand cleaners made by Fast Orange or Gojo, but a new brand I haven’t heard of called GRITT reached out and sent over their sample pack of abrasive bar soaps to test out. The kit includes 3 different grits: 80, 120, and 220 “gritt”.
I remember using Lava hand soaps a long time ago because that what my dad always had at home, and they’ve always worked just fine. It feels like pumice bar soaps like these have fallen out of favor over the past decade or so, but seeing a modern take on these traditional bar soaps definitely caught my intesest.
The first thing I noticed about these soaps is that they smell amazing. I’ve gotten kind of tired of the somewhat artificial orange or cherry smells that you get with the majority of hand cleaners out there. This was a very refreshing surprise to smell this amazing blend of ocean and pine fragrance. It actually make me want to use these soaps, even for normal everyday hand washing!
What’s also great about these GRITT soaps is its straightforward formulation of 6 ingredients: coconut oil, castor oil, graded pumice, purified water, natural soap and premium fragrances.
To test the lineup, I started with the Light 220 “gritt” soap. It still did a great job at cleaning my fairly dirty and oily hands after working on my car. Texture-wise, this bar feels relatively smooth to the touch, but it still offers enough mild abrasion to cut through light oil and grease.
After some more cleaning of my car of all the oil that had dried up underneath the car, I tried both the Medium 120 gritt and Heavy 80 gritt soaps. The green-colored medium soap is a step up in scrub power without being overly harsh on your skin. For me, this is probably the roughest I’d go with my own hands. With the dark-grey colored heavy gritt soap, it was pretty rough on my hands, although it certainly got my hands very clean.
I think these GRITT abrasive bar soaps are very appealing and have certain benefits over the typical liquid hand cleaners. One clear functional advantage of a bar soap over a liquid dispenser is targeted scrubbing. If you have grease in certain spots that you want to attack, you can use the physical edge of the bar soap where you need it. When lathered up, all three bars cover well and rinse clean without leaving a slick residue behind.
After using these GRITT bar soaps, I found two things that I really liked. The first is the scent. I think this is the best smelling abrasive hand cleaner that I’ve ever used. It’s never overpowering or artificial-smelling, just a clean and refershing scent everytime I use it.
The second thing is that they work really well at getting your hands clean. Sometimes I have sunscreen or something like dried wood glue that I need removed from my hands and using an abrasive bar soap like this gets the job done. Each of these grits work slightly differently, so if you are interested in using these, it’s worth trying the sample pack, so you know which one works best for you.
As for the downsides, I have a couple. First, the price is a bit high for my liking. It currently sells for $12.50 per bar if you buy it individually, or $10 per bar if you’re buying a 3-pack. I feel like the price is a bit high compared to the alternatives out there. GRITT does offer a 10% off discount on their website if you buy a 3-pack, but you can also use our discount code (see top or bottom of this review) to get 15% off your purchase.
Another drawback is that if you have multiple bars of soap (e.g. having multiple grit soaps out all at once), you don’t really have a place for them at your sink. Conversely, liquid soaps sit neatly in a single pump bottle on the edge of the sink or even inside a utility sink. Having three separate bars of soap out isn’t exactly an ideal setup.
If you do have multiple bar soaps out together, they tend to stick to one another making it difficult to pull apart when when it’s time to use it. If I had to choose one, I would stick to just the light 80-gritt or the medium 120-gritt bar and keep one out at a time.
If you’ve been using the standard liquid hand cleaner and want a refreshing change, try these GRITT bar soaps out. Like me, you might just find that you really enjoy using bar hand cleaners over the liquid ones. But if there’s one thing that seals the deal for me, it’s the incredible scent that make cleaning my dirtied hands really enjoyable.
GRITT Abrasive Hand Soap: grittsoap.com (use code TRACK15 for 15% off your order)
