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What's the difference between deodorant and antiperspirant? · Stuff You Should Know

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  Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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  Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know
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  Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot com Audi, Welcome to the podcast.
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  Speaker 1: Chuck Bryant, Josh Clark Here, This is Josh. That's Chuck. Hi, Hi, Chuck.
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  Speaker 1: How are you doing? I'm doing well, Josh. But something
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  Speaker 1: something stinks. That's not me, Chuck, that's actually Michael Wax.
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  Speaker 1: You played poker occasionally, but not really. Are you familiar
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  Speaker 1: with Michael Wax? Now? He is a professional poker player.
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  Speaker 1: He's a big guy, four forty pounds, and he was
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  Speaker 1: recently ejected from the Borgottic casino in Atlantic City for
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  Speaker 1: um an unpleasant smell. Basically, he uh, like I said,
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  Speaker 1: he's a big guy. He'd been playing seventeen hours straight,
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  Speaker 1: so apparently he was on a roll. But I guess
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  Speaker 1: he'd also failed to shower him between I don't know.
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  Speaker 1: I guess they didn't comp a room for him or
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  Speaker 1: anything for you know, a half hour or anything like that.
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  Speaker 1: But yeah, Mr Wax was ejected. No no word on
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  Speaker 1: his winnings or anything like that. Well, I hope it
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  Speaker 1: was enough to buy some soap in the odor and
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  Speaker 1: I imagine so, I imagine so. And you know, if
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  Speaker 1: you were close enough to Mr Wax, you'd probably think, well,
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  Speaker 1: this is you know, it's body odor. It smells like
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  Speaker 1: anybody odor I've ever smelt. But were you to really
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  Speaker 1: get up under there and you had a really good scent,
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  Speaker 1: like maybe you're a professional sniffer for a perfume company
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  Speaker 1: or whatever, you would notice that he has a very
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  Speaker 1: distinct what is called an odor type. And all of
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  Speaker 1: us apparently have a unique odor type. Do you know
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  Speaker 1: much about oder types? Uh? Well, I know that we
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  Speaker 1: we do all have one. And uh it's genetically based
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  Speaker 1: and it can be also environmental to write like what
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  Speaker 1: you eat. Yeah, so, so basically, there was one study
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  Speaker 1: in two thousand six that found that vegetarians emit a
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  Speaker 1: more pleasant body odor than meat eater. They smell like broccoli,
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  Speaker 1: and we smell like steak. That's gross. I would rather
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  Speaker 1: smell like steak any day of the week too. There
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  Speaker 1: was there's another study in ninety five that found that
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  Speaker 1: a pregnant woman's body odor was actually a combination of
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  Speaker 1: the mothers and the fetus's um body odor smell. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: that's fascinating and based on my own personal observations, as
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  Speaker 1: unscientific as it maybe, I've concluded, Chuck that your body
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  Speaker 1: odor is based on your love of hot rod racing
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  Speaker 1: and those delicious morning smoothies you make. Yeah, well, you know, Josh,
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  Speaker 1: based on my findings, I've I found that you smell
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  Speaker 1: like a mix of circus peanuts and old footballs and
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  Speaker 1: desperation and desperation, so strange combinations. Yeah, so it works.
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  Speaker 1: The thing is is, um, we do have our own
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  Speaker 1: specific odor types. We don't know precisely what makes what
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  Speaker 1: and and I don't think any has really been catalogued yet.
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  Speaker 1: Look for that in the future when somebody ends up
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  Speaker 1: with a lot of excessive funding. Um. But we do
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  Speaker 1: have a couple of theories of why we smell. There's
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  Speaker 1: this anthropologist named Leu's Leaky and he postulated that we
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  Speaker 1: actually smell um evolutionarily speaking to ward off predators, which
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  Speaker 1: is something we had to deal with before. You don't
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  Speaker 1: so much anymore unless you're like a lion tamer or
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  Speaker 1: a hill billy that kind of thing. Um, So now
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  Speaker 1: it's just kind of offensive to to a degree, right right, Um,
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  Speaker 1: So what do you do? Well, I would use deodorant
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  Speaker 1: or cold or I would use antipersprint. Aren't they the
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  Speaker 1: same thing? Why would you even go so far as
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  Speaker 1: to say both, I mean it's the same thing, right, Well,
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  Speaker 1: they're not the same thing, And I think anyone that
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  Speaker 1: pays attention in the supermarket of the pharmacy knows there's
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  Speaker 1: antipersprint and there's deodorant. That is true. I just thought
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  Speaker 1: they were different spellings. Well what's the difference. Well, one
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  Speaker 1: keeps you from sweating and actually, uh stops you from sweating,
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  Speaker 1: and one is just a perfume to mask odor. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: well it was very sustained that that's the easy answer.
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  Speaker 1: Did you know that your body odor doesn't actually emanate
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  Speaker 1: from your from your your glands, from your sweat? Do
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  Speaker 1: you do? You know where your smell actually comes from,
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  Speaker 1: something with bacteria, And it does. It does. So you've
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  Speaker 1: got two kinds of sweat glands. Um. One is the
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  Speaker 1: ecrine gland, and it just excretes salt and water and
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  Speaker 1: there's no smell to that. The other is the apocrine gland,
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  Speaker 1: and this one actually is in charge of carrying um,
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  Speaker 1: fat and protein secretions from your cells. I didn't even
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  Speaker 1: know myself secreted fats and Approacheinus gross um. But it
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  Speaker 1: carries it through these glands or these ducks to the
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  Speaker 1: glands and then out onto your skin, where there's plenty
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  Speaker 1: of native flora, which is another name for bacteria. And
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  Speaker 1: your smell is actually your the bacteria chowing down on
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  Speaker 1: these fats and proteins. That is so gnarly I can't
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  Speaker 1: get to this podcast. But yeah, and of course you've
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  Speaker 1: got um, you know the most the most both of
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  Speaker 1: these types of gland sweat glands under your arm an
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  Speaker 1: exact axillary area. The armpit, as everyone knows, is generally
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  Speaker 1: where the stink comes from, right, which is why we
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  Speaker 1: very infrequently put deodorant, or as Chuck calls it, antiperspirant,
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  Speaker 1: on the back of your neck. Um. That'd just be weird,
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  Speaker 1: although it would have a similar effect, I imagine, it's
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  Speaker 1: just nobody's you know, next smells all that bad. Um. So,
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  Speaker 1: do you know much of the history of deodorance and
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  Speaker 1: anti Well, I know that it kind of started in
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  Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties in the United States, at least, Well,
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  Speaker 1: it became a social taboo to smell in the fifties,
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  Speaker 1: right and watch Madman. Well, I was just gonna bring
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  Speaker 1: that up here because I don't want it. Yeah, it's
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  Speaker 1: it's one of my favorite new shows. I'm kind of
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  Speaker 1: late to it, but I've been watching it on the
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  Speaker 1: on demand feature and uh, there was an episode that
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  Speaker 1: dealt with anti pershmint spray and this is when the
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  Speaker 1: show is set and how they sold it to you.
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  Speaker 1: I think they said, uh, you're not afraid to get
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  Speaker 1: close or don't be afraid to get close, which recalls
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  Speaker 1: get a little closer from I think Arid Extra Dry
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  Speaker 1: was Oodorant that use that. So it's it's interesting that
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  Speaker 1: what they're implying is with a lot of advertising is
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  Speaker 1: is sex, get a little closer, don't be afraid to
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  Speaker 1: get close to your husband, and uh, I just think,
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  Speaker 1: I mean, the show in general is really neat. That
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  Speaker 1: in the nineteen fifties and sixties when add the advertising
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  Speaker 1: boom really started is where I mean a lot of
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  Speaker 1: the things that we we have today and social taboos
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  Speaker 1: like they were told to us by these admin in
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  Speaker 1: New York in the nineteen fifties and sixties and people
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  Speaker 1: bought into it, and all these years later, you know,
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  Speaker 1: you don't want to stink because you want to get
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  Speaker 1: a little closer exactly. And conversely, if you do stink,
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  Speaker 1: you should be afraid to get closer, right, right, so
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  Speaker 1: that it's really paid off. In two thousands six, just
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  Speaker 1: any pursh prints and deodorants accounted for two point five
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  Speaker 1: billion dollars in sales, and me, think about it, what
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  Speaker 1: their four bucks tops for you? Anything you find at
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  Speaker 1: the grocery store right, Um, and uh, it turns out
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  Speaker 1: I have a I've developed a theory about deodor and
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  Speaker 1: any perspirant sales. So there are three big things on
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  Speaker 1: the horizon that I think are going to cause the
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  Speaker 1: deodorant and any persprint market to fluctuate. You want to hear,
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  Speaker 1: I'd love to, Okay. So the first is baby boomers.
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  Speaker 1: It turns out that in in your fifties, right in
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  Speaker 1: the fifties to the sixties, range um, deodorant use kind
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  Speaker 1: of falls off. You don't need it quite as much.
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  Speaker 1: You don't need it or you don't you're not bothered
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  Speaker 1: by your smell. Either way, People in their fifties start
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  Speaker 1: to use less deodorant than they did when they were younger.
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  Speaker 1: That actually affects the market. And we've got a bunch
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  Speaker 1: of baby boomers we're hitting fifties, sixties, seventy now just
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  Speaker 1: walking around stinking pretty much? Have you smelled your parents lately?
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  Speaker 1: To try to keep my nose away from precisely precisely right. So,
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  Speaker 1: with all of this, this this huge aging population going
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  Speaker 1: on right now, I predict that the deodorant in any
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  Speaker 1: persprint market will decline because of that. But but you're ready.
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  Speaker 1: I also predict that they that market will be helped
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  Speaker 1: by global warming because summer sales for are just the biggest,
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  Speaker 1: bulkiest season for deodorants and nanty purse prints. With climate change,
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  Speaker 1: we're going to have longer, hotter summers, right, And hence
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  Speaker 1: the deodorant nanny purseprint market will soldier on. They'll be
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  Speaker 1: able to bounce back from that discrepancy. And the third
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  Speaker 1: thing I think will bump it up even further, uh,
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  Speaker 1: bovine growth hormones. It's all over the place. It's in milk,
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  Speaker 1: it's in beef, it's i I believe, in chickens, and
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  Speaker 1: it's causing early onset puberty in children. Yeah, and I
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  Speaker 1: know that your your glands that that make you stink.
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  Speaker 1: For lack of a bitter word, they don't come around
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  Speaker 1: so you're like eleven to eleven twelve until about the
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  Speaker 1: time you hit puberty. Right, if puberty starts at age
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  Speaker 1: eight all of a sudden, now thanks to drinking regular milk, um,
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  Speaker 1: then you're going to need deodorant soon. So that will
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  Speaker 1: expand the market, the younger market for deodorant nanty perspart companies.
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  Speaker 1: These are just some theories for amblings that come up
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  Speaker 1: with They come to me in my sleep, that kind
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  Speaker 1: of thing. But I wake up thinking about deodorant all
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  Speaker 1: the time, so do I. It's more market stuff that
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  Speaker 1: that I think of. But in this case, it was
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  Speaker 1: applied to deodorant, so chuck, Maybe we should get a
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  Speaker 1: little more specific, like how does deodorant work versus how
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  Speaker 1: does this any persport you keep talking about work? Well, uh,
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  Speaker 1: I know, deodorants don't keep you from sweating, so all
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  Speaker 1: they can do is, uh, you apply it to your excella,
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  Speaker 1: your armpit, Yeah, your armpit, and that that just masks
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  Speaker 1: the smell. It's a perfume to an extent, fill me
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  Speaker 1: in So basically it also most deodorants today include a
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  Speaker 1: um and an ingredient that actually kills the bacteria, triclosan. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: so you've got that that native flora on your under arms,
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  Speaker 1: on the skin, and that your cells are still carrying
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  Speaker 1: the fats and proteins, or the the facts and proteins
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  Speaker 1: from yourselves are still being carried to your skin. There's
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  Speaker 1: no bacteria there to eat them, hence no smell, right right,
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  Speaker 1: And they also include perfumes too. But what about andy pursprints. Well,
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  Speaker 1: the antie pershprint actually plugs the glands with things like
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  Speaker 1: aluminum and zirconium, which is kind of scary if you
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  Speaker 1: think about it, and that keeps the sweat from ever
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  Speaker 1: being produced in theory. In theory, yes, so any perspants
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  Speaker 1: don't let you sweat at all, well if if they're effective.
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  Speaker 1: So I was doing a little research, a little extra
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  Speaker 1: research for this article, and there's this New York Times
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  Speaker 1: article by a guy named Anthony Ramirez that it came across.
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  Speaker 1: It's awesome, um, and he was talking about a little
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  Speaker 1: bit about the history of andy pershprint's. The first patented
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  Speaker 1: one ever was called ever Dry and it came onto
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  Speaker 1: the market in nineteen o three. You had to apply
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  Speaker 1: it using a swab to the armpit and it was
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  Speaker 1: so acidic that it actually ate through clothing and people
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  Speaker 1: were putting this on their under arm. It's progressed quite
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  Speaker 1: a bit so far. Yeah, and and know that it's
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  Speaker 1: still there's a lot of controversy over the use of
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  Speaker 1: aluminum in products. It could post some health benefits, and actually,
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  Speaker 1: UM deodorance and Annie purse prints are considered over the
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  Speaker 1: counter drugs and are regulated by the FDA. Right, that's crazy,
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  Speaker 1: possibly in part because of the health the health hazards,
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  Speaker 1: potential health hazards like what well, potentially could be linked
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  Speaker 1: to cancer. I think most people have heard that aluminum
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  Speaker 1: deodorance can be linked to cancer by by causing DNA mutation, right.
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  Speaker 1: And then there's another one that's a little a little weirder,
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  Speaker 1: right with the kidney disease. Yeah, yeah, yeah, So, like
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  Speaker 1: I think two thousand to two thousand five something like that,
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  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, this warning label pops up on
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  Speaker 1: deodorance and it says, uh, ask your doctor about kidney
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  Speaker 1: disease or something like that. Um. And it just came
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  Speaker 1: out of nowhere, and there was never any really good
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  Speaker 1: explanation for it. Um. But it turns out that aluminium
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  Speaker 1: can also cause kidney poisoning, right, right, or if you
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  Speaker 1: have impaired kidney functioning, it can sinum out of the edge.
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  Speaker 1: So it's possible all sorts of bad things could happen
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  Speaker 1: to you, which is why, for my understanding, eleven of
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  Speaker 1: the population doesn't use of the American population, I should say,
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  Speaker 1: doesn't use deodorant or uses an off brand, which leads
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  Speaker 1: me to wonder, what is an off brand deodorant? And
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  Speaker 1: why would you use it? Like, do you have like
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  Speaker 1: a friend down the street who whips it up for you?
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  Speaker 1: Why not just go get it? At this story? Well,
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  Speaker 1: I think maybe what they mean bof brand it might
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  Speaker 1: be wrong, is maybe some of these all natural deodorants, No,
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  Speaker 1: those are included. They have made such headway into this
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  Speaker 1: market that the niche market like Tom's of Maine you mean,
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  Speaker 1: has actually expanded their huge players. So what they mean
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  Speaker 1: literally are these hippies that make up I guess although
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  Speaker 1: hippies aren't necessarily known to use deodorant, let alone go
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  Speaker 1: to the trouble to make their own. Now you know,
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  Speaker 1: that's the question for another day. The question for today,
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  Speaker 1: which I advise you to go check out on how
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  Speaker 1: stuff Works dot com, is what's the difference between deodorant
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  Speaker 1: and anti persporant and stick around to find out which
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  Speaker 1: articles homepage are really cracks chucking me up after this.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks for hanging around, Chuck. You want to tell him,
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  Speaker 1: I will. It's actually an article called how ativism works
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: or ativism and that's when humans have can grow little
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  Speaker 1: those of you don't know, we have a homepage art
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  Speaker 1: pictures to represent what the articles about. And some articles
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  Speaker 1: are a little harder than others. And I guess ativism
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  Speaker 1: is hard because writer Katie Lambert Clambert, Yeah Clambert. She
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  Speaker 1: she her homepage art is a a little baby kind
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  Speaker 1: of prancing around just from like the waist down when
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  Speaker 1: chop with it. You definitely did. Way to go, Katie.
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  Speaker 1: You could check out this homepage art when you look
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  Speaker 1: up how ativism works on how stuff works dot com.
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