Furniture Stains on Carpet

Chris Howell

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Chris Howell
High-end properties would never have poly carpets. They will always have ultra high quality nylon and wool carpets, so there will always be a market for the color repair industry ( unless your target market is low and properties).

We target high-end properties because they have the money to pay. They are willing to pay to maintain a first class image.

Nothing against those who target lower end properties. We just have a different business strategy.
 

D Luke

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I'm certainly not a genius, but I think I'm now able to compile some facts. Not opinion, but as far as I can tell, 100% unbiased facts.

-Dyeing carpets is not as easy as has been advertised.

-It takes a lot of time and effort to learn and even more to master.

-Sometimes the results are amazing and sometimes they are questionable, as can be seen from Chris's photos and the photos of his students.

-A huge portion of the carpet you encounter every day is not able to be dyed.

-Chris services an absolutely huge metro area with no shortage of higher end commercial clients that would potentially be willing to pay high prices. I actually cant think of a more perfect geographic area for him to service. Can you say the same?

If you are aware of the facts, and still want to write Chris a fat check, then by all means go for it...

You might just want to add on a couple zeros so he can post a pic of said check in an online brag post.
 
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Willy P

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OK- Time for a cold splash of reality. First off those stairs look HORRIBLE- the dye isn't even close to even, nor will it ever be. Colour change by dyeing darker rarely, if ever comes out even. Since most bleach neutralizing requires DRY carpet do you do 2 trips? Even spot dyeing is never 100%.I\ll go back in the time machine and come up with some other stuff, but it isn't the panacea some folk might believe.
And that's not negative, but just plain facts. Years ago I worked with a Langenwalter franchise, so I have a bit of background to draw on.
 

Bob Pruitt

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I guess I have another question ... Living near the Washington DC area, one of the wealthiest areas of the Country...why is it taking 3 or 4 months to Service your Clients? I have lived in areas where we serviced the very wealthy and my experience is when they want you ... they want you. Are you doing all the work by yourself? Since you are a Training Guru, is there a reason you can't train up enough Technicians/Artists to ramp your business up to serve your own area?
This reminds me of all the guys that had a home flipping business or cable show that end up in our areas telling us how to duplicate their tremendous success. I always wonder why aren't they back in their own areas flipping more houses if it's such a great business?
According to you Chris, you have so much work you can't do it all... explain that.
 

Shorty

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Willie, with respect, dyes have evolved over the years.

Yes, I also have had the same dyes you talk about that must be applied to dry carpet.

There are now powdered & liquid dyes on the market that are meant to be applied to DAMP carpet, (after mixing).

Some with hot water, some with cold.

I've never promised a 100% perfect color match, but a very close match.

One thing I don't like with full room dyeing, is that if there are any stains in the carpet, they'll still be there after dyeing, albeit, a different color.

Then, someone mentioned the poly's etc;

Remember the eminent gent that used to visit here and got us to use the "Solid Dye Sticks" ??

I wonder where he is now??

These, believe it or not, can also serve a temporary purpose. :winky:

(For those that wish to go down that track).

I'm dying to see my next dyeing job.

:yoda:
 

Chris Howell

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Bob, I have five people that work for me. We are very selective about which jobs we accept. We only take on jobs that we feel are very lucrative. My technicians are able to keep the business running while I'm training (I'm m in Minneapolis right now to do a training tomorrow through Wednesday). We are about 75% commercial, so our clients are willing to wait since it saves them from having to replace the carpet.

I used to have a bigger crew. At one point we had five vans on the road. But because carpet and rug dyeing is very specialized, I prefer to operate with a smaller crew to ensure quality and fewer headaches. We do a lot of very large commercial jobs such as sideseam matches, complete color restorations, etc.

We have more than enough work. I'm completely satisfied with where we are at. I enjoy tremendous freedom of my time. I travel all over the country and all over the world. I typically work one day per week, and that is just going out doing consultations for large commercial jobs. My technicians are able to handle everything else by themselves.

Good question! :)
 
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ruff

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Ofer Kolton
Chris,
  1. Once applied, how UV (sun fading) resistant are the new dyes?
  2. Do the existing old dyes (original) and new ones respond differently to UV exposure. In other words: Do the new added ones that compliment the existing dyes to make the new color age differently (causing a color variation)?
  3. Do areas not corrected age (fade or otherwise) differently to adjoining corrected area?
 

Chris Howell

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Ofer,

1. We guarantee our dyes to be permanent and colorfast for the life of the carpet. This, of course, does not include natural causes such as sun fading or abuse such as spilling bleach on the carpet. All carpet loses 2% – 3% of its color each year from normal use such as foot traffic, friction, cleaning, and sun exposure. Having said that, we guarantee our dyes to be just as permanent as new carpet. We've never had a callback from a customer who complained that the color has faded from sun exposure.

2. The dyes that we use "mix" just fine with the existing dyes. Here's a video that I think you'll enjoy:



3. All of the carpet (both areas that we have dyed and areas that we have not dyed) hold up just fine to cleanings, sunlight exposure, etc.

Great question! :)
 
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Chris Howell

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Oder, here's another example of carpet that was badly sun faded that we restored.
 

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Cleanworks

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Chris, when you "restored" do you mean that you brought it back to the original color, or that you have changed the color. For example, if some one has a sunfaded carpet in one area and the carpet extends into an area that is not faded, are you able to color match it?
 

Chris Howell

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Cleanworks, yes, it's possible to restore just the areas that are sunnfaded. It's not necessary to do the entire carpet.

Here are a couple of examples.

The first pics show sun fading along a glass door. We restored only the faded areas. The second set of photos show a stretched limo where we restored only the sun faded sections. The third photo shows an entire room that was restored, but you'll see a circular area against the far wall where a plant had been covering the carpet and some areas in the center of the room where a bed had been. We worked around those areas since the original color was still present there.

The last two photos show the carpet in the Maryland State Capital Building in Annapolis where the red background color was faded, but the yellow patterns were fine. So we worked out around the unfaded areas to restore only the faded areas.
 

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