The Cleaners: A Greener Touch

[February 13th, 2008]

Kelly Gately was doing her bit to save the environment way before Al Gore made it fashionable. The artist, gardener, parent and part-time student has been running a word-of-mouth green housecleaning business for 20 years.

“I’ve been encouraging people to switch over from chemicals since before it was popular,” she says. “I work with my clients to painlessly transform their homes and make it easy to become green.”

Gately uses readily available earth-friendly cleaners like Seventh Generation and Simple Green along with old-fashioned elbow grease. “Simple Green’s chemicals are biodegradable, which is great, but they’re still chemicals,” she says. “I also do the basics: baking soda, vinegar and water. Using lemon juice and vinegar takes more effort, but not really more time. I use peroxide instead of bleaches, and I have some really crazy concoctions I make for tough cleaning jobs.”

Gately sees most of her clients (names you would recognize from the local art scene) once every two weeks and tries to give them the tools they need to keep their homes green, even when they can’t afford her services (she charges around $25 an hour).

“The economy is tough on the housecleaning industry right now,” she says. “It’s considered a luxury item when people are short on cash, but I set them up so in the bad times they can do it themselves.”

While she acknowledges that one housecleaner won’t save the world, she says it helps: “It’s not perfect—I drive a car and carry my stuff around in the trunk—but I’m trying.”