Toothpaste Tablets

Continuing from my last blog about the Terracycle and Colgate recycling programs, I wanted to discuss a growing trend in dental health products – toothpaste tablets. These have been becoming more and more popular because they eliminate the need for plastic and the plastic waste recycling aftermath entirely. Additional benefits to tablets include the prolonged shelf life, and they are highly travelable for airline flights and even camping!

Unfortunately, getting my hands on toothpaste tablets was a little harder than I had expected. I only had two requirements in mind: they must be plastic free, and they must contain fluoride. Fluoride, as you probably know, is very important for your teeth to prevent decay and strengthen enamel. This proved to be very difficult because most brands do not contain fluoride. Both popular brands Bite and Hello do not contain fluoride, and I was unable to find any fluoride tablets in Target, Whole Foods, and Trader Joe’s.

Eventually, I was able to find Denttabs on Amazon. They were about $10, and one bag of 125 tabs replaces two tubes of plastic. The bag is also compostable, and they are vegan. While this brand did check off all of my boxes, the taste takes a little getting used to. The mint flavor is strong, but the sour powder taste is overwhelming and hard to tolerate. This may be another situation where you have to keep trying until you adjust to it, similar to my bamboo toothbrush, which I now love.

For now, I am going to begrudgingly use them and in the future, I plan to try brands Unpaste and ByHumanKind. These are both similar in price and offer fluoride options. If you have any brands that you have found and enjoy, please send them my way!