Cleaning Tip:
By Mike Schaffer - President, Tornado Industries

In regards to carpet cleaning, one of the questions distributors often hear from their customers is about how often carpets should be cleaned.

Some managers and cleaning professionals will suggest the obvious: when they are dirty. But usually by the time the carpets start to appear soiled, the soiling and stains are deeper than what is noticeable. This means they may be more difficult to remove, requiring more cleaning chemical, time, effort, and cost. What’s more, the soil can damage the carpet fibers.

Other facility managers have two set times of the year when they clean carpets: once in the summer and again in the winter. This is often true of schools. The problem here is that some carpeted areas will be heavily soiled, while others may need little or no cleaning whatsoever. Yet they are cleaned because it is on the schedule. Again, this can be costly.

A more scientific—or at least practical—way to maintain carpets for maximum soil removal, cleaning effectiveness, and cost effectiveness is to divide the facility into three primary sections, each with specific carpet cleaning needs.

For instance:

• Section A would include the most soiled areas of the facility. These are often walkways, building entries, and heavily trafficked areas. An effective carpet cleaning program would call for cleaning these areas four times per year.

• Section B would be interior locations of a facility such as large office areas or individual school classrooms. In most cases, these areas can be cleaned and soiling kept to a minimum if extracted twice per year.

• Finally, Section C would be those areas of a facility that are simply not used or soiled all that often. Private offices generally fall into this category, as do libraries in schools and offices, as well as conference rooms, especially if food and drink are kept to a minimum. A thorough cleaning with an extractor once per year should likely do the job.

With the facility divided into sections, we can begin to allocate carpet cleaning attention to where it is most needed, which will also help cut costs. For instance, Section A, the most soiled areas, usually includes about 10 percent of a facility. Section B may make up as much as 60 percent of the building, while the remaining 30 percent of the facility is the least soiled, requiring just one cleaning per year.

A little math shows how cost effective this division can be.

Assume we have 50,000 square feet of carpet to be cleaned twice per year at $1 per square foot. That would amount to $100,000 per year.

Cleaning just Section A four times per year would cost the same facility $20,000; Section B (cleaned twice per year) would cost $60,000 per year. Section C (cleaned just once per year) would cost $15,000 annually. In this case, the facility would save $5,000 per year in carpet cleaning costs and still effectively maintain the appearance and health of the carpeting.

Even more than the $5,000, this allows cleaning workers to devote more time to other cleaning tasks, less chemical is used helping to protect the environment, and less wear and tear on the equipment, which all can also produce cost savings.