5 Fast Fixes for your Funky Shoes

Where are quick shoe deodorizers when you need ‘em? 

It’s always at the worst possible moment, isn’t it? It’s a Monday, somehow or another you slept in, breakfast is forgotten, your hair looks like a bird has taken up residence. Got your jacket, wallet, keys. You’re just about to head out the door, and you’re putting on your shoes when you get a whiff of your feet. 

 

 

Let me rephrase that– a whiff of your shoes. Your feet are innocent. 

*Cue gagging noise* You instantly barf. Your dog looks at you with absolute disdain. The neighbors are ranting something fierce about a moldy cheese smell wafting over the fence, and somewhere a child is crying because the smell is so perfectly pungent. 

It’s your shoes that have committed the funky felony. The deadly deed. It’s pretty bad, and there’s literally negative ten seconds to do anything about it because you should have been out the door ages ago.

First off, it ain’t your fault ma’ dude. Smelly shoes affect even the best of us– it’s called being a human being, and human beings bare the burden of funky feet. 

Now, it would totally and most absolutely be your fault if you didn’t do a darn thing about it. I get it though– the internet is full of crazy-sounding tricks and really difficult-looking solutions and frankly it’s enough to make one want to just throw in the towel and throw out their smelly shoes.

 

Don’t you worry your pretty little mind, because we’re going to be taking a look at the best of ‘em together, alright? We’ll take a look at the fast ones in particular, because we all know that those are really the ones we want.

 

No tricks, nothing strenuously extensive. Just the simple, fresh-smelling solutions for your and your (soon-to-be) fabulously smelling feet.

 

1. Soak with White Vinegar 

 

Yep, I know, I know– vinegar almost smells worse than sweaty shoes– but we all can concede that its acrid tang is better than the foul funk emanating from your footwear. So make like your stinky shoes are Easter eggs and chuck ‘em into some vinegar.

 

NOT straight-up vinegar. We may be trying to clean your shoes quickly, but we’re gonna also try and do this sanely. 

Listen up, buttercup: One part white vinegar, two parts water, let your shoes take a bath for 30 minutes and voila! 

The vinegar is absolutely-posilutely a strong scent, but it’s actually a good thing.

 

Your shoes, even when your feet aren’t in them, are home to smelly bacteria, and every time you put your shoes back on and sweat in them, you basically are providing said bacteria with an all-you-can-eat buffet. 

Totally gross to think about, I get it. But don’t worry!

The vinegar is the bouncer who kindly shows the rank bacteria to the door. The one who mercilessly boots them from your booties and into the ethers! That sharp tang really is good for more than just assaulting and singeing your nose hairs off.

Simply soak the shoes and then let your previously pungent footwear dry someplace sunny. Remember, moisture is kind of the smelly bacteria’s best friend, so sun and even a nice breeze can make a huge difference (if you can manage to let your shoes dry outside). If you don’t have access to the great outdoors, feel free to just grab a dry rag and towel-dry your shoes to the best of your ability. Tip for success though– don’t wear while still soggy, because the whole deal here is to get those beloved shoes of yours back to basics and bone-dry before you slide ‘em back on.

 

2. Rubbing alcohol

 

 

If you don’t have any white vinegar lying about don’t lose your head, because rubbing alcohol is actually going to be able to accomplish basically the same thing. Death to the bacteria and all bad odors rising up from your rad footwear!

Here’s what you gotta do bestie– mix up a lovely concoction with three parts rubbing alcohol and one part water (cups, teaspoons, eyeballed measurements– whatever floats your boat, really). NOW, dampen a rag and just rub the offending shoes down. 

What, no soaking it? Why, pray tell, would this be any different than the previous option with white vinegar?

 

You don't want to soak your shoes in rubbing alcohol, believe me. Rubbing alcohol is actually a way stronger cleaning product than vinegar. Vinegar has a wide myriad of uses, to be sure, but rubbing alcohol kind of sweeps the court on this one. It’s like the Usain Bolt of cleaners, while vinegar is just the middle school track star– pretty awesome, but ya’ know, still just on their way to legendary greatness of epically grand proportions. So don’t let your shoes go for a swim when it comes to rubbing alcohol. Give your pungent pair of shoes a good scrubbing, and then just like the last time, make sure to let them dry before heading out the door.

What’s really awesome about rubbing alcohol, however, is that this stuff honestly evaporates so quickly and– get this– it can do all of this without leaving any kind of residue. Vinegar won’t either, btw.

What’s also really nice about both of these speedy solutions is that they don’t exactly go bad, and so you can totally just keep a big old jug of one or the other on hand for a rainy day. Or… a smelly day, as it were.

 

For any kind of funky fiasco, you can just head straight for your medicine cabinet, and there it’ll be.

 

3. Steam Clean the suckers

 

I hear ya’ though. Loud and clear, my smelly friend. White vinegar and rubbing alcohol can absolutely be just as malodorous as your smelly shoes, which just kind of sucks. Nobody really wants the slightly fresher funk of vinegar or rubbing alcohol if they can get around it (even if they do do the job). We’re not here to trade one bad stench for another, regardless of whether it is a super speedy solution. Is it too much to ask that the shoes just are… cleaned? Don’t you fret, dear reader, steam cleaners have got you back.

Stick one of those magical suckers into your shoes, and just let it do its thing for about twenty seconds.

The steam will be so hot that it will kill off the freakin’ bacteria. If you’d like, you can also wand over the rest of your shoes, and that’ll take care of stains. For real, I’ve seen the grungiest of white sneakers go from tragic to just like new asap with this method.

Bacteria remover and stain remover all wrapped up in one crazy cool piece of machinery. Plus you can get these things for like $10 at Target, and they last forever. Totally not just for getting rid of wrinkles. It’s like a facial for you (at a distance– DO NOT put these super close to your skin, you buffoon) and a death trap for the funk in your shoes.

PLUS I mean I mentioned that it literally takes twenty seconds, right? That’s not even like half a minute. 

 

4. Essential Oils

 

Um, but wait I think I can beat even that. This next one is gonna take you about 10-15 seconds, if can believe it. Two words: essential oils.

Essentially, the coolest thing since sliced bread. Or even bread itself. Essential oils are just kind of the coolest in that way. 

And if you actually want a smell (other than your pungent peds, that is), well sirs and madames, y’all have plenty of lovely options to choose from! 

Anything from rosemary to vanilla, you've got it. Seriously there are a gazillion options to choose from when you’re looking at essential oils. You want your shoes to smell like a proper rainforest? There’s an oil for that. Missing all of those xmas sugar cookies (which totally weren't all eaten by you)? Easy, we’ll have your shoes smelling like the Pillsbury Doughboy himself in no time flat.

So, directions: Grab your preferred essential oil. Put a couple of drops of said essential oil on a cotton ball or even a tissue. Grab a rag or something, if you'd prefer. Dab where it smells off, and ta-da!! No dry time! Seriously, you could like sneeze and the whole thing would be done and smelling crazy fresh before you even had time for someone to say gesundheit.

Alternatively, you can leave the cotton ball or tissue in your shoes overnight, and then you’d really be in the clear for your smelly shoes. You can also repeat several times throughout the week, even on a regular schedule, and you wouldn’t have to worry about grabbing a stinky pair of shoes in the morning. I mean we all remember what mom always said about an ounce of prevention being more of a heavyweight fighter than a pound of cure. 

I mean, and then you wouldn’t be in the pickle you are now, needing the speediest solution on the planet to save you and your spectacularly smelly shoes. Truly, without a doubt essential oils are a solution which is best enacted piecemeal– partial bits at a time, throughout the week.

 

A little goes a long way when it comes to essential oils. For real, dab a wee bit on your shoes, and don’t let them go for a swim in it. Just a little everyday and your shoes will be funky fresh and not just freakin’ funky in as little as 10 seconds.

 

5. Less work with LUMI

 

But then that brings us to our last option. I bet you could use LUMI in less than 10 seconds. Lumi’s Citrus Tea Tree Natural Shoe Deodorizer can be spritzed right in your stinky shoes and in less than a moment. Remember how I said earlier with regular old essential oils that quickly getting rid of your footwear funk could be done in less time then it takes to sneeze– this is that, but way faster.

Made in the USA, family-owned, and highly reviewed on Amazon (by half a millin people), LUMI is the simple and quick shoe deodorizer you may be looking for. As far as shoe hacks go, it’s about as fast as it gets, and it actually works too.

You could literally spritz this in your shoes right as you’re about to head out the door. Heck, you could do both shoes at once (that ain’t gonna work with the steam cleaner, sorry). No rubbing with cotton balls, no soaking or anything– you can just spritz and be smell-free, my likely late and assuredly stinky pal. Well, bad smell-free, because now your shoes will smell fabulous. Like citrus tea tree and all things amazingly fresh.

Less is more when it comes to how much work we want to put into keeping our shoes smelling like their best selves. Really, we got a whole lot to do and literally zero seconds to fix the smelly shoes issue. Like negative seconds, actually. We should’ve been out the door ten minutes ago and there’s no time for a steam cleaning spectacular. But if ya’ need to nix the nefarious nasal assault ASAP, LUMI is the quickest and most effective option out there.

So there you have it folks! Five fast ways to frikin’ fight the shoe smell. 

Deodorize your shoes with any one of these quick and easy methods the moment you’re hit with the foot funk. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got to be on your merry way in minutes, especially when you've got  LUMI. 

Trust me, we’ve all been there. You think you’re all ready to go– maybe you’re even late, and that sucks. It’s time to jam on your shoes and you get hit with that smell. You have to do something, like there’s absolutely no way you can head out with your shoes smelling this bad. Time to deodorize your shoes, but it’s gotta be speedier than your dog when you pull out the bacon treats. Anything that makes you even more late just isn’t worth it. It’s gotta do the job though.

There’s no time for any fake fixes. You just need something to work super quick, and you want it to actually work. 

No need to worry, though. White vinegar, rubbing alcohol, steam cleaners, essential oils, and LUMI have all got your back– and your rad runners– and they can save the day before you can realize you should have set your alarm for just a bit earlier. Have no fear, it’s not a problem without a solution.

 

Deodorize your shoes quickly with any one of these fine fast options, and we’ll have you up on your (fresh smelling) feet in no time flat. Simple and easy tricks to tap out the odorous bacteria hanging out in your shoes, and get you out the door. These are the quick fixes for deodorizing your shoes that you didn’t know you needed, but now you do, and you’re very welcome ma’ dudes.