Well. none of the over-the-counter drops or remedies work. I know this. Right now, even. And I’d love to have something like that gizmo, if it actually worked.
Actually, Q-tips were invented to clean out ears. The “they are dangerous” stigma comes from the remote possibility of puncturing your ear drum with one. In order to actually do that, one would have to push the Q-tip over an inch into the ear canal and through a bend in the ear canal. You would start to feel pain way before the Q-tip actually reached your eardrum.
Actually, the problem with Q-tips is that they tend to end up pushing more wax further into the ear canal than they remove. Once it gets impacted it’s really difficult to remove without getting a doctor to flush it out.
Happily, here in Canada that is free. If you live elsewhere, you can buy flush-em-yourself syringes online for about thirty bucks or so that do actually do a really good job. They’re super delicate, though, so don’t drop them or the special bent tip breaks off.
Otherwise, warm olive oil in the ear will help loosen the wax up, but ideally it’s supposed to just ball up and fall out on its own. I’ve only seen it happen once, though, although I will admit i have had a lot less issues with my ears since I stopped using Q-tips.
something like this is what I use: http://www.amazon.com/Oriental-Stainless-Steel-Cleaning-Spoon/dp/B0099J6JEY
use it ever few days, wash it off. Especially after a shower.
If you have a LOT of buildup, slowly add h2o2 to your ear to soften it, with a dropper. Some people say to cut it 50% with water.
I haven’t had to have my ears cleaned since.
Otherwise, google ‘ear cleaner’ and the vacuum above is a first result…
The store I worked at never gave any guidance on floor position or planograms For as seen on TV items. Most of the time the product never had a sign associated with it in the system. They were just a pain to deal with. We would have to damage out half our stock due to people opening the boxes an losing the pieces.
Why, Corporate, that’s who. Just every now and then, one of those “K-Tel” (I just dated myself) gizmos would work exactly as advertised – I’m still using my V-slicer that I’ve had for close to 20 years, and it still slices and dices like a charm. But that’s not all! If you order now…
…If that actually worked, I’d buy one. Mostly because I tend to have a lot of wax, and it gets annoying having to use like 4 Q-tips per ear. I’m laaaaaaazy. But at least I admit I’d buy it for the sheer lazy factor. XD
When I worked at a retail store in a more upscale neighborhood we hardly sold any “As seen on tv” products.
However when I moved to a more low end neighborhood and worked at a store there, I saw a lot more sales of “As seen on tv” products. So much so that we changed an aisle that was mostly magazines to just “as seen on tv” junk.
We had a display of “As Seen on TV” for Christmas and I’m sure that all of the stuff on it was more useless than “Wax-Be-Gone”… “Glow int he dark keyboard” was my favorite, only creepy old men were buying that, so yeah, target audience…. much worse than I wanted to know….. and there were other items..*Shudder* yeah, glad it’s gone(for now at least)
the “glow in the dark keyboard” has led to the built-in backlit laptop keyboard, so obviously it was seen as a good idea. Very useful on a late night airplane trip.
I know that Norm usually does Sunday comics pretty far in advance, but I’d like to think he was inspired by Joe Posnanski’s absolutely hilarious write-up about this product and its commercial in his blog: http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2013/01/waxvac.html
I’ve come up with a theory (probably not original, but I did it as a floor drone and without marketing information, so there). There is a defined “goober point” and an asymptotic relationship from both directions as the price approaches $20. The closer an item gets to being exactly $20, the probability of it being complete trash approaches 1.
For the low end items (like the magic knives for 99 cents), they CAN be bad because the price is so low. For the higher end items (like the Ninja Kitchen Suite – $160), the people who buy that are going to do research, read performance reviews, and plan accordingly. It HAS to be of better quality simply because it’s a different type of consumer buying it. But twenty dollars seems to be the magic point where an average goober sitting on the couch says “I NEED ONE OF THEM”.
3 years in retail and that’s my contribution to the world.
We have the “as seen on tv” stores. They’re called “Showcase” and you can usually get the stuff cheaper than sold on tv.
As for earwax, go see your Dr. for an earflush. Feels weird, but so good afterwards. You’d be amazed at what can build up in your ears, and what you can hear afterwards. AND, your Dr. probably won’t do it if you don’t need it.
My Dr. told me it’s something she could check for on my annual visit, but for the most part your ears clean themselves.
Yes the warm water earflush can be a little weird in first moment but it oddly feels good. I mostly go to do it when I have a issue in hearing in my still ok right ear. A lot of times the doctor said it looked ok but still went ahead and sure enough I was able to hear better again.
Thankfully I do not have much of a wax problem in right ear as I do on left in comparison. I used to wear hearing aids on both ears and the left earmold would get plugged up quite quickly sometimes.
I was just satirizing this product yesterday after seeing the commercial. Looks like the crappy vacuum for my computer work bench. Bet the power of this unneeded product is just as bad.
The real gross factor will come into play once someone has bought this useless piece of garbage, brought it home, tried to use it, and then shoved it back into the box without bothering to clean it off first. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t take that return.
What store do you work that the return policy is based on if its gross or not?
If its my store it doesn’t matter if the product in the box is used or dirty. We scan the receipt, the bar code on the box, then throw the box into the damages bin.
Some stores put certain products on a sales final list due to hygine reasons so if they put stuff like pillows as sales final then they may likely not accept a open box of this kind of product.
I remember an episode of Rugrats where Chuckie’s dad invested his lottery winnings in Stu’s earwax removal invention, something that looked really similar to this except it also shot water into the ear to flush it out. He lost it all when they found out that it actually increases ear wax build up.
Well Marla, it looks like you are going to find out!
I think she already found out – Gumbels’ corporate purchasing.
The commercial is 10 years old. This product goes with the “As Seen on TV” display, of course.
Then it’s made a comeback- the product has been all over the airwaves in recent months
Well. none of the over-the-counter drops or remedies work. I know this. Right now, even. And I’d love to have something like that gizmo, if it actually worked.
So would I. It’s supposed to be dangerous to clean your ears with Q tips but I don’t know what else to do.
Actually, Q-tips were invented to clean out ears. The “they are dangerous” stigma comes from the remote possibility of puncturing your ear drum with one. In order to actually do that, one would have to push the Q-tip over an inch into the ear canal and through a bend in the ear canal. You would start to feel pain way before the Q-tip actually reached your eardrum.
Actually, the problem with Q-tips is that they tend to end up pushing more wax further into the ear canal than they remove. Once it gets impacted it’s really difficult to remove without getting a doctor to flush it out.
Happily, here in Canada that is free. If you live elsewhere, you can buy flush-em-yourself syringes online for about thirty bucks or so that do actually do a really good job. They’re super delicate, though, so don’t drop them or the special bent tip breaks off.
Otherwise, warm olive oil in the ear will help loosen the wax up, but ideally it’s supposed to just ball up and fall out on its own. I’ve only seen it happen once, though, although I will admit i have had a lot less issues with my ears since I stopped using Q-tips.
Must vary for different people, because the otc drops work just fine on my ears. ::shrug::
something like this is what I use:
http://www.amazon.com/Oriental-Stainless-Steel-Cleaning-Spoon/dp/B0099J6JEY
use it ever few days, wash it off. Especially after a shower.
If you have a LOT of buildup, slowly add h2o2 to your ear to soften it, with a dropper. Some people say to cut it 50% with water.
I haven’t had to have my ears cleaned since.
Otherwise, google ‘ear cleaner’ and the vacuum above is a first result…
The store I worked at never gave any guidance on floor position or planograms For as seen on TV items. Most of the time the product never had a sign associated with it in the system. They were just a pain to deal with. We would have to damage out half our stock due to people opening the boxes an losing the pieces.
Why, Corporate, that’s who. Just every now and then, one of those “K-Tel” (I just dated myself) gizmos would work exactly as advertised – I’m still using my V-slicer that I’ve had for close to 20 years, and it still slices and dices like a charm. But that’s not all! If you order now…
Yes, lets pay 19.95 to not solve a problem we don’t have.
It’s a problem some of us *do* have.
Then you still have a problem, because 90% of the time the gizmo doesn’t work as advertised.
Do you have one? Can I borrow it?
…If that actually worked, I’d buy one. Mostly because I tend to have a lot of wax, and it gets annoying having to use like 4 Q-tips per ear. I’m laaaaaaazy. But at least I admit I’d buy it for the sheer lazy factor. XD
this is a real product
http://youtu.be/Htbo1yW6qeU
I always heard you’re not supposed to use q-tips in your ears- just shoves the wax further in!
It’s true you aren’t supposed to use those. They really can damage your ears using those things.
I like the true infomercial touch of bumbling, clumsy people.
It looks like a drill! I love how happy the woman in the fourth panel is.
When I worked at a retail store in a more upscale neighborhood we hardly sold any “As seen on tv” products.
However when I moved to a more low end neighborhood and worked at a store there, I saw a lot more sales of “As seen on tv” products. So much so that we changed an aisle that was mostly magazines to just “as seen on tv” junk.
There’s a store in the local mall that sells nothing BUT “As Seen on TV” items. They’re still there.
We had a display of “As Seen on TV” for Christmas and I’m sure that all of the stuff on it was more useless than “Wax-Be-Gone”… “Glow int he dark keyboard” was my favorite, only creepy old men were buying that, so yeah, target audience…. much worse than I wanted to know….. and there were other items..*Shudder* yeah, glad it’s gone(for now at least)
the “glow in the dark keyboard” has led to the built-in backlit laptop keyboard, so obviously it was seen as a good idea. Very useful on a late night airplane trip.
I’d probably get the backlit one just because it’s cool-looking. But that’s me.
I know that Norm usually does Sunday comics pretty far in advance, but I’d like to think he was inspired by Joe Posnanski’s absolutely hilarious write-up about this product and its commercial in his blog: http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2013/01/waxvac.html
I’ve come up with a theory (probably not original, but I did it as a floor drone and without marketing information, so there). There is a defined “goober point” and an asymptotic relationship from both directions as the price approaches $20. The closer an item gets to being exactly $20, the probability of it being complete trash approaches 1.
For the low end items (like the magic knives for 99 cents), they CAN be bad because the price is so low. For the higher end items (like the Ninja Kitchen Suite – $160), the people who buy that are going to do research, read performance reviews, and plan accordingly. It HAS to be of better quality simply because it’s a different type of consumer buying it. But twenty dollars seems to be the magic point where an average goober sitting on the couch says “I NEED ONE OF THEM”.
3 years in retail and that’s my contribution to the world.
We have the “as seen on tv” stores. They’re called “Showcase” and you can usually get the stuff cheaper than sold on tv.
As for earwax, go see your Dr. for an earflush. Feels weird, but so good afterwards. You’d be amazed at what can build up in your ears, and what you can hear afterwards. AND, your Dr. probably won’t do it if you don’t need it.
My Dr. told me it’s something she could check for on my annual visit, but for the most part your ears clean themselves.
Yes the warm water earflush can be a little weird in first moment but it oddly feels good. I mostly go to do it when I have a issue in hearing in my still ok right ear. A lot of times the doctor said it looked ok but still went ahead and sure enough I was able to hear better again.
Thankfully I do not have much of a wax problem in right ear as I do on left in comparison. I used to wear hearing aids on both ears and the left earmold would get plugged up quite quickly sometimes.
I was just satirizing this product yesterday after seeing the commercial. Looks like the crappy vacuum for my computer work bench. Bet the power of this unneeded product is just as bad.
The real gross factor will come into play once someone has bought this useless piece of garbage, brought it home, tried to use it, and then shoved it back into the box without bothering to clean it off first. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t take that return.
What store do you work that the return policy is based on if its gross or not?
If its my store it doesn’t matter if the product in the box is used or dirty. We scan the receipt, the bar code on the box, then throw the box into the damages bin.
Some stores put certain products on a sales final list due to hygine reasons so if they put stuff like pillows as sales final then they may likely not accept a open box of this kind of product.
I remember an episode of Rugrats where Chuckie’s dad invested his lottery winnings in Stu’s earwax removal invention, something that looked really similar to this except it also shot water into the ear to flush it out. He lost it all when they found out that it actually increases ear wax build up.
Ah, the 90s.