I’m the kind of person that takes pride in keeping my belongings spick and span, especially my shoes. It’s not just because I like things to be neat and tidy, keeping my belongings clean means I can get even more wear out of them. I often give my trainers a wipe after every wear, especially as they can be pretty pricey.
I don’t see the point in paying over £100 for a pair of shoes to only wear them a few times, and giving them a clean every now and then means I can rest assured that £100 was well spent. But having worked in a pub for the past few years, hours spent behind the bar has meant I’ve quickly worn through my shoes, and ended up reaching for my nicer pairs that I previously would have kept for wearing outside of work, and I’ve completely ruined my favourite pair of white trainers as a result. The problem is, I’ve struggled to find a pair of trainers that I would like to replace my Adidas forums with, so I decided to try to clean them and give them a new lease of life.
I’m wary of putting trainers in the washing machine, as the material and the shape can get damaged. Instead, I used a combination of two cleaning hacks I found on TikTok to give them a proper scrub, and was incredibly impressed with the results.
While they’re definitely not sparkling white and have picked up some stains from the pub that probably won’t come off, they’re in a much more acceptable condition, and I’ll be getting more wear out of them.
Although it did require some elbow grease, this method only uses two household items that you probably already have lying around: toothpaste and washing machine pods.
The Colgate toothpaste I used costs £1 at Waitrose, and I bought Daz All in 1 washing machine pods for £6 from my local corner shop.
Toothpaste is often recommended for cleaning trainers, especially as many brands contain baking soda, which not only helps teeth appear brighter but can also whiten trainers.
I applied some Colgate to a toothbrush and started to scrub around the soles of the shoe, where most of the stains were. It took a few minutes for the stains to budge, but once they did, I was quite astonished to see how white they already looked.
I did this twice on each trainer, scrubbing in circular motions, especially on areas where dirt had built up, and used a damp microfibre cloth to wipe the residue away.
While I was doing this, I left the shoelaces to soak in hot, soapy water and rinsed them after I’d finished cleaning my trainers.
Next, I saw a video posted by @davidzakwan who simply added a washing machine pod to a bucket of warm water to clean his trainers.
As the fabric part of my trainers had also become discoloured, I decided to give this a go, and it was just as good as putting them in the washing machine. I used a scrubbing brush to help lather on the mix, and I did it in the shower to rinse it off afterwards.
I’ll definitely be going over a few other pairs of trainers using both of these methods, and giving them a quick brush with toothpaste is something you can easily do every few weeks to keep them clean.
