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How clean is clean? There are many cleaning systems available ranging from a few hundred dollars to thousands - all claiming to clean carpet. Some systems do well, but some do not. Some systems make the surface of the carpet look great, but remove less that 20 percent of the soil in the carpet. Is that clean? How can you know what products and services really work? Thankfully, the Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI) can help.
At the heart of CRI's Seal of Approval (SOA) program is science, that is, extensive research and testing to determine and identify effective cleaning solutions, equipment, and service providers.
One type of technology that CRI utilizes to determine how much foreign material is removed from carpet after cleaning is an X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) device. What is that? It is the same device developed by NASA to make sure parts going onto the space shuttle were made out of the correct composition of metal. Using this technology, CRI is able to measure precisely the exact amount of soil being removed from the carpet being cleaned, helping them determine what truly cleans and what does not.
What does CRI’s investment in all this science mean for you? There's no need for trial and error, throwing hard earned money away on products that don't work. If you are looking for a good vacuum cleaner, cleaning solution, deep cleaning carpet extractor, or deep cleaning system - if it is SOA-certified, you can be confident of getting something that works. You can trust that the carpet has the best chance of being cleaned right the first time, without fear of faster resoiling, stains reappearing, or damage to your carpet or the environment.
With CRI's Seal of Approval program, odds are your carpet won't just look clean, it will be clean.
