Why is the paper white?

Not simply a matter of aesthetics or hygiene, the fact that toilet paper is white is a complicated story with many different influencing factors.

Not simply a matter of aesthetics or hygiene, the fact that toilet paper is white is a complicated story with many different influencing factors.

Toilet paper is weird. Although we use it almost every day to protect one of the most sensitive parts of our bodies, we rarely think about where toilet paper comes from and how it is made. One more fact that may surprise you is that toilet paper was not widely used in the US until the early 20th century and even later in many countries.

In the US, around the middle of the 20th century, toilet paper came in many different colors to "match" with the bathroom decoration. The heyday of multicolored toilet paper was in the 1970s, and then colored paper gradually disappeared. It's almost impossible to find a roll of colored toilet paper these days. Why is toilet paper always white?

There are a number of reasons, but one of the fundamental reasons why toilet paper is white, as with most toilets is white, is that white looks cleaner, more hygienic than brown paper. If toilet paper was brown, would you want to use it? Or the more logical question is, do you prefer white toilet paper? Toilet paper manufacturers, like Kimberly-Clark, have come together to decide on the white color scheme for toilet rolls. Possibly, they did in-depth marketing research to come to the conclusion, toilet paper must be white.

Of course, there are other factors as well. The bleaching process of toilet paper in addition to giving color also helps soften the paper. Why is that? Because bleaching can remove lignin, a polymer in wood that functions as a glue to hold the fibers together and make the tree stronger. Dr. Hou-Min Chang of N.C. University. State in Raleigh said: "Without lignin, the tree can only grow to about 6 feet (1.8 meters) tall".

In addition to softening the paper, removing lignin also makes the paper tougher. For example, if you see an old newspaper, you can see that the newspaper is starting to turn yellow, this yellowing is caused by the newspaper having lignin.

In addition to bleaching, there are many other reasons why toilet paper is white, from reducing the environmental impact of not having to use dyes, to reducing skin irritation and many other health factors, to helping reduce paper degradation time...

Of course, things like environmental impact or risks to users' health have never stopped businesses from bleaching toilet paper, or adding other chemicals to increase the softness, toughness of the paper, even Even if using color dyes increases paper sales, companies will also use them.

So, in addition to all the above very reasonable factors, the main reason why toilet paper is white is probably cost. For dyeing, they will have to add the cost of buying dye. This is expensive but does not increase sales for manufacturers, because users prefer white. Therefore, there is not enough incentive for manufacturers to produce colored toilet paper products, instead of the current white paper. Therefore, it will be difficult for you to find any toilet paper other than white.