Upholstery Furniture Cleaning Helps Safeguard Your Investment

Next to your home and your car, buying furniture is one of the biggest investments you'll make. Buying quality furniture is important, but it's only one part of the equation. The other? Upholstery furniture cleaning that will safeguard your investment.

Fabric Selection

The furniture cleaning process starts with proper fabric selection, care, and maintenance. Whether you're buying a new piece of furniture or having an existing piece of furniture reupholstered, it's important to select a fabric that is a good match for the use it will receive. If you have a family with small children, for example, it's probably not a good idea to choose stain or brocade for the family room, since the surface of the fabric is likely to wear with heavy use. It's a much better bet to select a tightly woven fabric that will withstand the dust, grime, and friction of daily use. For well-used pieces, it's also a good idea to add a stain-resistant treatment to the fabric. While this treatment won't make the pieces waterproof, it will increase the longevity of the furniture.

Furniture Care

You can increase the longevity of your upholstered furniture by following a few simple guidelines. First, of course, you should wipe up any spills as soon as they occur. Second, you should vacuum or brush your upholstery once a week. This prevents grime from building up between the fibers of the fabric, and will extend the life of your upholstery. Third, you should turn your cushions once a week so that they will retain their shape and wear evenly. Fourth, you should try and keep your upholstered furniture out of direct sunlight; the ultraviolet rays of the sun can fade the colors of your furniture and cause the fabric to deteriorate prematurely.

Furniture Maintenance

The third prong of safeguarding the investment you make in your upholstered furniture is making sure to have it professionally cleaned once each year. Although it may be tempting to try upholstery cleaning yourself, resist the urge. Fabrics are generally labeled with "cleanability codes," namely W, S, WS, and X. These codes relay information about the type of cleaning products that can be used on the fabric.

The caveat about relying on professional upholstery cleaners especially holds true if your sofa is covered in a microfiber or leather. If that's the case, you should leave maintenance to a microfiber sofa cleaning or leather furniture cleaning expert.

Finding Expert Furniture Cleaners

Because your furniture represents a major investment, be wary of upholstery cleaners who clutter your mailbox with offers for cheap cleaning. Instead, depend upon a company that prides itself on its network of furniture cleaning experts. You should be able to go online and find a directory of trained experts in your area who will provide you with quality, affordable upholstery furniture cleaning.

When you do, you can expect that the technician will come to your home and inspect your furniture for potentially permanent stains or damage. He or she will typically first vacuum the furniture to be cleaned, and then pre-treat potential stains. Following that, he or she will perform the upholstery cleaning according to the fabric care specifications, and perhaps even speed drying time with a blow dryer. At the end of the process, the technician will talk to you about the cleaning and allow you to inspect his or her work.

Remember, upholstery furniture cleaning helps preserve your investment. Relying on an expert will ensure that the upholstery in your home receives the care and maintenance it deserves.


Do you want to give your home a new look in furnishings, but don't have the budget to allow a complete makeover? Your answer may well lie in the used furniture market. Now, there's used furniture of a cheap and short-lived variety, just to fill in a gap in this month's group of friends to bridge a temporary gap in respectability. On the other hand, if you're operating on a shoestring budget and still want to gradually enhance your home with quality furniture, you can attain your goal. If you're a careful and diligent shopper, you can find quality furniture which answers more to the description of ԡntiqueԠor ԰eriodԠpieces than ԵsedԮ You just have to know where to find quality used furniture.

Just the term ԵsedԠimplies something inferior in quality or a stop-gap measure to hide the fact that you can't afford the best in quality. If you believe this, you need to educate yourself in the world of used furniture.

Used furniture falls into the same category of ԰re-ownedԠcars. Sure, the car may have been used by the person who bought it new, but that doesn't necessarily detract from it's value. If your used car was owned and driven solely by Grandma, who regularly maintained the vehicle, that used car may be as good as new. The same is true in the used furniture market.

Perhaps you're looking for a new dining room table. Your local furniture store may have a beautiful set of table and chairs, brand new and quite expensive. What if you take your time and look in each issue of your local ԎickelԠpaper? Chances are, a few weeks of looking in your Nickel paper or local classifieds will return a lead on that antique oak dining table with matching chairs at a substantial price discount over the new product. There's another bonus in this approach. New furniture lacks the patina and history of an older piece. Furniture that has been well cared for often has a lot more character than the new piece. Grandma spent many hours polishing her table and chairs, and the resulting patina may well prove to be far more attractive than its ԮewԠrendition.

The undisputed key to success in the used furniture market is quality. If you buy a poor quality new furniture piece, it won't stand the test of time. It may fill in until your budget grows, but it won't last as you grow out of the current moment of thrift.

On the other hand, if you shop garage sales, estate sales and the classifieds, with a little patience, you're sure to find a quality piece of used furniture at a bargain price.

Remember, յsed furnitureԠdoes not necessarily mean inferior quality. You just have to know where to look and for what.