How Often Should a Carpet be Cleaned?

As many of you know I inspect carpets for the major carpet mills. This week I had the opportunity to inspect for a woman north of Toronto for a carpet that was wearing out. She said that her home inspector had told her that she didn’t need to have the carpet cleaned by a professional. As a matter of fact the carpet did not have to be cleaned at all he said. Well needless to say the carpet was a wreck. The reasoning for not cleaning the carpet was that they were all located in bedrooms and that no one wears shoes in the bedrooms.

Well let me start off by saying –if you only have bare feet on a carpet then is the carpet not doing the same things as your socks would?? Don’t you change your socks on a daily basis?? Why? Because they stink from the oil and perspiration off your feet thats why. The oil off of feet can be murder to some carpets. Look along side your bed, can you tell the spot your feet land on the carpet every morning? Most people can!

Secondly–the soil in a carpet is extremely small. Its much smaller than the human eye can see. The soil is also usually very gritty and abrasive. In other words when you walk on a carpet loaded with soil you are creating an abrasive sand paper effect to the carpet.

Thirdly-the carpet manufacturers have spent millions of dollars to create carpet fiber that hides dirt. Yes it hides dirt. Whether the Antron fiber or trilobal fiber or foxface fiber, carpet fiber does a wonderful job of hiding the soil inside of it.

I always laugh at people’s reaction to my next statement because almost every body does it and it makes a good point. Why is it that people will look at a carpet adjacent to a ceramic tile and say “I had better clean the tile it hasn’t been cleaned in a week but I can wait till next year to clean the carpet.” Geez the ceramic tile can live through the next world war but the carpet is a textile floor covering.

Most carpet manufacturers recommend cleaning the carpet before it becomes visibly soiled and at least every 12-18 months. The preferred method for cleaning is hot water extraction. It is suggested that the carpet cleaner hold an IICRC certified carpet cleaning technician and uses CRI approved chemicals. I’ll talk more about that in the coming weeks.

If you have any questions email me at leesenter@hotmail.com.