Stains and odours 8 posts
Pet urine, winter salt and the spot that reappears a week after it was cleaned. These notes cover what is actually happening in the fibre and the backing, what you can safely try at home first, and when the problem has gone deeper than any surface clean can reach.
A carpet stain that ends up permanent is rarely the fault of the spill. It is usually set by scrubbing, hot water and the third product from under the sink. The rules that apply to everything, a table by stain, and the point where you should put the cloth down.
Blood is the stain where the usual instinct, warm water and a good scrub, does the most harm. Why it behaves differently, how to treat it fresh or dried, and what to do when it has gone through to the pad.
Wax is the one stain you should let sit. Most of it comes out as dry flakes, the rest needs careful heat, and a coloured candle leaves a dye problem that is separate from the wax.
Red wine is tannin plus a strong natural dye, which is why it can look worse after you clean it than before. The first minutes, the dried stain, and the three things people reach for that make it permanent.
The carpet looks clean and the room smells worse than it did yesterday. The kind of smell tells you most of what you need to know, and the fix is nearly always about water, not more product.
The white tide mark by the front door is not a stain in the usual sense. It is a mineral deposit, and it comes out the way minerals do, by being dissolved and carried away.
The surface is clean and the room still smells on a humid day. That is not a failure of effort. It is a question of how deep the urine went and what was used on it.
The spot looked gone on Saturday and there is a brown ring there on Tuesday. Two mechanisms explain nearly every returning stain, and one of them is in the bottle under your sink.
When it is a job, not a read
Carpet cleaning Hot water extraction that lifts dirt, grit and allergens out of the pile rather than pushing them further in. 
Area rug cleaning Wool, silk, jute and machine made rugs, cleaned at the right temperature and pH for the fibre they actually are. 
Upholstery cleaning Sofas, armchairs, dining chairs and headboards, on the same extraction equipment and usually on the same visit. Free quote
Hot water extraction that lifts dirt, grit and allergens out of the pile rather than pushing them further in. Free quote, and the price is confirmed before we start. How we do it
