Good Morning Betty,
Got your e-mail when I came into the office this morning. Monday morning is my morning for catching up with everything that came in from late Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
Here's the e-mail you sent...
Thought I'd cover your questions here since you asked about it here too. Plus the questions might help someone else as well.
Hi Rick:
This is Betty from D's Enterprises Stone & Tile Restoration. I received a sample bottle of Releasit a while back and it was great on a new customer's older carpet and old coke stains. I have not ventured off into cleaning carpet... I am in the business of stone and tile restoration and let's not forget I AM STILL LEARNING, like James and that process alone is dizzy spell for me!!! (that's scary!)
Well, I have a small portion left and the customer wants me to see if I can remove the dirty hand prints from newspapers and coffee spills (Starbucks) from bar stool "fabric" chair seats in this same business. I will try a very small portion on a chair seat tonight (no one knows what type of fabric is on the seats and why did they choose fabric with designs of white, green and purple is beyond me!) The fabric appears to be some type of tough tweed. And I checked...there are no fabric samples in the stock room. The construction guys put this on the stools to appease the store manager...colors matched the carpet and looked "cute.".
Now the seats are not so new looking any longer. The manager wants me to upkeep these stools once I get them clean (if possible.)
Thennnn I have another customer who has inquired with me if I may be able to help with his red (yes bright red) carpet in a book store and it has coffee, cokes and I noticed some gum on this carpet. The carpet is only 5 months old but the business is open 7 days a week. Can I use Releasit to soak on the spots and gum first and then encap with it? ANY advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated, I know it would not be difficult with the Releasit.
Sorry this is lengthy....I got carried away.
Much thanks.
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RESPONSE:
Betty, you're considering using Releasit on an upholstery fabric that's been chosen for a commercial setting, so without knowing the fiber - I think it's safe to assume that it's fairly durable. A simple approach to clean it would be to mix a small bucket of detergent and then use a terry cloth towel to buff over the fabric by hand. Take your time with this. Avoid over-wetting, wet it lightly and evenly. Work up a light foam as you rub the fabric. We've cleaned plenty of stools, benches and chairs in stores using this simple approach with Releasit.
Red carpet cleans as well as any carpet. In fact the color pop on red is real impressive! Here are some instructions that we've covered previously that addresses your questions about gum and drink spills...
How To Remove Chewing Gum:
We do a quick and simple two step process.
1. We freeze the spot with freeze spray and chip off the top.
2. We put a tiny dab of citrus gel on the spot to remove the sticky residue that's down in the fiber. The spot can be wiped with a towel if you use much citrus gel.
Then we encap like normal with the Cimex and Releasit. Gone!
This process takes about 30 seconds per gum spot.
How To Eliminate a Recurring Spill Stain:
1. First. Scrub the spot for at least 60 seconds (scrub for 2-3 minutes if the spot is a tough one). Scrub it with next to no moisture in the pad (practically zero moisture). So you're scrubbing the daylights out of that spot with MINIMAL moisture. I will normally scrub a circle around the spot with the Cimex first, leaving the spot bone dry. Then I'll run the machine over a section of dry carpet for a few seconds to dry out the pads. Then without squeezing the solution valve, I'll criss-cross over the spot for a minute or more as outlined above.
2. Next. Spray a few good mists of concentrated Releasit Encap-Clean onto the area using a trigger sprayer. The concentrate is mixed 1/3 if you're using Encap-Clean DS, and it's 50/50 if you're using regular strength Encap-Clean.
3. Final step. Work the concentrated Releasit down into the fiber by running the machine across the spot one last time.
This process works perfectly just about 100% of the time, if it is performed to the letter. You must scrub intensely with minimal moisture first. Then apply the concentrated Releasit. Then work the concentrated Releasit down into the fiber. The fluoro-chemical retards the wicking process during drying, and the concentrated polymer crystallizes any spill residue remaining at the base of the carpet. BaddaBing-BaddaBoom the recurring spot is gone for good. Even if the carpet is cleaned later with HWE, the spot won't reappear.
I hope this helps you Betty!
Have a great week
Rick Gelinas
encapman
