Office Carpet Cleaning in Vancouver, Washington

There are many different categories of carpet cleaning:

Residential Carpet Cleaning: which would consist of houses and apartments.

Industrial Carpet Cleaning: which would consist of large manufacturing facilities, or places like that.

Commercial Carpet Cleaning: which consist of offices, stores, restaurants, and places like these.

In this article we are going to cover office carpet cleaning in Vancouver, Washington and some of the challenges associated with
it.

Office carpets, depending on the type of office environment, can receive a huge amount of soil over a short period of time. This is because in MOST offices there are a lot more people, and a lot
more traffic, than in a regular home.

This also means there is more soil tracked in, and with more people in the office, that soil is much more likely to be walked on and pushed deeper in the carpet pile. The deeper the soil, the more difficult that soil is to remove.

Also, in most cases the carpet in your office is a "berber" style carpet with tight loops, which means it can be more difficult getting the deep down soil out of the carpet.

Office Furniture Can Also Be A Problem

The other issue with office carpet cleaning can be the furniture.

Not only is furniture more difficult to clean around, but certain types of furniture, like office chairs, can really make cleaning difficult.

Why Do Office Chairs Make Cleaning More Difficult?

When dealing with office chairs it is REALLY important to make sure you have the carpet under those chairs protected, otherwise the chairs are not only going to grind the soil into the carpet, they are also
going to scratch and abrade the carpet fiber and basically ugly the carpet out.

Once the carpet has received this type of damage, it can be cleaned, but it will never look the same again.

An absolute MUST in offices are the clear protectors that go under chairs. They don't have to be clear, but that is what most people recognize as carpet protectors under chairs.

These protectors, the good ones, can go a long ways to protecting your carpet under the chairs, and making it easier to get the area under desk and chairs clean. In this picture you see an example of a plastic carpet protector under a chair. There are different styles and quality of these protectors - get the best protectors that your budget allows for.

But Protectors That Go Under Chairs Can Also Cause A Problem

While we HIGHLY recommend having carpet protectors under chairs in place, they can also lead to a problem that most people do not think about!

And that is when the carpet protectors are removed the carpet can look darn near new, but the area surrounding the carpet protector can  look dull and dingy.

So if you decide to move the furniture in your office around, be aware that the carpet that was NOT under a protector is probably never going to look as good as the carpet that was not under a protector.

This can make for some strange traffic lane issues in your carpet.

Office Carpet Can Be Hard To Reach

If your office is in a high rise building, it can be extremely hard to reach with a truckmount carpet cleaning machine. The hoses cannot be run up elevators or through open doors in the lobby of your building
up to your office.

So having a high-rise building cleaned with the most powerful form of hot water extraction - truckmounts - is probably not going to happen.

This doesn't mean you can't receive good carpet cleaning with something less than a truckmount - you certainly can - but it means you will not have access to the BEST cleaning technology. 

So How Are Carpets Cleaned In High Rise Offices?

In most cases, high rise offices are cleaned with low moisture pad cleaning and portable carpet cleaners. And the results, at least visually, can be every bit as good as if the carpets were cleaned using a truckmount.

The issue is the amount of soil removal. Low moisture pad cleaning does NOT, in almost all cases, remove as much soil as truckmount carpet cleaning machines and, in most cases, it is not even close.

But pad cleaning can deliver outstanding results. Remember though, that just cleaning for appearance is not the only reason to have carpets cleaned. Cleaning for a healthy indoor environment is also very important.

Office Carpet Can Be Hard To Reach

By far the most important issue with any carpet, in any environment, is limiting the amount of soil that is tracked in. This is why having good walk off mats at the entrances to your office building and the
office areas itself is so important.

Keep the soil in the mats.

The Second Step In Keeping Office Carpets Looking Good

Vacuum! Vacuuming is the single most important step in keeping any carpet looking good on a regular basis. A vast majority of soil in your carpet is dry particulate soil, which is best removed by vacuuming.

If this soil is allowed to build up in your carpet it can wreak havoc on the appearance of your carpet. Every time someone walks on that soil it acts like sandpaper on your carpet. It scratches the fiber and makes the fiber look dull and dingy.

This is called APPARENT SOILING, which is not soil! The area looks dull and dingy because the fibers are scratched and the light reflecting off the fiber, and back into your eyes, looks duller. NOTHING can be done about apparent soiling - at least as far as cleaning.

The Third Step In Keeping Your Office Carpets Clean and Looking Good

Spot and spill cleanup. If there is a spot, or a spill of liquid or food, immediately clean it up. The longer the spot or spill is in your carpet the harder it can be to get it out.

Offices are famous, with carpet cleaners, for coffee spills. So if there is any type of spill, get to it quickly.

The BEST THING YOU CAN DO FOR YOUR OFFICE CARPETS

Call us at Linton's Carpet Cleaning. We have over 20 years of experience cleaning commercial carpets in Vancouver, Washington; with office carpets being one of the areas we are most experienced in.