Contemplating the number of gallons of Dr. Bronner’s soap used over the last seventy-six years to cleanse the patchouli-stained hands of hippies, the smoky hair of campers, and the parts and parcels of the rest of us is akin to wondering about the number of stars in the sky or the grains of sand on a beach: You could do the math—someone could do the math—but why? It’s a big number, astronomically big, suggested by the fact that in 2022 the Dr. Bronner Magic Soap company shipped thirty-five million pounds of products, not including packaging.
So, yeah, it’s a lot. It’s especially a lot coming from a doctor who wasn’t really a doctor.
Many a tentbound soul, trapped by rain and bored with nothing to read, has reached for their ubiquitous bottle of Bronner’s soap and tried to decipher its label, dense with text about things like All-One-God-Faith, first me, free speech, Thomas Paine, the Moral ABCs, and more.
600 words to go
You’re just getting to the good part.
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