Everyone knows that carpets get dirty, but you’d be surprised how many people don’t know how to properly clean them – including trained professionals. Thankfully, The Wilburn Company has decades of experience in the commercial carpet cleaning business, covering millions of square feet, so we think we’re qualified to give out some helpful advice. Below we’re listing four of the most common mistakes that commercial carpet cleaners often make which can drastically impact the feel, aesthetic, and longevity of your carpeted surfaces. Here they are in no particular order, as they’re all equally important!
Cleaning Your Commercial Carpet Too Frequently
While carpets obviously need cleaning, many people don’t know how often they need cleaning. Do you wait until the carpet is visibly dirty? Do you wait until there’s one stain bugging you and then clean the whole carpet? Or should you just get a spot-cleaning? Should you clean your carpet weekly, or even daily, just to be safe?
The answer to all of these questions is “not necessarily.” The frequency of a commercial carpet cleaning depends on your facility and your carpeted surfaces, the amount of foot traffic they get, and the type of carpeting itself. The point is this: it is possible to over-clean a carpet, which can cause an entirely new set of issues such as the general fraying and wearing down of material. It can also be needlessly expensive to clean an entire carpet when all you really needed was a single stain removed.
Spot-Cleaning Carpet Too Thoroughly
Shouldn’t you scrub as hard as you can at that unsightly stain? Surely the harder you scrub, the deeper your cleaning agent goes, right? Again, we’re looking at a case where what seems like “common sense” turns out to be fairly subjective. If it’s taking you an hour of the hardest floor-scrubbing workout of your life and you still see that ugly stain, the problem wasn’t how hard you cleaned the spot, but with what you cleaned it.
Often enough a commercial carpet cleaner will apply the wrong agent to a spot with too much force, which can fray the carpet fibers and allow even more dirt to get trapped within in the future, when all that really needed to happen was the changing of the cleaning agent being used. Even the right cleaning agent with too much force can cause similar, otherwise avoidable damage. There are abrasive and non-abrasive ways to spot-clean, and the amount of aggressive cleaning your carpet can handle depends on the integrity of its material.
Not Checking to Ensure the Job is Truly Done
How could someone not know when the job is done? The job is done when the carpet looks clean, right? You guessed it: not necessarily. It’s important to walk the entire area of a carpet after cleaning to be sure everything feels the way it should, not just looks like it. For example, a common method of deep cleaning is steam cleaning, the process of soaking the carpet in hot water and then vacuuming it back up at high pressure. Sometimes the process is immediate, and sometimes the water is left to soak longer for a number of reasons.
If the latter is the case, it’s important to make sure that every square inch of carpet gets the most important part of the treatment: the vacuuming up of the dirty water. Sometimes it can look like the carpet was effectively steam-cleaned but a single square foot of soaking dirty water can create a discoloration in the carpet that will be noticeable sooner rather than later. This is where quality assurance comes into play. In this case, and in many others, all that needs to happen to avoid an incomplete cleaning is for the site to be walked over and checked thoroughly, not just eyeballed from a distance.
Using the Wrong Equipment for Commercial Carpet Cleaning
As most folks know simply by visiting their local shopping districts, there are a large variety of vacuums available for purchase. Different models are better or worse for different situations, based on the size of your living space, the types of surfaces in it, etc. Just as there are numerous types of screwdrivers for varying types of screws, the same is true in the commercial cleaning world; choosing the right tool for the job is the first step in making sure the job is done right.
Let’s go back to our vacuum example. Using a vacuum with rotating brushes on a carpet material with looser fibers (like that shag rug you used to have) could tear the fibers, not only ruining the material but making a horrible eyesore of the remaining carpet – and all because someone didn’t know that not all vacuums are made for all carpets. Although it’s unlikely your facility is covered in shag rugs, the point remains that there are different vacuums, cleaning agents, brushes, etc. for different surfaces, materials, etc. You get the idea; hopefully your commercial carpet cleaner does, too.
Next Steps for Avoiding Commercial Carpet Cleaning Mistakes
Luckily for you, choosing The Wilburn Company as your commercial carpet cleaner guarantees you don’t encounter any of these issues in your facility. Our dedicated and trusted staff is extensively trained in all of our custodial methods with a wide range of equipment and years of hands-on experience. Whether you aren’t sure of the quality provided by your current commercial carpet cleaner or you’re looking to hire your first, The Wilburn Company is the best that the Maryland and DC area has to offer. Get in touch with us today to find out how we can help keep your carpets .