Emergency Spot Cleaning Carpet
For some reason, bad things always happen when we’re busy and in a rush. Sometimes, that means you forget your drink on the table and don’t realize it until it’s too late. Other times, your child spills their drink, or your dog decides to pee on the carpet.
You don’t have time to clean up the stain, but if you don’t take care of it now, it may become a permanent feature of your carpet by the time you get home. Letting a spilled liquid like this sit untreated on the carpet could cause an unsightly stain and even produce an unpleasant odor depending on what was spilled.
However, cleaning the spill may cause you to be late to work, which is not ideal. While this may seem like a lose-lose situation at first, you’ll be glad to know that it isn’t. In fact, there’s a very easy and quick way to deal with this stain.
Hi! My name is Katie, and in this blog post, we’ll be covering a quick and easy spot-cleaning technique that will make cleaning a fresh spill on the carpet easier and may even remove the stain completely. We’ll cover the list of materials you need, how long to leave it, and even how this works so you’re best equipped to deal with this mess and any future messes.
What You’ll Need:
Before we begin discussing how to clean up the mess, let’s gather the necessary materials:
- Some water
- An absorbent towel
- A cookie sheet
- Some books or other heavy objects
The Emergency Spot Cleaning Process
Now that you have the materials listed above, let’s start using them. First, pour water on the spill spot. While it may seem counterintuitive to do so, by adding water, you rehydrate any spots in the stain that may have dried. While this in and of itself makes cleaning it easier, the fact that the now rehydrated mess will begin to mix with the water will also ease the cleaning process.
Next, you’ll want to set your absorbent towel on top of the now-wet spot. As you may have guessed, the towel is your hero here; it will absorb both the spill and the water while you’re busy at work, running errands, or whatever else you may be doing.
Now, set the cookie sheet on top of the towel. If you don’t want to use a cookie sheet, you can use anything that won’t absorb liquid and can’t be damaged by water. Whatever you use, make sure it’s big enough to cover the stain. If it’s too small, you may come home to find that while some of the mess is clean, some of it will still be a wet, potentially stinky, discolored puddle soaking your carpet.
Finally, set the books or other heavy objects on the cookie sheet. Preferably, it should sit there for a full twenty-four hours, but you can remove it after a couple of hours if this isn’t an option. The weight of these books will press down on the towel and put pressure on the stain, urging it to cling to the water. You want it to cling to the water because the water molecules will naturally bind together and wick up into the towel.
The longer the towel sits, the more time the water has to absorb into the towel, and the cleaner the carpet will become. However, if your towel happens to be a bit thin and there isn’t a non-absorbent barrier between the towel and the books, you may come home to a cleaner carpet and a stack of soggy, potentially ruined books.
Watch
You can watch this video here for a quick overview of this process:
Emergency Spot Cleaning Made Easy
Cleaning stains, especially when you’re busy, is almost always a stressful, chaotic experience. I’d know; I have two dogs and two kids.
However, it can become a much simpler and smaller issue with this technique. The key to cleaning any stain is speed; the quicker you react, the less likely it is to leave a stain, and the easier the cleanup will be.
If this trick doesn’t remove the stain completely, even after twenty-four hours, you might also need to use a carpet cleaner. Before doing so, test the cleaner on a carpet spot that’s otherwise unnoticeable to ensure the cleaner won’t cause your carpet to become discolored or damaged.
After you finish the spot test, you can use your chosen cleaner on the stain. If the cleaner provides instructions on how to use it, be sure to look them over and follow them to prevent them from causing a new stain or worsening the existing one.
If this doesn’t work, we have a few blog posts and videos that may be able to help, and we also offer some cleaners for sale in the store to help you find the best one for your needs.
Once you’ve managed to clean the stain, make sure you neutralize any cleaner you used. To do so, you can mix some vinegar and water and dry the area with a clean, absorbent towel. Failing to do either of these can leave an odor and cause another mess as dirt and debris get stuck in the carpet fibers. Once this is done, all that’s left to do is enjoy your freshly cleaned carpet until disaster strikes again.
Happy Spotting!
– Katie