How to prepare your home for carpet cleaning

You have the carpet cleaners coming, what should you do to prepare your home?

 

If your anything like me then there will be places where "things" are stored/places/tucked away and hidden from sight that, when you get down to it, takes a bit of time to clear out.  So start out early.  This is also a great time to have a little sort out!

Firstly - Remove the small stuff

Give your self a little time time to go round the rooms and make a little mental list of what needs to be moved from the floor area. You want the floor to be completely clear of odds and ends, for example:

• Kids toys / pets toys / scratching posts
• Pets bedding
• Magazine racks
• Vases
• Statues
• Anything stored under/behind furniture

Store these in another room for the time being, one that is not due to be cleaned.

Now your room should be looking quite clear

 Next - Prepare the big stuff

A good carpet cleaner will clean the entire carpet including both beneath and behind the furniture.  They will move the furniture for you but you will need to consider removing the following items before their arrival:

• Any objects on top of furniture or inside display cabinets - such as ornaments, vases, picture frames, ashtrays - anything that could move/fall/break when furniture is moved should be removed and stored away safely.
• Any small furniture such as stools and side tables should be stored elsewhere.
• The contents or drawers of heavy furniture such as chests and dressers should be removed to allow the technician to move the heavy furniture.

Now your room will be looking a little empty!

Finally

 There are just a few last points to consider removing from the room:

• Any excessive soil or debris from the carpet
• Any pets and/or children!

Your room should now be ready for the team to come in and whip through their work, obstacle free

REMINDER - A GOOD CARPET CLEANER WILL PLACE FOIL TABS OF SOME OTHER PROTECTION UNDERNEATH THE FURNITURE TO PREVENT IT FROM ABSORBING MOISTURE THAT COULD 1) DAMAGE THE FURNITURE, OR 2) CAUSE COLOUR TRANSFER FROM THE FURNITURE TO THE DAMP CARPET.

We are a professional cleaning company who specialise in Carpet, Rug, Hardwood floor, Stone floor, Upholstery and Leather cleaning for domestic an commercial clients.

 For more information about our services contact the team on 01223 863632 or at www.artofclean.co.uk to find out more.

Marcus has hidden talents! Great high speed video of carpet cleaning

 

The stains are gone in a flash!  This is a great little video one of our techs made whilst cleaning carpet stains at a B&B in Saffron Walden.

Find our fantastic carpet stain removal product at http://www.artofcleanonline.co.uk/

We are a professional cleaning company who specialise in Carpet, Rug, Hardwood floor, Stone floor, Upholstery and Leather cleaning for domestic an commercial clients.

 For more information about our services contact the team on 01223 863632 or at www.artofclean.co.uk to find out more.

Cat Poo....Perhaps you can relate to our clients scenario...

We recently had an email from a client with an enormous cat poop problem…

“I arrived home last Friday evening, ready to rush around and pack our bags before heading out promptly to Somerset for a friend’s wedding the next day.

But….upon opening the front door I noticed one of the cats had decided to poop right by the door, underneath the post flap, so that my post could land right in it……GROSE RIGHT!

Being pregnant and knowing the hazards of cat poop can cause to my unborn child I left the door open to air the place and thinking my husband would clean the mess when he got home a few minutes later….

But….

In his excitement at arriving home he completely didn't see the mess, proceeded to walk through it and transferred it on his shoes ALL THE WAY THROUGH THE HOUSE!

My nose picked up the problem first…..I turned from doing the washing up in the kitchen I noticed brown marks all over the floor! Screaming, I demanded my husband stopped moving IMMEDIATELY!

What a mess.

I think I need Art of Clean pronto……..”


Dear Serena

Thanks for getting in touch. It does sound like you need our help as soon as possible. The staining on the carpet – like you pointed out is not healthy as bacteria will start breaking the staining down and this is not healthy for your unborn child. The best way to treat this is by rinsing it (steam cleaning) from the carpet. We will apply a sanitizer to the carpets to get rid of the smell.

Our truck mounted cleaning system will also ensure the dirty air gets vented outside the property rather than in your home keeping a healthy living environment.

Please call us on 01223 863632 when it is convenient and we can schedule a visit or you.

Warmest Regards and thanks for choosing Art of Clean

Gail

Check out some more naughty cats at Dailymail

Commercial carpet cleaning

Appearances count for a lot in business. Dirty, worn carpets don’t give a good impression to employees, customers, visitors. Regular carpet cleaning is necessary to ensure the appearance of your business is upheld.

Carpets take a lot of daily wear, especially in commercial premises.  Keeping your carpets clean not only make them look better it also extends their life expectancy as dirt in the carpet will wear the fibers down more quickly, about two to three times faster!  So cleaning your carpets regularly will save you a lot of money in the long run as a full carpet refit is a very costly outlay.

Here are some images of a commercial carpet clean we did recently:
Before:

 After:

Here's a video of our last commercial carpet cleaning....

If you would like some more information about our professional carpet and hard floor cleaning service please contact our friendly team on 01223 863632 or visit www.artofclean.co.uk.

Have you heard about Air freshener hazards???

We cleaned a commercial properties carpets recently and were shocked to find they were using plug-in air fresheners!  Do you know they are a fire hazard?  There have been news reports over the years of houses catching fire because of plug-in air fresheners.  The London Fire Brigade issued a warning about the dangers of plug-in air fresheners after tacking a blaze at a bungalow in London. In a commercial property, or at home, do we really need a hazard such as this? Do we really want to risk?

Another hazard that has been bought to our attention in the press is the effects or air fresheners on our health.  A report by the Natural Resources Defense Council states:

"Phthalates are hormone-disrupting chemicals that can be particularly dangerous for young children and unborn babies. Exposure to phthalates can affect testosterone levels and lead to reproductive abnormalities, including abnormal genitalia and reduced sperm production. The State of California notes that five types of phthalates -- including one that we found in air freshener products -- are 'known to cause birth defects or reproductive harm.”

We hope that this information will give you a perspective on the possible hazards of such products.  To eliminate odors the best way will always be to open windows to allow air flow, and clean your environment regularly…especially carpets and upholstery.

If you would like some more information about our carpet and upholstery cleaning services please contact our friendly team on 01223 863632 or visit www.artofclean.co.uk.

Protecting carpets from furniture damage

There are a number of good reasons to get a professional team to clean your carpets, and largely this comes down to experience and knowledge.  The mistakes of an inexperienced and untrained cleaner can cause damage to both carpet and furniture that can be expensive or impossible to repair.

Here’s the difference:

A professional carpet cleaning team will have good powerful machines that will remove most of the moisture from the carpets once they are cleaned. However, not all moisture can be removed instantly and this can cause major problems to your carpet and furniture if preventative measures are not taken.  What will happen?...

• Moisture will work up the legs of your wooden furniture and cause damage to the wood
• Dye from the wood can transfer onto your carpet – staining your carpet!
• Metal legs can start to rust, damaging both furniture and carpet.

We at Art of Clean are very aware of this concern and take preventative measures to ensure that this will not happen.  After cleaning, furniture is replaced back onto the carpet with protective foil/plastic tabs and Styrofoam blocks under the legs. Why? Well sometimes the moisture left in the carpet will leach out any colour-stain finish from the furniture leaving a (very difficult to remove) stain on the carpet.  We are one of only a very few carpet cleaning companies in Cambridge that offers this.

If you need any further advice or would like to talk to us about our carpet cleaning service please contact us on 01223 863632 or visit www.artofclean.co.uk

How to remove blue tack from the carpet

We recently completed a cleaning job where blue tack was stuck to a carpet, this is a very common problem, especially in family homes. Home owners are so used to searching on the internet for solutions for everyday problems, that we decided to check out what advice is available.

The advice offered ranged from an amusing freezing a whole carpet – which could be very difficult due to the average, and in fact the person with the problem did have trouble closing her freezer door, to pouring oil, including pharmaceutical grade oil onto the stained area – any type of oil poured onto the carpet could be really difficult to lift off, so we would strongly not recommend you do this. Another one is Dylon stain remover, which could cause serious discolouration to a carpet, especially if it is a wool carpet, to Vanish which would have not impact much impact on removing blue tack, it would just make the blue tack go further into the carpet grain if rubbed as suggested on the stain removal instructions.

If you find yourself with a tricky stain, the best thing to do is to call in a professional carpet cleaner, such as Art of Clean, and we will be able to give you immediate advice over the phone to make sure it doesn’t get any worse. We will then probably need to steam the area, which will help to remove the blue tack. Please see the before and after picture, we have restored the carpet to as good as new, and there are definitely no oily stains!