Richard Middleton, owner of the Great American Rug Cleaning Co. in Tomball, offers advice for how homeowners can care for their rugs.

How can homeowners best care for their rugs?

[Homeowners should] start by vacuuming in the home, spot cleaning appropriately, rotating the rug at least a couple of times a year, and having your rugs cleaned for your typical household every couple of years.

What is the difference between in-home cleaning and taking a rug to get it cleaned?

When you’re coming into someone’s home you’re going to be utilizing, typically, a steam-cleaning-focused, or hot-water extraction, method. You can only do so much, especially when most rugs are going to have pet urine to some degree, which you cannot flush and clean out appropriately on location. You’re not able to do dry soil removal thoroughly; you can only vacuum the surface of the rug, [and] you cannot work on any type of stains thoroughly, which takes time. When you bring a rug into our shop it goes through a very rigorous 10-step process from tagging the rug, taking pictures of the rug and dry soil removal. After that it’s going to go through a process to neutralize pet urine. After that it’s going to have to be dried properly. Then it will go to the finish floor, where we’re going to do a final quality control.


What’s the value of a rug?

[A homeowner should own a rug] for aesthetics. People have been getting away from wall-to-wall carpet, and that’s been the trend for the past 15-20 years now ... so you want something that’s going to warm up the room, feel good on your feet, and of course really ties things together.

Great American Rug Cleaning Co.

212 E. Main St., Ste. 100, Tomball


281-205-8325

www.greatamericanrugcleaningcompany.com