Christmas is fast approaching and with more social gatherings happening, accidents will happen! As professional carpet cleaners, we see a large variety of issues, some of which even we can’t fix. However, we see many situations where hasty decisions have caused simple spillages to become disaster zones.
Here are a few simple do’s & don’ts for treating stains in your home. If you have wool, 80:20 & fully synthetic carpets, then these tips are for you. If you have had an accident on sisal/seagrass – blot it with a towel & then it’s a case of hoping for a divine intervention I’m afraid!
Let’s start with the don’ts –
Firstly, don’t panic & avoid the actions associated by panicking. These include the most common reaction, which is to scrub the stain hysterically, pouring large amounts of another liquid onto the area in an attempt to counteract the problem or using ‘hacks’ that you have seen online.
There is a lot of misinformation online that can do more harm than good.
Scrubbing a carpet will cause permanent damage to the pile, particularly if it is a looped wool carpet.
Adding more liquid to the problem will cause it to widen or cause the carpet backing to yield an additional brown stain.
We don’t recommend using off the shelf stain treatments as most of these products contain some form of bleaching agent. If you see the phrase ‘oxidising’ think bleach. These products might seem like the answer you’re looking for, but they have the potential to cause several additional problems.
- They can bleach/lighten your carpet, especially if it has a wool content
- They will almost certainly leave a residue in the carpet which leads to accelerated resoiling in this area over time.
Now for what you should do!
Step 1: Absorb the spillage using kitchen towels/old towels. Gently scrape up any solids using a blunt tool.
Step 2: Gently blot the area with a very mild solution of warm water & detergent. Do not scrub.
Step 3: Use more kitchen towels/old towels to absorb the remaining moisture. Leave the towel on top of the spillage & apply a weight to aid absorption.
Granted this step-by-step guide may not remove more serious stains such as wine & coffee but it should help with most of the other types of stain. If you are unlucky enough to have coffee and/or wine stains that are still visible after completing the steps above, then it is probably best to call in the professionals.
It is worth noting that having a good stain protector applied to your carpets can significantly reduce the likelihood of spillages causing permanent staining, as long as you are able to address the issue fairly quickly. On treated carpets, spillages bead up on the surface & therefore give you time to blot them away without a trace. If this is something you think that you might be interested in for either your carpets or upholstery, then please feel free to give us a call for a quote.
I hope that if you do have any unfortunate spillages this festive season that our list of do’s & don’ts are helpful in keeping the damage to a minimum.
Wishing you all a Merry Christmas!