TP: Tentative Proof

Consumer Relations
Kimberly-Clark Corporation
Dept. INT
P.O. Box 2020
Neenah, WI 54957-2020

Dear Cottonelle,
When I started seeing commercials for your new Cottonelle Roll Poll, I thought little of it. After all, the choice was obvious. I’ve always rolled under. Everyone I’ve ever known has rolled under.
But then on a whim I checked the poll statistics and found that (as of January 12, 2010), 83% of Americans roll their toilet paper over the top. My home state of Connecticut is the only state in the nation where a majority of citizens roll under.
But let’s get real. Having a majority of Americans choose something hardly guarantees its superiority. The majority of Americans also like Dunkin’ Donuts’s donuts, CBS’s “Two and a Half Men”, and the New York Yankees. 300 million people can be wrong. And so I would like you to consider the facts before you conclude your study in the field toilet paper and announce one to be superior based on just popular opinion.

• Ease of Removal.
As you can see in the diagram and assume using your powers of common sense, the Earth’s gravitational forces pull the loose end of the toilet paper in a downward direction. When the toilet paper is being rolled under, this means the end of the paper hangs in the air obediently. However, if the roll has been set up such that the edge hangs over the top, gravity then draws the loose end back onto the roll. The picture at left is a microspic view of toilet paper. In it, you can see the tiny fibers that stick out from toilet paper. We don’t notice
it on our skin, but when a sheet of toilet paper touches another sheet of toilet paper, those fibers lock together like tiny Velcro. A roll rolled over the top stays rolled thanks to toilet paper’s cohesive properties, and suddenly the edge becomes elusive. The bathroom patron spins and spins the roll but can’t find the edge until he puts his face an inch away from the roll and squints.

• Rerolling Capability
People on both sides of the over/under debate have made a big issue out of which side prevents paper overextension, leaving extra paper hanging down. I believe them to be about equal, but rolled-under toilet paper is much more easily rerolled after overextension. Once again, gravity acts in the paper’s favor, causing it to smoothly roll back onto the original roll leaving no trace of what had occurred. Due to the same gravitational and cohesive issues described above, rerolling overextended toilet paper on an over-the-top roll causes it to bunch as it rerolls, creating a bulky, unsightly mess.

• Hygeine
Ergonomic efficiency makes us naturally put the side of the toilet paper that is facing out from our palm against our skin when we wipe. If you look that the second diagram at right, you will see that when one takes toilet paper from under the roll, the side of the paper one uses to wipe is the clean, soft side that hasn’t been exposed to the world. It’s like the main character in Bubble Boy. Now someone who chooses to take toilet paper from over the top of the roll is using the outside of the paper to wipe with. The problem with that is that the outside of the paper is exposed, for minutes or hours, to the open air. Invariably it is exposed to at least one flush, which sprays bacteria and viruses onto the absorbent fabric where they can then be transferred to an unsuspecting and unprotected human bottom. The outside of the toilet paper is like the girl that gets away at the end of The Ruins, destined to bring the evil man-eating plant out into the world.


Honestly, I’m a bit appalled with America’s choice. The advantages to rolling under are so simple, so obvious. It’s easy, it’s clean, and it’s beautiful. Rolled-under toilet paper has brought me so much bathroom bliss I just get a little worked up over the hordes of people living in such ignorance.
Now I assume that the Cottonelle Roll Poll is leading up to some sort of announcement on America’s Favorite Way To Use Toilet Paper, and while I’m not asking that you take a cue from the global warming scientists and fudge the numbers for the benefit of mankind, maybe you could add some sort of asterisk stating that America’s opinion should be taken with a grain of salt.

Yours,

Letter Status: Replied
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