U.S. consumers wash more than 660 million loads every week, or about 35 billion wash loads a year, totaling 100 million tons of clothes. That translates to 1,000 wash loads started in the United States every second of every day.
--The average household washes 7.4 loads -- about 50 pounds of laundry -- per week.
--50 percent of all loads are washed in warm water, 35 percent in cold and 15 percent in hot. Ninety percent of all wash loads are put in a dryer.
--As a rule of thumb, clothing manufacturers anticipate a life expectancy of 50 washings for their products. The time span covered by these 50 laundering varies widely from less than a year for products that get washed regularly, like underwear and socks, to several years for items that are worn seasonally or only for special occasions.
--Consumers have an average of eight laundry products in the laundry room: three types of detergent, one regular sodium hypochlorite bleach, one oxygen color-safe bleach, two fabric softeners (a liquid and dryer sheets), and one stain remover. Virtually every household -- 99 percent -- has some type of detergent on hand.