The Laundry Room Staple That Can Come In Handy For Removing Stickers From Glass

Anyone who has ever bought glassware at a yard sale has probably experienced the annoyance of removing stickers. Or maybe you just have kids who like to put stickers on windows or mirrors throughout your house. These stickers can be pretty annoying and hard to remove. It's important never to use a metal object, like a butter knife or a nail file, to scrape them off, because that can leave scratches. You can try scratching them off with your fingernail, but they usually leave some sticky gunk behind. When this happens, most people scrub the glass or run it through the dishwasher. But you can look in your pantry and find some laundry stain remover, which will lift those stickers in just a few minutes.

Laundry stain removers tend to come in spray bottles, and popular brands include Shout and OxiClean, which, according to Consumer Reports, is one of the best stain removers on the market. These sprays use a mix of solvents, enzymes, and surfactants (detergents) to break up grease and oil better than pure water ever could. To deactivate the adhesive paste that keeps stickers attached, you can use the same chemicals that have made artificial stain removers effective since they were popularized during the mid-20th century.

Start this simple process by spraying the pesky sticker with your stain remover, and then let it sit for 10 minutes. Make sure the sticker is completely saturated, otherwise this hack will not work as well. The next step is to scrape away the sticker. It should lift off the glass easily, but just make sure not to scrape it with anything that can damage the glass. The final step is to wash the glass thoroughly, not only to remove any remaining sticker gunk but also to clean off any of the toxic stain remover.

Most stain removers are made with volatile organic compounds, which emit gases that are harmful for the environment and have been associated with adverse health effects. White vinegar offers a safe and sustainable alternative. You just need to soak some tissue paper in vinegar, place it on the sticker, and bind plastic wrap around the glass. After about 10 minutes, remove the plastic wrap and wash the sticker off. If you don't have any stain remover or vinegar laying around, you can always place a few ice cubes on the sticker for about five minutes, after which it should be easy to scrape off. You can also remove stickers in a breeze with a can of WD-40 or even a hair dryer.