Purely Products BlogResponsible Products for Responsible Living

As this NY Times article begins, Food scares, such as the latest salmonella outbreak and egg recall, often trigger a rethinking in cooking and shopping habits. Any kind of recall or universal food scare triggers a rethinking of our habits and sends us scurrying for fixes and remedies. For a while. Then, the scare moves out of the headlines, and how many of us slack off from our new clean and healthy living habits?  Too much trouble. Forgot to do it today. Just this once won’t hurt.

This full article on creating a clean kitchen, In the Age of Recalls, Tips for a Pathogen-Free Kitchen reminds us,  “This summer’s huge egg recall was the latest reminder that we do battle against dangerous pathogens like E. coli and salmonella in our kitchens every day. And the battle is expensive.”

Recently a nutritionist reviewed Pocket Purifer, the handheld UV germ-killer that kills 99.9% of germs that cause colds and flu, plus E. coli and salmonella, along with mold, fungus and MRSA (staph). Among several suggestions is using the right cutting board and keeping it sanitized.

“First a dietician, now a nutritionist, I used this product in the kitchen to sanitize the surface of my cutting board after cutting raw chicken and then switching to lettuce.”  

Ultraviolet light technology, a non-chemical approach to disinfection, is used in sewage treatment plants, hospital clean rooms and many other areas where killing bacteria, viruses and spores is crucial.

So how does UV light work?  UV-C light is germicidal,  deactivating the DNA of bacteria, viruses and other pathogens and thus destroying their ability to multiply and cause disease. Specifically, UV-C light causes damage to the nucleic acid of microorganisms, preventing the DNA from being unzipped for replication, and the organism is unable to reproduce. In fact, when the organism tries to replicate, it dies. A very satisfying thought for any chef.

After cleaning with your favorite eco-friendly cleaner, give those cutting boards and counters a once-over (15 -20 seconds over the surface at about a distance of 2-3 inches).  If you’re looking to green up your kitchen, cut down on your chemical exposure and keep your family healthier- this compact, lightweight, good-looking but deadly little germ-killer may be just the thing you want to pop in your kitchen drawer and pull out often.

We‘re looking for a few good foodies to try Pocket Purifier! Anyone game? DM us @purelyproducts and tell us what you think of kitchen germs.

We love any blogger’s post that includes the shout-out, “Purely Products is my kind of company.” But then able2able.com put Healthy CFL, the little air purifier wrapped in a compact fluorescent lightbulb, to the ultimate smell test – baby poo and doggie drool.

You can read her entire review including her passion for Pocket Purifier here, but check out her family’s bottom line on the bulb.

“I also reviewed the Healthy light bulb. This innocent looking compact fluorescent lightbulb actually has an air purifier in its middle. The Healthy CFL cleans the air of cigarette smoke, pollen, mold, germs, dust, odors, pet dander and other airborne contaminants. As it cleans, the built-in ionizer also counters the draining effects of positive ions emitted every day by items like computers, cell phones, televisions, and forced air ventilation, while flowing a steady stream of refreshing negative ions into the air to boost mood and energy. Yeah, I was happy to have two of these in my home!

So does the Healthy CFL work?

My Red Dog loves to sneak on the couch when we are out on Clara-Bear’s longer appointment days. I discovered he was drooling on my couch when I started coming home to a closed up house with a funky smell. Now I leave the living room light with the Healthy CFL bulbs in it and I no longer notice a dog smell or closed up stuffy smell, even with the a/c turned up to 79 degrees. Since the Healthy CFL uses 80% less energy than a traditional light bulb we have not noticed an increase in our electricity bill with the light on all day.

I also had to move my essential oil diffuser out of the living room since I could not smell my beautiful oils. And I put the Healthy CFL to the ultimate, grossest test yesterday. I changed a super-pooper diaper underneath it, turned the a/c temp up, and left the house for an hour. I was relieved not to smell poop when we returned!”

“Since we have a houseful of asthma, allergies, and exzema, I really like knowing that allergens and triggers are being cleaned by the Healthy CFL’s along with the funk.”

Got any household funk issues for the little light bulb that could to take on?  Two free  Healthy CFLs to the grossest funk challenge! Thru 9/15/10.

As the economy pushes families to scrutinize household budgets even more intensely, mom’s influence has solidly increased  in all family purchases, according to a recent report from Experian Marketing Services reported on by Media Post News.  69% of moms report being  “the most influential person in the household when it comes to making purchase decisions.”

And from organic milk to free range chicken, the trend is moving swiftly from thinking green to buying green. “The growth trend toward green purchases among younger moms, at this point, is outpacing the 35-and-older mothers by at least 5% a year.” The report  attributes it, especially with moms under 35, to “more information available about the impact of green choices on children’s health.”

Bloggers this summer reviewing Pocket Purifier, the handheld germ-eliminating UV light  from Purely Products, just  in time for the back to school germ wars bore this out.

Real Moms Real Views asked,”Why would you not avoid getting sick if you could?  Well…TADA!  You  can! Did I ever test it out!  I used it on my keyboard, my toothbrush, the sponge, my puppy’s toys, my cell…everything I could think of. Now you can kill germs without chemicals, isn’t that very green chic!?”

Or as RealMommy365 explained, “I have a large family with 8 children and that means I’m in a constant war with germs. I love that the Pocket Purifier is chemical free and so would my followers. Most of my followers are similar to me in that they prefer more natural choices when it comes to their families.”

After disinfecting stuff at home, it was time to take it on the road! First stop, the food court at our local mall. While the hubby did the ordering, I whipped out my new “toy” and began to sanitize the table. I had quite a few stares from people wondering what I was doing with that cool light.“

We have more reviews from Moms, on the watch for their children’s health and well-being, on Purely Products’ Facebook page. Go there to hear it straight from the source – out of the mouths of moms.

What steps do you take to protect your children from germs? And more importantly, tell us -  would you be willing to zap a fast food table with a gizmo that looks like something out of Men in Black?

That’s one of the conclusions from a mother with an environmental science background with an interest in brain chemistry exploring the contributing factors to ADD, attention deficit disorder.  In a blog on her website, Born to Explore, The Other Side of ADD, Teresa Gallagher details a plan to create balance with hormones that affect brain chemistry. 

Our ears perked up when she got to serotonin levels.

Serotonin is a hormone that is found naturally in the human brain. Serotonin can be considered a “happy” hormone, as it greatly influences an overall sense of well-being. It also helps to regulate moods, temper, anxiety, and relieve depression. It is also credited with being a natural sleep aid.

Gallagher lists stress, modern food processing, lack of exercise & sleep, poor nutrition, and deionized air as principal causes of  reduced serotonin levels.

21st century lifestyles take their toll even as they make life easier with all the eletronics that fill every possible crook and nanny (uh, that would be nook and cranny if I were paying attention) of our lives. Gallagher ticks off a top ten plus one list of proactive, non-medicating, more organic steps to take to create more balance in your brain’s lab.

Tips 1 through 10, you can incorporate some healthy new lifestyle habits right now, like more sleep and exercise, improve your diet, meditate or do yoga, keep cool, add in B vitamins, look for ways to relieve stress every day.

Tip No. 11?

“Buy an air ionizer. Yes, it sounds weird, but air with negatively charged particles appears to help out serotonin in the brain. Pollution and the modern world have nearly eliminated naturally charged air in urban areas. You can feel the pleasant effect of negative ions wherever there is running water, like an ocean beach or near a waterfall. The opposite – positive ions – are generated by warm winds moving over dry land, like the Santa Ana winds of California, which are known to increase irritability…”

Tip #11. Got that covered. Plug into Ionic Lifestyle. 

Negative ion generators that emit 2,000,000 negative ions (also known as anions) per cubic centimeter counter the energy-draining effects of positive ions emitted by electronics, household materials, and other trappings of modern living. In your car, at your computer, in front of your big-screen tv – wherever you are bombarded by positive ions, you can plug in an Ionic Lifestyle unit  from Purely Products, a leader in negative ion technology, and naturally charge the air, increasing “feel good” serotonin levels and improving oxygen flow to the brain. 

Check out this mom’s recommendations to engage the help of this hard working “happiness molecule.”  Can you see integrating any of these changes into your life to see the difference they could make?

Lots of things to think about here, before the big homecoming, including “Consider any allergies or health concerns, since many types of pets have fur that can aggravate allergies and asthma.“  And (imagine) we just happen to have some advice for you on that one. Clean, healthy (and odor-free) living with pets is not a contradiction in terms. 

New Pet CFL (how cute are those faces on the box?) helps remove pet odors and dander (an allergen that aggravates asthma and allergies), along with smoke, dust, pollen and mold spores. It’s got a built-in air purifier inside the energy-saving, money-miser compact fluorescent lightbulb. Which will come in handy when you have to get up a lot at night to soothe a crying puppy and take him ouside. So swap out your lightbulbs, take a deep breath and check out the Buttoned Up Way to greet the newest member of the family.  

How does your family handle  the “I WANT A  PUPPY!” campaign?

From all of us at Purely Products, a big THANK YOU (ooops, all caps is shouting), thank you to tweeters and followers, fanners and likers

of the 2010 Purely Earth Day Giveaway. Your Pocket Purifier, HealthyCFL or SunMate to make clean, healthy living easier will soon be on the way to you. (Giveaway ended April 23 12:01 am)

We can’t answer everyone in this space, but here are some random clips from posts and answers. A few are recycled from Earth Day emails, comments & tweets, but hey, Earth Day is all about the recycling.

To our new FB liker in Pell City, AL and others wondering: YES, to us liking is the same as fanning and definitely giveaway-worthy. And thank you Facebook for the running change during our giveaway. Either verb works for us.

@EcoBlogz. Absolutely, we want you to review Pocket Purifer. New bloggers found us on Earth Day!

@ScottSchablow “Greetings Purely Products people of earth,” We like being addressed as people of earth.  Thanks for fan/like/follow and that lovely old fashioned fav, “warmest regards.”

To S in Knoxville  Thanks for calling it an ”Awesome giveaway,” @KatTansey who tweeted “great promo idea” and @CourtV who found it an ”interesting campaign.”

@aemccarthy Thank you for your excitement over your “green mystery thing.”  Congrats on just beginning to use CFLs and declaring that “Healthy CFL looks so awesome!”  Fyi, it is. Watch it eat cigarette smoke like PacMan.

To J. in Knoxville, wondering in your email  if you were one of the 2010. Yes, you are. 

@ghmiller As far as your daughter’s study light, @purelymyron chimed in and he has a solid opinion on wattage and Kelvin for best reading.  Stay tuned. We want your daughter to have a very bright future in her studies.

To D who heard us on The Phil Williams Show. Thanks for your loyalty to hometown business and thanks to Phil for the giveaway shoutout.

To someone – we can’t remember this minute – who emailed, asking for the “sun thing.” We assume you meant  SunMate and not the actual star that is the center of our Solar System and 1,392,000 kilometers away from Earth. Cause we can’t ship that.

To H in Knoxville who already knew us. ”… I love the products your company has to offer.” Thank you.

To J. in Canal Fulton, OH who wants a black Pocket Purifer and @HilLesha who wants a pink one, you’re both going to love what this little germ-eliminator can do.  

We like knowing we were part of over 31 billion acts of green on Earth Day. We like following in the corporate carbon-cutting footsteps of Arm & Hammer, the first and sole corporate sponsor of Earth Day 1970. We like getting to know you getting to know us…starting a conversation…taking eco-nomical steps together… your trying Purely Products and taking time to share.

And finally, to the bright eyed toddler visiting her daddy at Purely corporate headquarters on Earth Day wearing a green tie-dyed shirt proclaiming, I love my planet  … Thank you for helping us remember Earth Day is really all about you.

Thanks y’all for a Purely awesome 2010 Earth Day. We like (fan/follow) you, too!

Clean and healthy living is a bit easier and FREE with 2010 Purely Earth Day Giveaway.  Purely Products celebrates Earth Day 2010 all week long with a FREE Pocket Purifier (handheld germ eliminating light) or  SunMate (handheld UV strength index monitor) or Healthy CFL (lightbulb wrapped around an air purifier) to the first 2010 registrants from April 16 – April 23, 2010. We’ll randomly send you one of these products and we would simply ask that you try it out and tell us and your Twitter or Facebook groups what you think.  We’re excited to hear your opinion.

Be ONE of 2010 for 2010. It’s easy.

1. Become a fan on Purely Products Facebook fan page & share our post of the 2010 Purely Earth Day Giveaway
   OR
2. Become a new Twitter follower  @purelyproducts & retweet the promotion (of course you can do both)
   IF
3. You’re already a Purely Products Facebook  fan or a Twitter follower, share the post on your FB page or retweet the promotion.
   THEN
4. Email us at  customerservice at purelyproducts.com and tell us if you tweeted or Facebook fanned us and include your shipping address. (You know, of course, to NOT post your shipping address on Facebook or Twitter – EVER, right?)

• The first 2010 emails received will be shipped absolutely FREE (even shipping is on us!) one Purely Products Pocket Purifier OR a SunMate OR Healthy CFL (choice of free product at discretion of Purely Products due to availability)
• Limit 1 (one) product per email registrant
• Limited to US and Canada shipping addresses

And, of course you are FREE to tweet about being 1 of 2010 winners  in 2010 and tell your groups about your 2010 Purely Earth Day gift.

Promotion ends April 23, 12:01 am EST

But keep Earth Day in your heart – and your clean and healthy living choices – all year long!

Yep. Really. Clean and healthy probably aren’t words one typically uses to describe spring break. But when the Knoxville Ice Bears asked us to put together a prize for their Chuck-A-Puck giveaway, that’s precisely what we gave them: a clean and healthy spring break.

The Purely Cool Spring Break Package featured a Pocket Purifier™ hand-held germ eliminating light. Think about it… rest stop bathrooms, hotel TV remote controls, the stroller, running shoes, the backpack after the fast food floor spill. The Pocket Purifier kills 99.9 percent of germs in 15 seconds … even on spring break.

Then we threw in the SunMate™ hand held UV monitor to measure UV strength intensity. This helpful little ’mate’ will  take out the guess work on which SPF number sunscreen to use on sunny and cloudy days, when it may not look like UV rays can do any damage.

Finally, we made sure a clean and healthy spring break was possible from start to finish by tossing in the IonicLifestyle™ car negative ion generator. It plugs into the 12-volt outlet in your car to eliminate dust, pollen, smoke and fumes. Oh, and it also helps fight odors, which we figured might also be a problem in your car on spring break.

You might even say this little ionizer also helps fight “fights”, or at least helps keep things a bit calmer in the back seat. Negative ions can actually boost positive vibes … even if you’re stuck on the interstate.

The winning dad was thrilled that he was heading off with a carful of kids on a clean and healthy spring break. As for making them behave … well, we have our limitations.

What other ways can you think of that might make spring break clean and healthy? Drop them in the comments. The best idea gets an IonicLifestyle negative ion generator for your car for your clean and healthy spring break trip!

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Say hello to Purely Products new Executive Vice President of Sales, Tony Pecoraro. You might not know his name, but you will know the national brand names he has helped to grow over the past thirty years– household names like Helen of Troy (Revlon, Bed Head, Vidal Sassoon Hair Care Appliances), Nordic Ware, Litton Microwave, Magic Chef, and  As Seen on TV, K-Tel.  Tony has enjoyed a thriving, successful, satisfying career and led his salesmen and companies to thrive, grow and contribute to the marketplace. In one of our first conversations, the question popped up, How did you get into sales? His ready answer was, Someone saw something in me.

The story he told sounded like the opening scenes of Tom Hank’s tribute film to the early 1960’s, That Thing You Do. As a teen-ager, Tony worked every Saturday as a delivery boy in Buffalo, New York for one of those long gone neighborhood mom and pop appliance stores.  One day, the owner, Don Pirson, told Tony his customers had been raving about the helpful, conscientious young man who delivered their appliance, set it up, patiently walked them through the manual and answered all their questions.

Don asked Tony to show up the following Saturday in a jacket and tie instead of jeans. It was time for Tony to learn more than just delivery. Also working in the store were five retired gentlemen – all salesmen – who just could not retire. Each had been successful in their respective fields, from utilities to furniture to stocks & bonds, with a lifetime education in sales and service to offer. These six gentlemen chose to take him under their wing. Tony listened, learned and modeled everything he saw – what serving a customer with excellence truly meant.

So instead of following a career after college in psychology (like all natural salesmen, people fascinate Tony), he pursued a career in sales, moving vertically through sales management positions for some of America’s best loved household brands into senior management.  Thirty years of serving his customers followed, just like when raving customers called Don Pirson about him, only now he was serving in a national and international arena.

Which is why coming to Purely Products was a next logical step. The founder and president preaches and lives the gospel of raving customers – customers who are madly in love with you because you served them well. Tony sees opportunity and the vision of this thriving eco-minded, consumer-demand driven company. He is excited about expanding and opening up new channels for Purely’s innovative clean and healthy living brand. 

However, Tony also saw something powerful in Purely’s heart to give back by helping children as part of its business model.  A percentage of all Purely Products’ sales support diaperLove™ a non-profit supplying diapers to children in need.  Tony sees the Purely paradigm as “the new American entrepreneurial spirit that unites strong business practices with social responsibility.” Again, it’s all about serving with excellence.

Twenty years into his career, Tony got the opportunity to go back to Buffalo and thank Don Pirson for seeing something in him and taking the time to help him develop natural gifts. The other five gentlemen who mentored him were no longer around to thank, but when asked, their names – Judd Rosengrant, Ellsworth Layer, Abbie Goldman, Eddie Wolmuth, George White – roll off his tongue as quickly as the names of friends he saw last week. Unforgettable, these six gentlemen from Buffalo. We thank them, too.

Tell us about someone who springs to mind who saw something in you.

At its founding in 2006, Purely Products blazed a narrowly targeted trail to fill a market niche and offer the best germicidal ultraviolet bulbs available. A few years in, we are the leading national brand with the largest selection of 100% quartz UV replacement bulbs and our customers trust us to take good care of them.

But suddenly, people with very good ideas for fresh new consumer techie products found us to collaborate. Innovative ideas, sometimes startlingly so. Lifestyle enhancing. Problem solving. Clean and healthy living driven. Carbon footprint shrinking. Products you fold into your day – the kind that cause friends to ask, Where’d you get that? How does that work? Who knew? Products with intriguing what if’s?

What if we wrapped an energy-efficient compact fluorescent light bulb around an air purifier? So it not only uses less energy than an incandescent and saves CO2 emission, but also cleans the air with a built-in ionizer – so you can love your cat (as much as a cat will allow it) pet your dog and lose the dander and the odor?

What if Purely’s ionizer technology came in a nifty car adaptor you just plug in and it emitted negative ions that lift your mood, leaving you feeling energized? So you feel a bit more like you’re collecting sand dollars at low tide, than caught in traffic with a van of  post-soccer practice 10-year olds?

What if you could carry a pocket-size UV-C light that sterilizes all those germy surfaces you face everyday – the computer keyboard everyone at work uses, the kitchen counter after your son makes sandwiches, hand weights at the gym, your purse after it spilled on the theater floor, the baby’s pacifier?

What if you could, by simply hitting an Add to Cart button, know that a percentage of your Purely Products’ purchase goes directly to provide diapers to babies in need who deserve a healthy, dry little behind? You can learn more about Purely Products’ passion and why Sharing God’s Love One Dry Behind at a Time is truly our bottom line at diaperLove. It represents the heart and soul of who we are.

In the quirky soul mate romance, LA Story, Steve Martin said, “There’s someone out there for everyone – even if you need a pickaxe, a compass, and night goggles to find them.” Translation? There are people who are meant to change your life one day at a time. The trick is … finding them.

There are products, and we like to think companies, whose mission is to help change your life one small step at a time.  The trick is … finding them.

Since you’re here, reading this, your compass led you to us. That works out well.  We were looking for you, too. Since we seem to be going in the same direction on things that really matter to all of us (healthier families, cleaner earth, happier children), let’s do this trip together.

It’s a journey that takes some juggling to keep a balance, and then dares us to try something new that makes clean and healthy living easier. See how it works, adjust, listen, learn, embrace it. Small steps in the right direction can make a big difference in all our lives.

Responsible products for responsible living is true north for Purely Products. Bringing innovative, eco-friendly, healthy living products to market, all the while helping kids. So there’s our compass. We’ll grab the pickaxe. You bring the night goggles.

Tell us, what pointed you in the direction of cleaner, healthier living?