This Simple Cotton Ball Hack Will Save Your Garbage Can From Smelly Odors

There's nothing worse than a smelly garbage can. Okay, well, burning dinner might be worse, but stinky trash is high on the list. It can make your entire kitchen reek, and it's not the least bit appetizing when you're preparing or eating meals in your kitchen. Depending on your home, it could even start to stink up the whole place (via The Spruce). What's even worse is that sometimes your trash can smells awful — even when you've recently emptied the garbage. Not only can having a pungent trash receptacle be annoying, it can also attract bugs, flies, and other unsavory pests to your kitchen, which means an even bigger problem to deal with.

Sure, you can sprinkle baking soda in the bottom of your can, but that can get messy, and you have to repeat it often (via The Spruce). The good news is, there's an amazingly simple hack, according to Apartment Therapy, and it's something you can do once and forget about it for a while without suffering gross smells from the garbage you throw away in your kitchen. Real Simple reported that this easy trick might mean you don't have to empty your smelly can before it's full.

The cotton ball hack for deodorizing your smelly trashcan is both affordable and straightforward. Simply soak a cotton ball in essential oil and place it into your receptacle before putting in a new trash liner (via Apartment Therapy). The fragrant aroma will mask any unpleasant smells from your refuse. While it might work with any oil, the publication suggested several that would fit best in your kitchen, while hiding especially odorous garbage. Lemongrass oil works well because it naturally balances terrible odors. If you think your problem could be bacterial, try an essential oil like tea tree or citrus to combat the problem. If you have a problem with rodents, especially outdoors, a cotton ball soaked in mint oil could do the trick. Finally, if your smelly trash attract bugs, you can try neem oil to get rid of them while masking odors. 

While this hack won't last forever, it should last for several days, so you won't have to deal with reeking rubbish for a while after you drop the oil-soaked cotton ball in your can. Trying it out could change your life for good.