Lots of good points.
We live on very very little, so every penny currently counts for us. Startup costs for wipes and canister come to about $35, but for someone with more sewing expertise you could probably do it for under $10 by buying an old flannel sheet and making your own. I bought mine because I wanted something well-made that would last for a long time.
arebelspy, I do actually wait until I have a maximal white load to wash it. I don't have many whites. My white washcloths that I use for cleaning all sorts of stuff, a pair of white jeans, a white shirt and a few pairs of white drawers. Some white socks...that's it. Doesn't fill a load. I also have white sheets but they are HUGE (cal king) and take a load of their own. White towels too, but again, a load of their own. I pack the washer as best I can while leaving enough room to agitate. With the addition of wipes, my white load "misc" load will fill the washer.
We run our whites through the dryer, though we hang everything else to dry. I don't mind the time spent folding warm cuddly just-dried things - it's actually fun for me and takes only a few minutes. It's a great break from the high-intellectual-load things I do with the rest of my day.
I think the most salient points are that if this represents a huge inconvenience and unpleasantness for you, then it's not going to appeal to you. For me, better ass cleanliness, money saved, and no more lugging huge bales of TP up and down the stairs to my house are motivators. I have a very high gross-out threshold, so I'm not bothered at all by the washing etc. For more squeamish folks, I suppose the imagined ick factor would be a barrier.
It's not a massive ROI, but I think it will bring me a higher quality of life. So let's do a little math: currently I spend $120 year on TP. Let's say the cloth cuts that down to $20 (guests, etc.). That's $100 saved a year. Start-up costs of $35, and let's say the wipes themselves last for 5 years. Then they are replaced for $30 ($5 was my canister). So over 5 years, I spend $135 instead of $600. I'm incorporating the washing into a laundry schedule that won't need to be changed, so I'm setting myself up for 5 minutes a week of extra folding. Over 5 years, I save $465, which is $93/yr, or $1.79 paid for that extra 5 minutes of work. That's a hourly "wage" of saved money that I calculate at $21.48 for that time spent folding. Right now as a student my two jobs each pay an hourly wage that is half that.
I already find the concept appealing, so the extra money saved is icing on my super-broke cake. It won't cost me hardly any extra time or effort, actually probably equivalent to the time and effort I already spend. Think about it: between finding and buying toilet paper, making that extra trip back to the car to go lug the fucker up to the house, pulling it open to store all the little 4-packs in the closet of my tiny apartment (no room to just leave a bale of TP on the floor), and opening those little 4-packs to replace the TP that sits on the holder and the reserve holder in my bathroom, I probably break even on the time spent, will save myself the physical effort of hauling TP across the parking lot and up my stairs.
Across the world, I've used all sorts of local remedies - Korean built-in toilet bidets, Cambodian water ladles (you ladle up water from a little reservoir and use your left hand to wash up), Kenyan bring-your-own situations. I like the bidet thing, but I don't have the extra income right now for Mr. Everyday Dollar's great finds. I guess I'm just not a huge fan of TP - after getting quite sick while traveling and discovering the joys of baby wipes, I have been open to suggestions since.
So no hate to the folks who will only give up TP if it is ripped from their cold dead hands - there's room enough for all of us. And I know that for some if not most, saving $93 a year is not enough financial incentive to change one of our most ingrained hygienic habits. But for me, fuck yeah it is, hand me the ass rags buddy because I'm as broke as a joke!
I guess I'm saying I really like the discussion and all the points everyone is raising. If it ain't for ya, it ain't for ya. But for me it's money saved and no more work, and even though I can't afford Charmin I'll feel like I'm wiping my ass with a fluffy cloud.
On another note: who can tell me about good places to find hankies? How do the people who carry them use them? SO CURIOUS