COMMON SENSE ABOUT CARPET Carpet is a vertically challenged fabric. We walk on it, lie on it, spill on it and grind dirt into it. Sometimes pets even urinate on it. Carpet does not have an easy life. We have a few simple recommendations to hopefully make your life easier and keep your carpet looking better longer. Today people are using a lot more resilient floors, vinyl, wood, ceramic and laminate. When you have mostly resilient floors on your main level and you have a carpeted stairs going up and down from that level you will notice the stairs taking a beating from the amount of soil from your feet, shoes, and slippers as you walk across it. Try keeping a scatter rug in front of the stairs. Let the scatter rug get most of the soil before the stairs collect it all. A scatter rug can easily be removed when company comes. The same scenario can be used when you have a room or rooms surrounded by resilient floors. Notice the first few feet of carpet going into the room. Put a scatter rug down as you are going into the room. Let the scatter rug take the beating. Color can play a major roll in how long a carpet will maintain its original appearance. A smooth solid light color carpet will show soiling quicker than a textured solid color. A textured carpet, like today's patterned solid color berbers, have a smooth appearance and will show soiling. A texture that will not show as much soiling would be like a twist or frieze style. A monolithic or multicolored carpet in a smooth surface will show less soil than a solid texture. A monolithic or multicolor in a texttured carpet is the least likely to show soiling. Carpet cleaning. We all need showers. Vinyl and ceramic get cleaned about once a week, and wood gets dusted and vaccuumed. Althoug carpet accepts the soil from the other products your feet deposit on it and it does get vacuumed weekly, many people believe they do not have to wash or clean the carpet becuase of the warranties offered by yarn and carpet manufacturers against staining. Wrong. The carpet mills ask that carpets get professionally cleaned once every 18 months to keep warranties in effect. We will be happy to provide warranty information once you have selected a product for installation. Some people don't want to get their carpets cleaned. They reason once they do, it will have to get cleaned more often. The simple answer is rinsing. You don't let soap stay in your hair, so ask the cleaner to rinse the carpet once it has been cleaned. This will help make it look better longer. We have seen homes where the children have spilled clear liquids on carpet. As the carpet dried the liquid became sticky and in a couple of weeks - because the sticky substance took more soil off the feet - dark circular spot appeared in the carpet. Sometimes because the spill came from a garbage bag dripping as the children walked across the carpet, there were multiple spots going across the room and down the stairs. This is not a stain. It could become one, but just as we need to clean vinyl or ceramic, we need to clean the carpet. A.J.Rose can provide spot cleaning kits or your local market sells spot cleaners for carpets. Keep track of what you have used to clean your carpet. You may be asked what agents were used if the spot becomes a stain later on. The mixing of cleaning agents can set a stain and void a warranty. Most carpet manufacturers provide a number to call to assist in spot removal. If you cannot remove the spot it is still not a stain. The mill asks you to call a professional to keep your warranty in effect. If the professional cannot remove the spot, and you have a list of agents used to assist in the spot removal, most mills or yarn manufacturers would then agree you now have a stain. The stain may or may not be covered by the warranty but we now are at the point of determining that you do have a stain. We can provide help and assistance with warranty-covered issues with the carpet mills and yarn manufacturers. This Common Sense About Carpet memo is not to direct or persuade one to change color or carpet selection. We try to give all our customers the necessary information and education so an intelligent consumer can make the right decision for their home and family. We hope this information assists you in visualizing your family, you decor and how you want your carpet to enhance you home's appeal. For questions on how to remove stains.... Shaw Carpets 1-800-441-7429 Mohawk Carpet 1-800-387-9881 Stainmaster 1-800-438-7668 |