As some of you may know, I'm a bit of a sucker for coupons (thanks, Jackie), so you will not be surprised to learn that when this Sunday's paper had a coupon for a free refill with purchase of a Swiffer Wet Jet Starter Kit (up to a $7 value!) I was intrigued. This intrigue, combined with a few hours of free time in the vicinity of Target, resulted in the purchase of said highly-marketed cleaning system. Target also had a store coupon (which I filched off a bottle of Cascade) for an additional $1 off the starter kit.
In addition to the perceived savings, my reasoning for the purchase is thus: Since 1) I now have approximately 15 square feet of moppable floor (the rest of the linoleum having recently been converted to wood), it seems unlikely that I will ever go to the trouble of filling the sink and wringing the mop for such a small space and 2) the floor in need of mopping happens to be the bathroom floor, it therefore follows that unless I want to instate a "shower shoes" policy for my entire bathroom, I had better come up with some other way of cleaning the floor.
Enough talk, on to the rating!
Ease of use:
Excellent. This rating does not include opening the rather cryptic box that the product came in, or the time it took me to find four AA batteries with which to power the sprayer. Really? It takes FOUR batteries to make a glorified spray bottle work?
Effectiveness of cleaning:
Excellent. The floor looks good. The scrubber pad and the bonus scrubber on the edge of the cleaning head work well.
Cost effectiveness:
Eh, not so much. The mop (let's be honest here) is $20, the cleaning solution is $5 for a refill, and the extra cleaning pads are $20 for 36 (which I just looked up on Amazon, having not anticipated this particular expense), plus the cost of BATTERIES for a MOP... Let's just say that they aren't losing money with these coupons. Although there were 5 $1 off refills coupons in the box, just to be fair, so the first 5 refills are only $4 a bottle.
Hygenic-ness:
Lovely. There is a long stick between you and ugly.
Versatility:
Variable. The pad doesn't fit between the base of my pedestle sink and wall, but they do have a cleaning solution for wood floors.
For the visual aid portion of my review, I contemplated exhibiting before and after photos of my bathroom floor, but I can guarantee that no one wants to see such a graphic before picture. That and the camera batteries had already been shanghaied by the WetJet. To protect our weak-stomached readers, I opted for an after picture only, although I did compromise by including the cleaning pad for comparison.
Would I recommend this product? Meh. Depends on your personal ratio of laziness/germiphobia to tolerance of buying endless pricey refills.
Be sure to tune in for our next coupon-induced product review: Mr. Clean Magic Eraser.
