One startup, Dropel Fabrics, wants to eliminate that feeling forever.
Using nanotechnology, the company has created a completely unstainable fabric that can be used in shirts, jackets, or anything else in danger of discoloration.
Though it may seem like magic, it's not - it's science!
The shirt is treated with a hydrophobic coating that prevents the liquid from absorbing into the shirt. That coating is made of a hydrophobic polymer that repels moisture of all types and causes it to bead up on the surface of the fabric.
If you really wanted to stain the shirt, you could apply pressure to the beads and press them into the shirt, you monster.
Bloomberg's Seth Porges, who tested a Dropel shirt, remarked on how the shirt felt "almost exactly like plain-Jane cotton."
The shirt's potential for disaster-prevention is endless. Aside from keeping white dress shirts pure white, the stain-free nature of the fabric means you can get more wear out of your clothes. That's good news for business travelers with small carry-on luggage.
Along those same lines, the fabric could even be touted as sustainable, as the shirts require less washing, Dropel co-founder and president Bradley Feinstein told Time.
Bloomberg posits that the shirt may be a great summer staple, as it wouldn't absorb smells and sweat stains.
But then, as Esquire pointed out, if the sweat isn't absorbed by your clothing, it will just stay on your skin, which makes for an uncomfortable experience and is antithetical to the philosophy behind most athletic sportswear, which include moisture-wicking proprieties to absorb the sweat from your skin.
Dropel is using the fabric in its own men's clothing line, Kelby & Co, which has products available for pre-order.
Time reports that, according to one client study, the fabric increases production costs by 5% but has the potential to spike sales by 40%. Seeing as Dropel is offering the fabric to other designers and clothing companies, this new fabric could become a business dress standard.