Comet is a powdered cleaning product sold in North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

 and distributed in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 by Prestige Brands

Prestige Brands

Prestige Brands, Inc. is a company that manufactures personal care and home cleaning products. It was formed by the merger of Medtech Products, Inc., Prestige Brands International, and The Spic and Span Company...

. Scratch Free Comet with Bleach Disinfectant Cleanser contains 1.2% sodium

Sodium

Sodium is a chemical element with the symbol Na and atomic number 11. It is a soft, silvery-white, highly reactive metal and is a member of the alkali metals; its only stable isotope is 23Na. It is an abundant element that exists in numerous minerals, most commonly as sodium chloride...

 dichloro-s-triazinetrione dihydrate (a derivative of cyanuric acid

Cyanuric acid

Cyanuric acid or 1,3,5-triazine-2,4,6-triol is a chemical compound with the formula 3. Like many industrially useful chemicals, this triazine has many synonyms. This white, odorless solid finds use as a precursor or a component of bleaches, disinfectants, and herbicides...

) and 98.8% "other" ingredients. The only clues about the other ingredients in the product are disclaimers on the label that mention that the surfactants in the product are biodegradable and that it contains no phosphate

Phosphate

A phosphate, an inorganic chemical, is a salt of phosphoric acid. In organic chemistry, a phosphate, or organophosphate, is an ester of phosphoric acid. Organic phosphates are important in biochemistry and biogeochemistry or ecology. Inorganic phosphates are mined to obtain phosphorus for use in...

. Despite being labeled as scratch free, its label also advises the use of plenty of water on delicate surfaces. Comet is not recommended for use on silver

Silver

Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal...

, painted surfaces, walls, soft plastic

Plastic

A plastic material is any of a wide range of synthetic or semi-synthetic organic solids used in the manufacture of industrial products. Plastics are typically polymers of high molecular mass, and may contain other substances to improve performance and/or reduce production costs...

, aluminum and rubber

Rubber

Natural rubber, also called India rubber or caoutchouc, is an elastomer that was originally derived from latex, a milky colloid produced by some plants. The plants would be ‘tapped’, that is, an incision made into the bark of the tree and the sticky, milk colored latex sap collected and refined...

. Mixing Comet with other cleaners, specifically dish soap, toilet bowl cleaners and products that contain ammonia

Ammonia

Ammonia is a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen with the formula . It is a colourless gas with a characteristic pungent odour. Ammonia contributes significantly to the nutritional needs of terrestrial organisms by serving as a precursor to food and fertilizers. Ammonia, either directly or...

, is dangerous.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Comet was known for a series of popular television ads featuring the character of "Josephine the Plumber" (played by actress Jane Withers

Jane Withers

Jane Withers is an American actress best known for being one of the most popular child film stars of the 1930s and early 1940s, as well as for her portrayal of "Josephine the Plumber" in a series of TV commercials for Comet cleanser in the 1960s and early 1970s.-Biography:Withers began her career...

). Later, in the 1980s, she gained a niece named JoAnn or Jo, who, after helping her customers with their plumbing issues, would show them a picture of her beloved Aunt Josephine, who uttered, via voiceover, her famous tag line, "Nothing can hold a can to Comet!".

The brand was introduced in 1956 by Procter & Gamble

Procter & Gamble

Procter & Gamble is a Fortune 500 American multinational corporation headquartered in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio and manufactures a wide range of consumer goods....

, and was sold to Prestige Brands

Prestige Brands

Prestige Brands, Inc. is a company that manufactures personal care and home cleaning products. It was formed by the merger of Medtech Products, Inc., Prestige Brands International, and The Spic and Span Company...

 in 2001. Procter & Gamble retained the rights to market the brand in Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, and to the professional (non-home consumer) market in the USA.

Parodies

In 1969, The Wacky Packages

Wacky Packages

Wacky Packages are a series of trading cards and stickers featuring parodies of North American consumer products. The cards were produced by the Topps Company beginning in 1967, usually in a sticker format. The original series sold for two years, and the concept proved popular enough that it has...

 series included a mock ad, drafted by Art Spiegelman

Art Spiegelman

Art Spiegelman is an American comics artist, editor, and advocate for the medium of comics, best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning comic book memoir, Maus. His works are published with his name in lowercase: art spiegelman.-Biography:Spiegelman was born in Stockholm, Sweden, to Polish Jews...

 and painted by Tom Sutton

Tom Sutton

Tom Sutton was an American comic book artist who sometimes used the pseudonyms Sean Todd and Dementia...

, depicting a flag-waving American Revolutionary soldier and a pair of club-wielding policemen chasing a group of hippies carrying picket signs inscribed "For Freedom!" and "Love! Not War!", with a prominent slogan, "Keep America Clean with Commie Cleanser" and a can, depicting a caricature

Caricature

A caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...

 of Uncle Sam

Uncle Sam

Uncle Sam is a common national personification of the American government originally used during the War of 1812. He is depicted as a stern elderly man with white hair and a goatee beard...

, and inscribed, "Extra Strong Commie Cleanser" and "Gets Rid of Reds, Pinkos, Hippies, Yippies & Flippies". The mock ad has also appeared depicting the can alone.

A children's song

Children's song

Children's song may be a nursery rhyme set to music, a song that young children invent and share among themselves, or a modern creation intended for entertainment, use in the home, or education...

 about Comet

Comet (song)

"Comet" was a well-known humorous children's song in the United States. It describes the deleterious effects of consuming Comet cleanser—a powdered cleansing product sold in North America. The most prominent and often-occurring effect in the song is that it turns one's teeth green...

 is sung to the tune of the Colonel Bogey March

Colonel Bogey March

The "Colonel Bogey March" is a popular march that was written in 1914 by Lieutenant F. J. Ricketts , a British army bandmaster who later became director of music for the Royal Marines at Plymouth...

. It rhymes "Comet" with "vomit." The complete lyrics are:

Comet, it makes your teeth turn green

Comet, it tastes like gasoline

Comet, it makes you vomit,

So try some Comet, and vomit today!