In this short video, we’ll discuss the two mistakes that most rug owners make that severely shorten the life of their rugs. These two mistakes are easy to avoid, and in just a couple of minutes, you’ll know how to avoid them yourself and keep your rugs looking great and lasting as long as they possibly can.
There are three factors that affect the need for cleaning and the overall life of your rugs.
The first is the general activity and level of soiling where the rug is located. Most rugs are located in relatively high traffic areas of the home, where there’s a lot of dirt and foot traffic.
The second factor is the quality of the materials used in the manufacture of the rug. Many modern rugs are chemically washed to soften the face yarns and give the wool extra shine. Unfortunately, this also damages the wool and can shorten the life of the rug.
There may not be much you can do about the first two factors, but the third factor is completely in your control.
The final factor that affects your rug’s life is, does the rug receive proper vacuuming or appropriate maintenance on a frequent and consistent basis?
The two mistakes that most rug owners make when taking care of their rugs are, either they don’t vacuum their rugs enough, or they vacuum them improperly.
You want to view vacuuming your rugs like dusting them. To see why, let’s consider how rugs become worn.
Dust settles on your rugs in the same way that it settles on your furniture, floors and countertops. In addition, abrasive dirt is tracked on your rugs from foot traffic. This dirt starts off in the very tips of the face yarns of the rug, but over time the dirt becomes embedded in the base of the yarns and finally into the foundation of the rug.
This dirt is abrasive and with continued foot traffic and the full body weight of people walking on them, the fibers of the rugs are cut and worn out from contact with the dirt. And this is the reason most rugs are lost. They simply wear out and there are no fibers left, no design and nothing soft to walk on.
So let’s talk about how to keep this from happening to your rugs.
Preventing this damage is fairly easy. All you need to do is break the cycle. In other words, if the dirt gets deposited on the face yarns of the rug, but it gets vacuumed off or dusted before it has a chance to work its way into the foundation, it stops the dirt from reaching the foundation of the rug and prevents the abrasive wear in the foundation.
So the best way to prevent wear in your rugs is to frequently dust them.
When the dirt becomes embedded in the foundation, it’s almost impossible to remove it without a thorough washing. And this is why it’s never a good idea to surface clean rugs the way a carpet cleaner would. This type of cleaning cleans the face yarn, but does nothing to remove the damaging dirt in the foundation.
If it’s been two years or more since your rugs have been immersion washed, it won’t be possible to get ahead of the cycle. There’s probably already embedded dirt in the foundation of your rug and vacuuming alone won’t remove it.
A thorough washing will remove the dirt in the foundation and then frequent dusting will help to keep it from coming back.
This is why we recommend washing your rugs every two to three years, depending on the traffic level on the rug, and we recommend vacuuming or dusting your rugs as often as you can.
Meanwhile, if you have any questions about proper maintenance of your rugs, just give us a call and we’ll be happy to help you out.
