Our first route runs mid-February 2027. Sign up now and your address and pickup day are held for that first route. We text you the week before your first bath, and nothing is charged until that visit is confirmed.

Do I need to be home?

No. We clean your bins at the curb on your trash pickup day, after the truck has emptied them. Just leave them out like normal and we will roll them back when we are done.

We follow your trash pickup day. Our route runs behind the garbage truck, usually later the same day. We text you the day before so you know to leave the bins out.

Pick a plan, enter your address and trash day, and reserve your first bath. It takes about two minutes on your phone. Nothing is charged until we confirm your first visit.

What about the smell?

The smell comes from bacteria growing on old food and liquid in the bottom of the can. Our 200°F water kills it and washes it away, then we add a deodorizer. Most customers notice the difference right away.

Is it safe for my driveway?

Yes. The cleaning happens inside our truck and all of the dirty water is captured on board. Nothing is left on your driveway, in your yard, or in the storm drain.

What if my bin is really bad?

Bring it on. Our first visit is always a deep clean, and heat plus high pressure handles almost anything. If a bin needs a second pass, we do it at no extra charge. That is our stink-free guarantee.

Plans start at $29 a month for two bins on the Monthly Bath. Every-other-month is $35 a visit, quarterly is $39 a visit, and a one-time deep bath is $49. Extra bins are $5 each per bath.

Any time, no contracts and no cancellation fee. Text or email us and we will take you off the route. You can pause for a vacation the same way.

What if it rains or there is a holiday?

If weather or a holiday pushes your trash pickup, it pushes our visit the same way. We text you the new day. If we have to skip a visit for safety, we make it up on the next pickup day at no charge.

What if my bin still has trash in it?

We can only wash empty bins. If the truck has not come yet or there is still trash inside, we leave it and catch it on the next visit. If this happens on your first visit, text us and we will reschedule.

How to get rid of trash can smell (and keep it gone)

You took the trash out. The bag is gone. The can still smells like something died in it. If you want to know how to get rid of trash can smell for real, the first thing to understand is that the bags were never the problem. The smell lives in the can itself, and it will keep coming back until you deal with what is growing in there.

Where the smell actually comes from

Every bag that goes into a rolling cart leaks a little. Meat juice, coffee grounds, a yogurt cup that did not get rinsed, the water from a bag of old salad. It collects in the bottom and the corners, and within a day bacteria move in. Those bacteria eat the residue and give off gases, mostly sulfur compounds, and that is the smell. The same thing happens on the underside of the lid, where condensation and splashes build a film you cannot see.

So the smell is not the trash. It is the bacteria living on what the trash left behind. That changes how you fix it. Masking products help for an afternoon. Killing the bacteria and removing what they eat fixes it.

How to clean a smelly trash can, step by step

Plan on 20 to 30 minutes the first time. Pick a trash day, once the can is empty, so you are not working around a week of bags.

Pull out anything loose. Scrape the bottom with a dustpan or a putty knife. If there is a solid layer of sludge, this step matters more than any product you add later.
Hot water and dish soap. Fill the bottom a few inches with the hottest water you have. A kettle of boiling water on top of hot tap water is a good combination. Add a good squirt of dish soap. The heat kills bacteria, the soap lifts grease.
Scrub. Use a long-handled brush and get the floor, the lower walls, and the seam where the floor meets the wall. Tip the can over and scrub the lid, the rim, and the hinge area.
Rinse on the grass. Dump the dirty water on the lawn or a flower bed, not into the street. Storm drains in Kernersville, Winston-Salem, and Greensboro flow directly to creeks without treatment. Soil handles soapy water fine. A creek does not.
Deodorize. Half a cup of baking soda sprinkled on the wet floor, or a cup of white vinegar swished around and rinsed, takes care of what is left.
Dry it in the sun. Lid open, can on its side if you can manage it. Bacteria need moisture. A dry can does not smell.

Why hose water alone does not work

A lot of people rinse the can with the garden hose every few weeks and wonder why it still stinks. There are three reasons.

Hose water is cold. Bacteria do not care about cold water. It moves them around and leaves most of them in place. You need heat, at least hot tap water, to kill them.

Hose water has no pressure where it matters. The film on the walls is greasy and it sticks. A hose at 40 psi washes the loose stuff off the top and leaves the film behind. A brush or real pressure is what lifts it.

And a hose rinse leaves the can wet with no deodorizer, which is exactly the condition bacteria like. Rinsing cold and closing the lid can make the smell worse by the next morning.

Between washes: what helps and what does not

Baking soda. A thin layer on the floor of the can absorbs moisture and neutralizes acids. Replace it every couple of weeks. It is cheap and it works.
Dryer sheets. A couple taped under the lid or dropped in the bottom give a clean scent and do a little to repel flies. They mask more than they fix, but they are better than nothing between cleans.
Activated charcoal. A charcoal bag or a few plain briquettes (not the match-light kind) in a mesh bag absorb odor without adding a scent of their own. Good for people who find the dryer sheet smell as bad as the trash.
Cat litter. A scoop in the bottom soaks up leaks. Swap it out on trash day.
Bleach. Skip it. It does not outperform hot water, it damages the plastic over time, and the runoff goes down the storm drain.
Scented sprays. They cover the smell for a few hours and do nothing about the cause.

Whatever you use, the single biggest help is keeping liquid out of the can in the first place. Tie every bag. Double bag meat and seafood. Rinse containers. Freeze the worst scraps until the night before pickup.

A summer schedule for the Triad

Our summers run hot and humid from late May into September, and a closed black can on a driveway can hit 130°F inside. Bacteria double in minutes at those temperatures. Here is a schedule that keeps most homes smell-free:

Once a month, May through September: a full hot-water wash like the one above, on trash day once the can is empty.
Every trash day: a quick look in the bottom. If there is standing liquid, dump it on the grass and drop in a scoop of baking soda.
Every two weeks: swap the dryer sheet or charcoal.
October through April: a wash every two to three months is plenty. Cold weather slows everything down.

If a monthly hot-water scrub is not how you want to spend a Saturday, a mobile cleaning service does the same job with 200°F water at high pressure, captures the dirty water on the truck, and deodorizes the can before putting it back. Triad Trash Bath’s monthly plan is $29 for two bins, we come after your trash truck does, and you do not need to be home. First baths start mid-February.