The risk of chocolate stains ending up on your upholstery is not just present around Halloween. Sure, the candy coming freely into your home through the utterance of a single phrase, “trick or treat,” does certainly put you at greater risk, but this is a year-round risk.
Even if you don’t eat chocolate. You might have someone bring over their hot coco. A chocolate cake may come out for a birthday celebration. It could come as a drip from an ice-cream cone. Perhaps you handed someone a cookie, and didn’t realize some of the chocolate chips melted on your hand.
The point is that chocolate is always around. And sometimes it shows up in an unexpected manner, which results in a stain on your furniture. Even if you are going to call for upholstery cleaning, you can still improve your stain. So how do you get chocolate stains out of your upholstery?
Lifting & Blotting
If the chocolate you are dealing with is not fully melted (only partially liquid), it is important to lift the remnants before moving forward. You do not want to have any additional staining material around when you blot the stain, as this might press larger chocolate crumbs into the upholstery.
When you are blotting the stain, you are trying to remove any moisture. This is more for chocolate drinks like hot cocoa. If there is just the wetness of melted chocolate, be sure you are not swiping or scraping with your blots, as this could move or spread the stain.
Hot Water
Hot water might come back into play if you use steam cleaning services, but in this instance, we are just talking about hot water. Not warm or heated water. Hot water. Why does heat matter? In the case of chocolate, it re-activates it into a fluid state.
Hot water will set certain stains, but in the case of chocolate, it is exactly what you need. Just as the chocolate melting made it able to rub off on your upholstery, that same heat will be used to have it rub off your upholstery.
Basic Cleaning Substances
There are a lot of basic household remedies that will clean upholstery chocolate stains. The most commonly found in a home are dish soap, rubbing alcohol, and laundry detergent. If you don’t have basic cleaning materials, perhaps you have white vinegar, lemon juice, rubbing alcohol, or baking soda.
You want to use these substances along with the hot water. Why does this work? Because these materials have properties that lower the surface tension of water molecules. Soaps will also attach to impurities, so the soap can be washed away while holding dirt and grime.
Professional Upholstery Cleaning
The final step to ensure the stain is truly gone is to use a professional cleaner. In most cases, you can call a United Carpet Cleaning company. They will have everything you need to clean your upholstery. There is no need for an upholstery repair company at this stage.
If you have performed the steps above correctly, it will be much easier for an [upholstery cleaning service] to get the results you are looking for. On the other hand, do not attempt to perform any cleaning yourself if you feel that you will exacerbate the stain and make it more difficult to clean.