Commercial carpets are meant to be strong. They take a lot of wear and abuse every single day.
But in your home, your carpeting doesn’t get the same level of foot traffic. And in some areas of your home, you may even have carpeting that’s more delicate in nature. One of a kind or antique rugs, or even delicate carpeting made out of natural materials don’t wear and handle the same way as carpeting meant for high traffic areas. Which is also why you can’t treat them like you would with any other carpeting.
Keeping them as clean as possible is the key to longevity. Start by ensuring visitors take off their shoes before walking on it. Then vacuum on a regular basis to ensure dirt, dust and debris doesn’t settle into the fibers.
But even with these extra precautions, they still will need cleaning on a regular basis. Yet not every carpet cleaning company is meant to clean this special type of carpeting. High temperature cleaning machinery can easily impact fragile and antique carpeting by causing colors to dull and patterns to fade. And if you have carpeting that has been glued to the floor, hot water can actually penetrate to the glue, causing it to come apart and begin to dissolve.
What should you do instead?
Never use high heat, boiling water carpet cleaning companies. Their philosophy is the more water, the hotter the water, the more dirt will come out. However with delicate carpeting, hot water may do more harm than good.
Low moisture is best. When gallon upon gallon of water is used in the cleaning process, stress is put onto each fiber. Less water is more in the case of delicate carpeting – focus in on using a low moisture system made with natural cleaners instead.
Go with experienced carpet cleaners. Before you hire anyone, talk to the consultant about your carpeting. Have they worked with something similar before? How will they test the carpeting to ensure their method is safe for your carpeting and can give you great final results? What guarantees do they offer? Harsh chemical cleaners will only reduce the life of your rugs and carpets; an experienced carpet cleaner will be able to offer solutions and information on how to do it the right way every time.
