I find that if I stick to 100% cotton or linen that I have better luck. You might try adding Dawn blue to a cold water soak to loosen oily stains as those are the ones that seem to appear magically over time as they oxidize.

I have had the best luck with red napkins as they don't show red sauce, etc. I wonder if your stains are oily in nature if that initial cold wash is setting them? When we get an oily stain on a shirt, I always try to get some kind of soap or stain remover on it quickly and then soak it in hot.

So far I've been lucky with my table linens. As I clear off the table I check them and if there's a wine or sauce stain I spray them with Oxi-Clean and throw them in the wash. I check them again when I take them out of the washer and if by chance I've missed something I pre-treat them again and throw them in a bucket of water until the morning.

MIL always soaked red wine stains in milk first and never had an issue...something with the enzymes. Oily stains, lipstick are good with spray n wash; other food stains are good with oxy-clean. I would not wash first. I would use the spray stuff first and then wash. Never dry the item until the stain is completely removed, or it will be set for sure.

Maybe this guide will help...she pre-soaks in hot water.

Hmm, I have to go back to Laundry 101. I did not know that cold water could set any kind of stain. The thing I liked about my method was I can just throw it all in the cold water together, and think about it tomorrow, like Tara.

Sometimes I am a bit tired or slightly ... incapacitated ... after a party and I thought I was doin' good by getting them all the wash before bed!

I go through everything right after the party and spray Zout ( I like it best) on stains, wash the next day. Seems to work fairly well but I also have a closet of napkins and runners and the same dilemma.

I also always buy extras of things, recently I bought some pasta bowls, I wanted 4, so I bought 5 in case one broke. But that feels uneasy, like maybe I should have bought 6 but then I would have to buy 7.

Same with glasses, coffee mugs, china patterns, towels, lol.

Yeah. bumble, I have settled on 14 of everything, so that i have 12 if something goes wrong (twice!), although I don't often have 12 people, but I like the insurance.

I used to buy 13 of everything but eventually realized I only had big groups once a year so stopped the madness. Particularly when my big groups were 19 or 23 so I had to use two sets of things anyway.

I've never had or heard that cold water could set a stain. If something oily has left a mark, I have always been able to get it out by doing an appropriate treatment and rewashing. Drying will set a lot of stains and hot water can set certain types. I find Dawn or Shout works for oily stains, Oxi-clean for most other food stains (sometime need both) and a splash of vinegar (used like a spot treatment before washing)helps remove the last bit of a tomato based stain from white cotton. Takes care of most anything. At least, since that time the dryer made its way into the dryer.

I had always heard, perhaps incorrectly, that hot water can set a blood stain and cold water can set an oily stain. My best success in getting rid of oily stains has been immediate treatment with a stain remover or dish soap and a hot soak.

I pretreat as well - often just a bit of detergent or stain treatment liquid is enough, but I also have a product by Dritz called 'Magic Wand', which is great for food stains. Peroxide is good for blood/meat stains as well...

After a dinner I toss everything in the laundry sink with Oxyclean to soak overnight...or until I get around to washing it lol!

You seem to be laundry savvy but I just wanted to check to be be sure that you don't use the dryer after you do your initial cold wash. The dryer will set any leftover stains. Especially grease which is hard to see when the items are wet.

We had people over last Sunday and I waited until Monday to wash the napkins and placemats. I sprayed the stains with Zout, rubbing it in and letting them sit for a few minutes. Threw them in the washer with detergent on the cold/cold setting. Once the washer agitated a bit, I stopped it and let them soak for a bit. Napkins went in the dryer, placemats air-dried. All the stains came out.

We have a bunch of solid colored, all cotton napkins that were bought at World Market. Each person has their own color, so they can be reused if decent enough. Most of the time, I just spray with Shout or use Dawn. For a casual group, served buffet style, I can set out a stack of napkins of varying colors and have enough. For my vintage embroidered napkins that we use around the holidays, I usually treat and soak before bed and feel virtuous that is done.

I think that using clean cloth napkins and placemats with subtle stains on them are comforting in their own way. It's a sign that we use our stuff, and it doesn't sit in drawers waiting for big occasions.

Mtn, I just came by some old linens via an estate. The napkins had apparently been sent to the laundry and starched to death, but some have stains. I have no doubt they were 'clean' at some time, but after years of storage stains develop.

I have looked online at how to remove. Disclaimer: I have not done this yet, but I know people who have. It does take HOT water and sometimes several soaks. Use Oxi-clean and. Biz & mix in the hot water and soak overnight. You can look on ehow or Google 'removing stains from vintage linens' and get other methods.

Graywings, you are always welcome at my house.

Any skin oil on your hands will make spots appear after years in storage. Oxyclean and cold water as a soak takes out most stains on white and ivory cotton and linen. Laying almost dry napkins on sunny grass was the old time way to lighten stains. I would pretreat any spots for ten or fifteen minutes after dinner and then soak in cold over night. This is all time consuming but remember how estates used to have servants dedicated to the care of fine tableware and linens. Now days most of us have to do that job ourselves. I have a set that has light stains and use when I don't have time to wash right away and others that I use when I know I can get to any discolored right away. I have rescued sets of napkins that have been discolored and stained. With regular use, most stains will lighten and some disappear. The exception is very dark foxing ( dark specks) which often become holes later and rust stains. I would not use starch on anything you are planning to store for a while. Critters are drawn to the starch and eat the fibers along with the starch.

A good laundry can get out stubborn stains sometimes but I find that soaking and drying on the grass along with regular use gets them white again. I never serve cranberry or tomato sauce when I use my best linens. Can you imagine days gone by when people used to use the corner of tablecloth as the napkin?!

Don't let them get wet before you treat the stains!

All sorts of desserts, veg and even bread crumbs can release oil onto a napkin or placemat. Examine them carefully and spray every food or grease spot with oxyclean, toss them into the washer and run it the next morning on a warm water setting.

That said, things will get ruined from time to time. I also buy in bigger lots because we frequently have 14 to 16 for dinner. And when one gets ruined I use it to line the bread basket or tray. Most of my napkins are white cotton, linen or cotton damask. I have casual napkins in Provençal prints and in various shades of green, and some "semi formal" red napkins I use in the dining room (colored napkins by definition are not formal but I use them anyway!) I also have holly berry damask napkins for 50 (souvenir of hosting my garden club Christmas party one year) and Ivory napkins with a satin ivory stripe as well as some odds and ends of sets of four, six or eight that I've been given. The method above---pretreat, wait overnight, wash in warm water--- works on them all. And we have never knowingly put napkins or placemats in the dryer, they are pulled (opposite corners tugged ever so slightly) and hung over a drying rack. They iron beautifully when they aren't dried in a dryer.

Hi KSWL,

Don't let them get wet before you treat the stains? Why? I always think of cold water as the first and most immediate and most effective step in stain removal. After that, what you do next is a function of the stain and the fabric. Are you saying they should not get wet before one uses stain treatment, eg Shout?

We send them out to be ironed and folded, so they are ready to go for next time. I guess I could have them cleaned, but I'd rather do that myself.

Rococo, But what if my linens aren't pure white? Most of the time they are not. That is part of the reason I use cold ... plus I figure that cold never makes it worse, hot might, so always start with cold and see if that does the trick. BTW I use Persil. We all like the scent.

Annie, Nope, nothing ever in the dryer until its inspected.

Dear all, Thanks for your tips. It sounds like most people do what i do, except many of you follow up with a warm rinse. Maybe next time I will do that too. Just had a party Friday and no casualties among 16 napkins, all done in cold with Shout. Today I am going through my old stuff and trying to decide if I should try to rehabilitate any of it.

"Are you saying they should not get wet before one uses stain treatment, eg Shout?"

Correct. You should use a pretreatment spray (I like oxyclean because it works on blood, don't ask) BEFORE the item gets wet. If the stain has the slightest component of grease---and almost all our food seems to---water is the worst thing for it in my experience. Cold or hot doesn't matter, you need a solvent to hit that spot before water. With other stains like wine, fruit, lipstick, etc. (I don't count protein or stuff like bread or veg because that all contains some oil, either fat or butter or olive oil or something) water can either set a stain or dilute and spread it. Sitting overnight with oxyclean or shout seems to encapsulate the stain so at least it doesn't get worse..

(My tips/methods come directly from the Source of All Knowledge our long time housekeeper who in in charge of all laundry here. She has trained me to spray and leave overnight and to use only warm water, with vg results.)

Start hot water running into washer.

Add OxiClean.

Add linens or whatever you are washing and wanting to make sure they are stain free.

When washer starts agitating, stop and let soak for 24 hours.

Restart machine and set it to rinse with cold water.

I have used this method for many years and it works for me. Recently, a friend had an item she could not get the stains out of. I told her to bring it over and I would try for her. The item was very, very stained and had been for months before she told me about it. Tried my method and every one of those stains came out. She could not believe it (and to be quite frank I was surprised that they all came out).

If they are white, I suppose it won't matter, but I did spray a spot on some clothing with oxiclean and let it sit over night...bad move. It removed a lot of color, not just the stain. So now I use the stain sticks which are designed to be left on the stain for a long time.

Could that be a function of the type of fabric, Annie? We've not had any color loss with my red and green napkins but have with clothing. It hasn't mattered because I wouldn't have worn the item with a stain anyway.

walmitcreek, your method wouldn't work for my front loader.

That's funny, Annie, because I just searching Shout's site to see what they say, and while I am not done searching I did come across this

"You should only wait 1-5 minutes before washing in the warmest water your item recommends. Waiting any longer could mean putting your colors at risk, especially when using Shout® Advanced Ultra Gel Brush on bright, khaki, or fluorescent colored clothes."

If after washing (or even drying) I discover a stain is still there, I soak the item in a pail of hot water/Oxyclean for several days. This usually works. If I have a really stubborn stain, I cover the stain with fresh squeezed lemon juice and lay in the sun for several hours. My worst stains always seem to be tomato based.

OMG, now i am going crazy.

I just looked at this list from Shout, a product I like.

Shout tips and tricks

- They say the hotter the water the cleaner the wash; but everywhere I read today they say you should use cold the vast majority of the time and that new washers and new detergent have made the use of hot water unnecessary!

- They say avoid sunlight, but someone above linked to an expert who said sunlight was the best way to remove stains on linens

- They say don't try to remove a spot by rubbing hard. But elsewhere on their own site, they show their experts in a lab scrubbing a stain with a nail brush!

_ They say, when all else fails, bleach .... but everywhere I read says bleach will eventually make things yellow.

I''ve had enough.Clearly there is no consensus. I will do what i have been doing and just throw out the casualties and use my energies on things where I can better influence the outcome, like world peace.

"and new detergent have made the use of hot water unnecessary!"

Yeah, and there's no global warming either.

kswl, I can do a presoak in my front loader even though I don't have the option. I select a regular wash cycle, run it for a few minutes and then cancel the cycle. The water and soap will stay in my machine until I restart it. Then it will drain and start a new cycle. YMMV

There's a difference between the spray stuff and the stick. The stick can be left on the clothing. I use a shout stick, but it's pretty old...not sure they make it any more. Here's amazon's site on the stick:

OxiClean Max Force Gel Stick

Wear white without fear!

Sometimes, stains are unavoidable. But when getting them out is this easy, you’ll never worry about it again. OxiClean Max Force Gel Stick helps you fight stains like never before. Just apply pretreater and wash your clothes up to a week later. The innovative formula includes four types of stain fighters, while the advanced applicator helps penetrate deep into fibers to get out more stubborn stains the first time.

Lots of opinions, lol. I never use hot water anymore. If the Oxi stick doesn't get it out Dawn usually does.

I tried that once Dee, and it did not start over, jist icked up where it left off and I had to wash twice. I thought all front loaders operated the same way!

We dont wash anything in cold water, imo it doesnt clean as well as warm or hot.

I disagree. I use Coldwater Tide and find it does a great job of cleaning even my dirty gardening clothes.

Link: Why are you still washing your clothes in warm water?

Sources: New York Times | Consumer Reports | CNet | Dr. Chemical (2)| BBC

"More
than 60% of Americans still wash their laundry in warm water. It’s a
practice that’s as costly as it is environmentally unfriendly. What’s
more, it doesn’t make our clothes appreciably cleaner. Here’s why you
should make the switch to cold water.

Given that
we all have to do it, it should come as little surprise to learn that
laundry exerts a significant global footprint. Of the total energy use
and greenhouse-gas emissions produced by a single load of laundry, approximately 75% of it comes from warming the water itself.

There’s also the cost to consider. According to Consumer Reports,
doing laundry in cold water will save you upwards of $60 per year (or
more if you live in an area with higher-than-average electricity rates),
assuming an average of 300 loads per year. That may not sound like
much, but it’s significant when considering the pressure placed across
the entire electrical grid.

Think of it
this way: If every Las Vegas household switched to cold washing for an
entire year, the amount of energy saved could power its famous Strip for
nearly a week. If every household across the U.S. switched to cold
water for an entire year, that would save the same amount of energy
produced by the Hoover Dam in 20 months.

As noted by Leigh Krietsch Boerner at The Sweet Home,
“[U]nless you have a really good reason for washing in warm or hot,
such as really stinky clothes or cloth diapers, go for cold. It saves
energy, and your clothes will last longer.”

Indeed,
cold water is actually good for certain clothes. Lower temperatures
protect the dyes, and therefore the color of clothes, while also helping
to preserve the fit of the clothes by preventing shrinkage,
particularly along the seams. What’s more, some stains, like blood,
should only be washed in cold water. Warm water just makes blood stains set in.

So
aside from some rare instances, there’s really no reason for you to
keep washing your clothes in warm water. The Laundry Goddess offers some practical tips:

Personally,
I have found that you can wash everything in cold water successfully,
as long as you follow a few basic rules: Only use liquid detergent, as
most powders need warm water to completely dissolve and clean
successfully. Use the proper amount of detergent – too little and your
wash load will not come clean, and too much will leave a soapy residue
behind on your wash.

Also, do not overload the washer; be sure to leave room for items to move around in the water.

Substituting for Warmth

Now all
this said, warm water does play an important role in helping to make
your clothes clean. Well, provided you use high performance detergents
and washing machines — and provided you follow the manufacturer’s
instructions. Using too much or too little detergent can result in
sub-optimal performance, as can using the detergent at the wrong
temperature. Using a standard warm-water detergent in cold water, for
example, may not get you the results you want. So, unless you opt for a
specifically cold water detergent, you may not notice that the warm
water is cleaning better. But the fact of the matter is that you can get just as clean with cold.

Laundry
involves a number of chemical reactions — reactions that go faster at
higher temperatures. So, along with chemicals and mechanical energy, the
thermal energy produced by warm water helps to get rid of stains, dirt,
and residue on our clothing. Until very recently, most detergents were
designed with this in mind. Owing to a demand for more environmentally
friendly solutions, detergent manufacturers have now found ways to
create detergents that work remarkably well in cold water. But to do so,
they had to get around some very tricky chemical constraints.

One of the
biggest challenges to developing detergents that work in cold water, or
regular “tap water,” is that tap water temperatures are inconsistent
across geographical locations and seasons. For example, “cold” water in
Florida during the summer months is ~80 degrees F, while “cold” water in
Minnesota during the winter months can dip as low as ~40 degrees F.
Consequently, cold water detergents need to work effectively across a
surprisingly large spectrum of temperatures.

To
complicate things even further, surfactants — the so-called “work-horse”
of detergents — don’t perform as well in cold water. These chemicals,
which comprise upwards of 30 to 40% of the weight of detergents, lift
and removesstains. They involve a class of chemicals known as linear
alkylbenzonesulfates — long chains of a chemical called a dodecane.

Writing in C|Net, Richard Baguley and Colin McDonald explain how surfactants work:

[Dodecane]
readily forms long chain molecules, quite similar to petrochemicals
like oil. Attached to this is a benzene ring, with a sulfate molecule
attached. These two parts fundamentally disagree about something: how
they feel about water. The dodecyl chain hates it, doing all it can to
get away from it. The benzosulfate bit, however, loves water and wants
to get close to it. Chemists call these properties hydrophobic
(water-hating) and hydrophilic (water-loving), and this conflicting
nature is what makes detergents so powerful. Dodecyl chains hate water,
but like each other, and also like other chemicals like fats, sugars,
proteins and others. In other words: all of the things on your clothes
that you want to get off. Dodecyl chains also like each other: give them
a chance, and they will gather together and complain about how much
they hate water.

It’s this
tension that works to clean our clothes; the hydrophilic part mixes with
the wash water while the hydrophobic part of the molecule lifts up and
absorbs stains and dirt so they can be rinsed away. Surfactants work the
same way when exposed to different temperatures, but as Mary Johnson,
Fabric Care Principal Scientist for Tide and Downy, told me, surfactants
“can become super-sluggish in colder water temperatures – leading to
stained and dingy clothes.”

To get
around this problem, Procter & Gamble chemists — who get the credit
for developing this innovation — created a specially formulated
surfactant system, which can be found in Tide Cold Water Clean and Tide PODS. Their system overcomes these limitations in three ways. Here’s how she explained it to me over email:

1.
We use a variety of different surfactant types and within each type we
use a variety of chain lengths. This makes the surfactant system
super-fast and super-responsive across a broad range of temperatures —
even in temperatures as cold as 40 degrees F.

2.
We also use polymers – long chain molecules – at high concentrations
that act as cleaning boosters to help remove more stains – even greasy
stains in cold water.

3. We use enzymes to help break up stains which can then be lifted away by the surfactants.

Indeed,
enzymes are another important component of modern laundry detergents.
Enzymes, which are comprised of biological components, break down stains
that are otherwise hard to remove with conventional surfactants alone.
Fascinatingly, P&G uses enzymes that were inspired by the evolved
systems of organisms found in cold ocean water — systems that don’t get
sluggish when exposed to cold water.

“In
addition to using a wide variety of surfactants while adding polymers
and enzymes – we also increased the amounts of these ingredients to...
clean in even the coldest wash temperatures,” added, Johnson, who says
Tide’s Cold Water Clean works better in cold water than its base Tide
liquid product.

In addition to the products already listed, other cold water detergents include Arm & Hammer Cold Water, and Purex Coldwater. Encouragingly, washing machine manufacturers are getting involved as well; Whirlpool’s Maytag Bravos XL is a washer designed to work with cold-water detergents.

But as
noted, you may not need to resort to these specialized products in most
instances. So what are you waiting for? It’s time to start cleaning your
clothes in cold water."

Sources: New York Times | Consumer Reports | CNet | Dr. Chemical (2)| BBC

"We send them out to be ironed and folded, so they are ready to go for next time. I guess I could have them cleaned, but I'd rather do that myself."

Why?

I'm guessing Mtn doesn't want her stuff washed communally, a common practice for commercial laundries. I say that because I wouldn't want my napkins or anything else washed with OPL (Other Peoples' Laundry).

Cindy, I have heard all the Tide-sponsored "research" and my empirical evidence is that warm water cleans better, period.

Interestingly, given that Tide products cost much, much more than other brands, I wonder if there is much of a savings once the price of Proctor and Gamble's special surfactant is taken into account.

As for this argument: "If every Las Vegas household switched to cold washing for an entire year, the amount of energy saved could power its famous Strip for nearly a week." Sorry, not terribly persuasive !

There are a number of cold water detergents. The article mentioned 3 or 4 of them. I've been a Tide user for decades ... long before giving up hot water usage about 10 years ago.

Consumer Reports rated laundry detergents in the September issue. There's a reason Tide is rated so highly. Persil is too, but I don't know if they have a cold water product. Doesn't really matter since the cost per load is the same.

I grew up being told that hot water washes best, but the times have changed and cold water is a better option.

I use stain stick on spots that may be a week old or more. Rub it on the stain, throw the article into the washer, wait a minute, then wash. Chocolate, wine, grease, tomato sauce all come out in the wash. Depending on the fabric, I use hot water wash cycle for cottons, warm wash for everything else. Rinse is always cold.

I quit using tide years ago...the stuff gives me a rash. My skin must be sensitive so I use the arm and hammer stuff for sensitive skin...no more rash.

"I grew up being told that hot water washes best, but the times have changed and cold water is a better option" ......yes, for you.

Hi,

I've had great luck with Spray & Wash Stick. I usually use it right away. I keep one stick in the bath room where I undress and where there's a bit of a counter, one in the laundry - and have an extra in case . . (well, it's worked out well - having so many probably a life time supply for me). It works fine waiting some time before washing. Even works (most of the time) when an item comes out of the drier with a stain. (I deal with stains and my husband does most of the laundry.) For things like a yellowed sheet OxiClean soak usually works. For more persistent stains, I try Fels Naptha, which I think hasn't been mentioned in this discussion. I had a pile of some antique linens with stains and the Fels got them out --- found the idea from here at Garden Web. (Have the one with Purex on the label - the one with Dial is supposed to have a strong unpleasant aroma.)

As far as water temp use goes ---- I find I'm fearful of using cold (will it come out clean?) and usually use some medium temp (my machine goes from cold to 85 and so up up by a few degrees through to 205. Too many choices. AND, have to say although I've been doing laundry for nearly 50 years I feel like a novice. I sometimes add some borax --- just because. And that's because of all the options. I'm learning all over again. (At least I'm past feeling that many stains just can't come out.) And will get there with the help of you all!

If you get a tough stain that won't go, you can try Fels- Naptha soap. It's a yellow bar soap that has removed even oil paint off my shirt and some weird flourescent green oily goo that came out of a kids toy and got on my jeans. This is the cleaner of last resort as it can remove the dye out of cloth. I agree that lemon juice and sunlight works well for 100% linen. I wonder how many times you can do it before the fibers weaken but I know it does work and will not cause yellowing like chlorine bleach.

I wouldn't like to have my napkins washed in the same machine with people's shirts and whatever else.

FWIW, i read that sunlight USED to be good for whites, but now they reccommend you keep them OUT of the sun, because they add a whitening agent today to white cloth, and that will yellow in the sun ...

The same machine thing is silly. What happens at restaurants, hotels, b&b's? I'm a bit of a germaphobe, in non rational ways, but this is too much for me.

That was KSWL's point. I don't want to take them to the laundry because i can get to it a lot sooner myself, and I don't trust anyone to care enough about getting stains out on a whole pile o' napkins. I'm thinking they'd just wash and dry it and set the stains without inspecting.

my placemats are double sided. I think fabric is linen but there is some kind of stiff material between the layers. Don't think they can go in the washer. help

Interesting on the hot water issue, but I am trying to avoid using disposable plastic, and the liquid detergent comes in single use plastic bottle. Plastic "re-cycling" is not particularly effective, most products made from recycled plastic eventually have to be disposed of as well, and there is way more plastic than market for recycled products. Also recycling uses energy too. I also take a tip from grandma and save up my old soap bits and grind into laundry detergent. That stuff needs hot water. And who knows what the chemicals in the cold water wash do to the water supply . . . Laundry is an environmental conundrum for sure! Not saying using cold water is bad or not conservation oriented, just commenting on some of the trade offs I grapple with when doing laundry. Haven't really found my idea way of doing it yet!

Have you tried posting on the laundry forum? People there are fanatic about getting things clean.