Stain Remover

Learning how to clean upholstered furniture is a must if you want to ensure that your furniture stays beautiful. While you may not be able to prevent accidental spills and stains, with any luck you can clean them after they happen. It’s important to find a good stain remover. Often, spray-on stain removers can be used to make your upholstery look like new again. But it’s important to keep a stain remover on hand at all times, as when it comes to removing stains and spills from upholstery, the sooner the better. Follow these steps to remove stains on your upholstered furniture.

Vacuum First

The first step to cleaning your furniture is vacuuming it. Even if it doesn’t look dirty, your furniture may have accumulated dust particles that you cannot see.

Although you might not think this step is important, it can actually help you to prevent rubbing dust and dirt into the upholstery when you wet the fabric to remove the stain. While vacuuming, be sure to use a small vacuum head attachment specifically for upholstery. It should have bristles, like a brush, around the suction tube. This is going to help you to get into all the cracks and crevices on your chair, couch, or other piece of furniture. If you have a pet and you find that vacuuming doesn’t do much to remove hair, try using a pet hair remover. These work well on upholstered furniture.

Blot the Spill

When it comes to fresh spills and stains, time is of the essence. In order to prevent the spill from soaking the fabric and beneath it, the wood or furniture stuffing, you need to act quickly. Blotting refers to a technique that involves gently patting the stained area with a paper towel, cloth, or towel. Scrubbing and rubbing the stained area will not help to remove the stain, but will only set it further. On the other hand, blotting works to remove additional liquid before it soaks deeper into your furniture.

Different Fabric Types

The type of stain remover you use will firstly depend on the fabric. Upholstered furniture may be made from fabrics including: cotton, acetate, linen, wool, silk, acrylic, olefin, or a blend of any of these. In addition, some upholstered fabrics are colored with dyes that can bleed when wet. It’s important that you look on the tag of the furniture in order to find out the type of upholstery fabric, not to mention the care instructions. If you have removed the tag, you will need to contact the company that manufactured the furniture in order to find out the care instructions.

The Stain Remover

The tag of your furniture should indicate what type of cleaning product to use on it. There are four codes: W (water-based), S (water-free), WS (water based or water-free), and X (nothing). Water-based products include detergents and spray-on stain removers, such as the Woolite P.O.D. or Resolve Spot Remover. Water-free solutions include alcohol, baby wipes, and dry cleaning solvent. It’s important to try the solution on a small, inconspicuous area of your furniture before cleaning. That way, you won’t accidentally do damage to your furniture.