If you have stains on your carpets that make them look bad. You’ve probably been looking for the best way to get rid of them. Baking soda and vinegar and a lot of products on the market that are made just for getting stains out of carpets. But they can be pricey. Plus, they often contain harsh chemicals that can damage your carpets and the environment. They don’t always work on tough stains, either.
Baking soda is an affordable and more natural way to clean your carpets. Baking soda will help make things look and smell fresher. And it doesn’t have any chemicals that are bad for your health, carpets, or the environment. And if you mix it with vinegar, another natural cleaner, it can get rid of even the toughest stains.
Depending on the type of spot, you can clean with baking soda or a mixture of baking soda and water.
Simply Baking Soda Will Remove Non-Oily Stains
If the stain isn’t oily, it should be easier to clean. Tea, soda, ink, and anything else that is colored or dark but not oily or fatty can leave stains that aren’t greasy. Since there is no residue underneath these stains. The baking soda only needs to soak up the color that caused the stain.
To remove a non-greasy stain using baking soda, do the following steps:
- First, sprinkle baking soda on top of the stain. Make sure that it is fully covered and not too lean.
- Next, you’ll need to dump the baking soda with cold water. Never use hot water because it could make it harder to get the stain out. And don’t use too much water, or the stain could spread. You can mist the area with a spray bottle because all the baking soda needs are to be damp.
- Let the baking soda sit out overnight. Again, you don’t want to rush this because the longer it sits, the more it can absorb.
- Lastly, vacuum the area and look at the stain.
If you follow these steps, you should be able to get rid of most stains. But if the stain is tough, you may need to do the process again.
How to Get Pet Smells and Odors Out of Carpet
If you have pets, you know that along with their usually friendly and happy personalities, they can have smells that aren’t so nice. These smells can be caused by “accidents” in the house or build-up in places where your pets like to hang out. Pet smells can be embarrassing when you have guests over, and if you don’t take care of them, they can also become unbearable for you and anyone else who lives with you.
However, baking soda may successfully remove pet odors.
If one or more rooms in your house have a general “pet smell” from the animals being there often, you can start by spreading a thin layer of baking soda over the blanket and allowing it to sit for a few hours. This should give the baking soda time to soak up the smells coming from the carpets. Then you vacuum up everything!
If, on the other hand, your pet smells come from more concentrated sources, like urine, you can either treat them like non-greasy stains or go one step further and add vinegar to the mixture.
Read Also: How to Get Baking Soda Out of Carpet
How Vinegar & Soda Can Be Used to Clean Carpets
You’ve tried the above methods, but you still have an ugly stain on your carpet, or you can still smell something bad. Then you might need the big guns: a mixture of baking soda and vinegar. But before we talk about the steps you’ll need to take, let’s discuss why this mixture is so powerful.
Why Do We Combine Baking Soda with Vinegar?
As you can see, baking soda can soak up a lot. Because it soaks up grease and smells, it is great for getting rid of stains and making things smell better. Vinegar, made of acetic acid, is a natural way to clean up germs. It’s so acidic that it can kill bacteria and eliminate stains by breaking down dirt and grease.
When these two ingredients are mixed, they cause a chemical reaction that makes fizzing and crackling sounds as the acidic vinegar transfers its proton to the absorbent base of the baking soda. You may remember this chemical reaction from the volcano baking soda and vinegar made when you were in school.
In the end, you get all of the cleanings and dissolving power of vinegar and the absorbing and deodorizing power of baking soda, plus the fizzing reaction that moves the mixture around the stain and gives both of them some extra cleaning power. So, instead of just absorbing or disinfecting. You’re doing both simultaneously, and the stain should be completely cleaned and gone.
Some cleaning companies use this mixture to get rid of tough stains when doing a deep or move-out clean.
How to Use the Sodium Bicarbonate and Vinegar Mixture
Now, if you want to clean with vinegar and baking soda, follow these steps in order (we don’t want a volcano science project, after all):
- Make sure you’re using white vinegar first. White vinegar is clear and won’t change the color of things like other kinds of vinegar.
- Next, cover the stain with white vinegar, leaving the area damp but not soaked.
- The next step is to cover the vinegar and stain completely with dry baking soda by liberally sprinkling it over the area. You should hear fizzing and crackling, which means the chemical reaction has started. You might even see some bubbles form and move around, which is good.
- Now you must wait! You might have to let it sit overnight, but it is important to wait until the vinegar is completely dry. The smell of the vinegar should go away as it dries.
- The last step is to vacuum up the baking soda. If there’s more than a little left, you might want to pick some up first.
After doing these things, your carpet should be clean and free of spots. If the stain or smell is still there, you can do it again as many times as needed.
Conclusion
You can’t go wrong with baking soda or vinegar if you want a natural and cheap way to get the spot and smells out of your carpet. Baking soda is excellent for removing stains and smells because it naturally absorbs them, and vinegar is a natural disinfectant, so you know the area is clean. Just remember to give the baking soda or mixture enough time to do its thing before you vacuum it up, and you should end up with a clean, fresh carpet.
But if you have a very big stain or a stain that won’t come out no matter how often you try to clean it with baking soda, you may still need to hire a professional cleaning service. They’ll have special tools to help them do the job better and faster.
