7 Creative Uses for Your Coffee Grounds

Each morning after you make your daily cup of coffee, you’re left with coffee grounds that most people swiftly throw away in the garbage. However, what if we could use these grounds for a better purpose? I bet you didn’t know that there are a variety of different uses for coffee grounds other than adding to your garbage. We did our research and found 7 of the best uses for your coffee grounds.

1.) Soil Dressing Used coffee grounds contain a lot of nutrients that will make your acid-loving plants happy. Mix in about 1/2 cup of used grounds per gallon of soil in containers. For garden beds, use about 1/2 cup per 5 square feet. Sprinkle the grounds over the surface and work them in to the top six inches of soil before planting. To make them even more nutritious, mix them with a couple of finely crushed eggshells. This mulch made of coffee grounds is perfect for plants such as roses, azaleas, rhododendrons, evergreens, and hydrangeas. 2.) Snail Repellent Do you have problems with slugs and snails munching on your growing vegetables? Draw a 1/2-inch wide circle of coffee grounds around the plants you want to protect. It won't kill the slugs, but it will turn them away. Apparently, they don't care for the gritty texture against their bodies. And your flowers and other plants will be saved! 3.) Deodorize Your Refrigerator If your refrigerator always smells a little funky from various foods and occasional spillages, it can be hard to get that smell out. Use your coffee grounds as a sort of air freshener in your fridge so it will always smell like the wonderful scent of coffee! Just put a whole used filter filled with used coffee grounds in an old butter dish and leave it on a shelf in the fridge. Coffee can overpower any powerful scent. 4.) Coffee Body Scrub Why spend a fortune for designer body scrubs when you can make your own for just a couple of dollars? Just add mineral oil or Vitamin E oil to your old coffee grounds and apply it to your skin with a loofah. Coffee grounds help to exfoliate your skin because it will stimulate blood flow and promotes tighter and healthier skin. 5.) Hand Cleaner Since we have already established that coffee is a great exfoliator, it makes sense that it makes great hand soap as well. To make this easy DIY hand cleaner, toss unused soap ends in a small jar. Add a few tablespoons of coffee grounds and enough water to cover it all. In a day or two, you'll have thick, creamy liquid soap scrub. The grittiness of the grounds work together with the very mild acids to remove ingrained dirt and soften your skin. As an added bonus, coffee is a great deodorizer, so your hands won't smell like the garlic, onions, or fish you cooked. 6.) Hair Glosser The nutrients in coffee stimulate your scalp and give your hair a glossy, healthy shine. To achieve this look, simply save up a few pots worth of used coffee grounds in a covered container. Add a cup or two of warm water and let it steep while you wash your hair. Strain out the grounds and pour the liquid over your hair. Massage it in well and leave it in your hair for about five minutes, then rinse well. If you are a brunette, there is another helpful use for these coffee grounds. Rinsing your hair with the coffee grounds can help rejuvenate your hair color! Steep your used grounds in two cups of hot water, and then rinse the mixture through your hair. Now you can skip a trip to your hairdresser, and save a great deal of money as well. 7.) Use Coffee Grounds as a Dye Everyone knows that coffee stains, and those stains are stubborn too- so why not use that to your advantage? Reuse spent coffee grounds to make a weak dye solution to color natural fabrics, yarn and paper. The resulting color will depend on the strength of the dye and the length of time you leave it in the dye bath, but you'll generally get a soft, antique tan color rather than a dark brown. For variations, try sprinkling old coffee grounds over wet fabric or paper and letting it dry.   We hope these creative suggestions for using coffee grounds will encourage you to recycle and reuse them, instead of throwing them away. This just goes to show how many uses the miraculous coffee bean truly has!