American Cleaning Institute

confusion.” In 2017, the state of California enacted legislation requiring ingredient labelling on cleaning products sold in-state. Hockstad adds, “We want it so there is no risk of California doing one thing and another state doing something else, and then another state something else. You can buy the same product in three different places and it’s telling you different information and that can be confusing. So, our top issue really is working on federal legislation and ingredient communication space. We brought on some new staff to help us work on that and we are starting to build momentum on Capitol Hill. It will be a longer-term project, but one that our members are very committed to.” During COVID, many members of ACI had to adjust their production to meet the rapidly growing need for cleaning products. Many member companies shifted their manufacturing facilities to run 24 hours a day, seven days a week – some even building brand-new facilities in record time, just to make sure they could get these critical products out to the consumers and customers that needed them. “I have been so proud of the cleaning products industry, everything that they’ve done to really keep that commitment and focus to keep people healthy and safe, during what I would say were unprecedented times,” shares Hockstad. In March of 2020, during the early days of the pandemic, hand sanitizer was in short supply across the country. A temporary allowance was made by the Food and Drug Administration to allow distilleries to shift their production to alcohol-based hand sanitizers. ACI is now advocating that it is time to move back to having hand sanitizing products made by regulated industries. Hockstad maintains, “It was meeting a need at the time but, right now, there is a glut of hand sanitizers out in the market. ACI has been communicating our position on it with the FDA, saying it’s time to withdraw the temporary AMER I CAN CLEANING INST I TUTE (AC I ) Melissa Hockstad, President & CEO