This week we’re taking a look at cloth napkins. So far we’ve discussed basics of why you need to use cloth napkins, and looked at some places where you can get some for your home.

Now for some pros:

• Cloth napkins feel better and work better than paper napkins.
• Cloth napkins are very cost efficient. Even if you buy a super nice set, cloth napkins will still save you money over paper napkins.
• Cloth napkins are much healthier for the earth than paper napkins or paper towels. Paper napkins not only create waste because they’re made with paper, but they also come in wasteful packaging, take gas to ship, and are extremely hard to recycle.
• Cloth napkins last forever and serve other purposes. While paper napkins are a use and toss product, cloth napkins can be used to death, then switched over to cleaning rags. I still have good cloth napkins from over five years ago. My now scrappy and unusable napkins are used for dusting and cleaning. Pretty soon they’re going to biodegrade right at my house they’re used so much.
• Cloth napkins are NOT that much more work. To keep them looking good throw them in a wash when you do a load of cold delicate items. If you don’t care if they lose a little color, toss them in with any load of laundry.
• Cloth napkins, contrary to popular belief are still better for the environment than paper, even though it takes water and energy to wash them. Cloth napkins are so small – even if you have a big family, cloth napkins will only run you about one load of wash per week. If you wash on cold, hang dry, and use eco-friendly laundry soap, they just don’t add up to the same eco-badness as paper napkins.

Are you still using paper napkins?

Where are all the cloth napkins…

• Thrift stores.
• Department stores.
• Trendy eco-stores.
• Antique sales.
• Ask for them on your wedding (or other) registry.
• Make some.

Some options…

$14.99 Bardwil Cobblestone 17-inch By 17-inch Set of 4 Napkins, Barley (other colors available).

Sew Your Own Cloth Napkins with Mitered Corners

From $38 per set – 100% Organic Cotton Napkins – In Prints

From $38 per set 100% Organic cotton napkins – in solids

diy: cloth napkins – really cute ones.

$13.99 – Ecolution Hemp Napkins – set of 2

Set of 5 Napkins: $22.95 - FUN for kids – from Fabkins – all sorts of cute kids cloth napkins. Many designs and colors.

You can score great deals at department store sales and thrift stores though. The only downside is that you may not be able to find organic.

At my own house, all we use are cloth napkins. We’ve never used paper napkins, and we don’t even use paper towels. I was a little shocked about all the paper napkin use at dinner the other night, and almost considered wiping my hands on my jeans just to cut down on the excess. On a given day, (not a family dinner night) there are still about 5-8 random people at my dad’s. If you do the lowest math that’s about 5 people x’s three meals and snacks a day. That’s possibly:

• 20 paper napkins a day.
• 140 paper napkins a week.
• 7,280 paper napkins a year! For ONE household. Not to mention the family dinners.

Wow right?

How many trees is that affecting? Let’s use a basic bulk pack of Bounty Quilted Napkins, 100-Napkin Packages (Pack of 20) for our calculations. If you buy in bulk, that’s about 12 pounds of paper napkins. In my family, you’d need about 3.5+ bulk packs for the year.

Semi-fuzzy math calculations:

Conservatree notes that paper calculations are tricky, but they offer some estimates. One estimate is that it would take a rough average of 24 trees to produce a ton of printing and writing paper. It’s harder to find calculations for napkins.

The NRDC notes that “If every household in the United States replaced just one package of virgin fiber napkins (250 count) with 100% recycled ones, we could save 1 million trees.” Obviously, if all households used only cloth napkins, those 1 million trees saved would grow to many million.

There are 2000 pounds per 1 ton, and I found one calculation that estimates that it takes about 3.84 trees to make 2000 pounds of paper. My family is using about 42 pounds a year of paper napkins, which granted seems ok, that’s not even one whole tree. BUT what about all those other families using paper napkins? It would take about 47 families (with five members) to kill around four trees yearly with paper napkin use. That’s a fairly typical neighborhood size, and smaller than most apartment complexes.

The current U.S. population count is 305,837,897. If just half of this count uses paper napkins daily that’s 1092 napkins a year per person; 166,987,491,762 napkins a year total; 83,493,745 packs of napkins (bulk) a year; 1,001,924,950 pounds of napkins a year; 500,962 tons of napkins a year; which kills about what? 1,923,695 trees a year.

Why bother adding this all up?:

So, I’m hoping my math is close. I did the above calculations fairly quickly. And yeah, the figures above would be more accurate if I had some sort of paper napkin weighing lab, a math genius, and some tree mill company to help me out, but overall, the basic idea is clear – paper napkins waste WAY too many trees.

Imagine if everyone used cloth napkins? It would be a HUGE change for the better. Later tips for folks who want to argue that cloth napkins waste water and electricity, plus some cloth napkin options, ideas about how cloth napkins save you cash, and maybe some other paper napkin alternatives.

Does your household use paper napkins or cloth?

Linen table items are best because they’re reusable, and of course last longer than paper products. Plus, they just look nicer. Some good linen fabric choices include hemp, organic cotton, and bamboo. Although, I’m more of the mindset that if you use linen over paper, paying extra for organic is cool, because you limit chemicals, but honestly, any linens are better than paper. Here are some good choices for the holidays:

Amenity Cove Organic Placemats via Velocity – I like the cocoa and silver above, but these come in a great gray and espresso color as well.

Amenity Organic Cotton Napkins also from Velocity – cocoa, gray, and cream color choices available.

Add some shiny sparkle to your table with place mats made from recycled potato chip wrappers from BTC Elements.

A super large selection of organic hemp and French linen table cloths (in lots of colors) are available at Rawganique.

In the next table setting post, we’ll look at which holiday eco dishes are available – good stuff coming.