Having Your Carpet Dyed: Tips on Refurbishing Carpets

My son is four now and one day when I was sick, he got into the refrigerator and dumped his entire jug of red Kool-Aid on the floor in his bedroom. Now the light beige carpet in his room has a huge area of dark pink. I have tried resolve, I have tried Spot Bot, I have hired carpet cleaners to come out and scrub it. It might get a little bit lighter each time. But the stain isn’t coming out. There are two options for dyeing your carpet. You can do it yourself or hire somebody to do it for you. My theory is this, I could hire a professional to come and do it for me. However the only thing that tells me he’s a professional is him. I’ve heard a lot of horror stories where these professionals come out and do the job and it looks great at first only to find later that he did it unevenly and now it looks worse than it did to start with. My main problem with hiring professionals to do it is that I can’t control the job they do.

The second option is to do it yourself. I’m a firm believer that you can do it! I can do anything I set my mind out to do and trust me, if I can do it, you can do it! My advice would be to do the research first to find out the tricks and techniques that make it perfect and work the best.

My first tip is that you choose colors one or two shades darker than your carpet so they will cover the stains. You want to make sure your carpet is thoroughly cleaned before dyeing it and try to treat the stains. Use tape and plastic to cover your lower walls and baseboards in order to protect them from splatter. If you do splatter the walls, you will want to wipe off the splatter immediately so you don’t end up having to repaint!

You want to use long even strokes and pass over each area several times. Many people worry whether this is safe for children and pets, it is. Many people have also checked it out. The main issue is that darker colors tend to rub off onto socks and feet for about a month or so. Vacuuming helps this and it does go away after about a month. In the meantime, maybe wear darker socks or none at all.

Let me also tell you what not to do. Don’t overlap. Overlapping would cause stripes. Not that I’m saying that isn’t cool, but if that isn’t the desired effect, then overlapping would be a bad idea. Don’t let the carpet soak up too much water. This could cause mold and rot problems as well as ruining the carpet and pad. Don’t leave the shampooer standing in one place too long. This will make the color uneven.

There are many companies out there that dye carpets. I live in Florida, I know we have “Color Your Carpet” corporate offices in Jacksonville and they serve all of Florida. You can even go online to www.servicemagic.com and it looks like they’ll find local contractors for you. I haven’t used this service before so I don’t know how it works. This isn’t an endorsement, just an observation. There are tons of places that sell “Do It Yourself” dye kits online. Commercial cleaning supply shops would be another good place to check. If he can do it, I can do it. And if I can do it, you can too!