Ever bought furniture?

alazo1

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Albert Lazo
Meaning you screwed up a piece and had to pay for it.

How many pieces do you think you've cleaned?.

What went wrong that you had to buy it.


Albert
 

Desk Jockey

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I think only a couple in the last 10-years since I quit cleaning.

When I was cleaning, 1-every other year. I kept trying to be the hero and make each piece a master piece. :oops:

I think that experienced cleaners damage more upholstery than less experienced cleaners. Less experienced cleaners are afraid and have a little more respect for the piece.

I don't fear it and think I can clean anything, which would get me in trouble when I tried to WOW the customer!

On special care fabrics, use neutral cleaners and acid rinses also leave upholstery as dry as you can and you will stay out of trouble most of the time.

Standard care fabrics, look for worn areas and be less aggressive in these areas. Especially quilted cushions and piping trim.



:wink:
 

Jose Smith

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I had to replace a large custom ottoman. I actually had it recovered at $206 a yard. Fortunately there were only two yards.

I had cleaned this piece several times before, but took that for granted. We all make mistakes.

This was worth it, however. This client averages around $700 per visit.


Jose Smith
 

GRHeacock

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I had to recover a silk velvet sofa back about 1980, which I mistook for a nylon velvet. Cost me $1500 to recover, as I recall.

One cotton velvet sofa turned from light gray to pink because it was dyed with pH sensitive dyes, called indicator dyes. But I was able to reverse the color back to original the next day.

I have cleaned furniture since 1956, thousands of items.

Yes, I have screwed up several others, but was able to fix my mistakes, so did not have to pay for recovering or replacement.

I wrote a manual about 1987 to help others from screwing up, and making the mistakes I have made.

Still occasionally teach the course on how to avoid the mistakes I have made.

Gary
 

alazo1

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Albert Lazo
Can you say what happened that you had to replace/reupholster?.

So far I haven't had to replace anything but who knows what tomorrow will bring..LOL.

Has anyone ever heard of someone screwing up a piece due to old rotted cushion material wicking?. How about wicking from the brown paper cord. I suppose these would be from very old furniture. Would you choose to dry clean these?.

One thing I don't do is overwet the back of cushions. Just gets a quick pass with drymaster tool. A lot of times there is writting from a felt pen in the cushion material and would hate to have that wick.

Albert
 

Desk Jockey

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Many different reasons, when I first started cleaning upholstery most of mine were from high PH pre-spray that caused the material to bleed.

A few from spotting a material and leaving a halo of discolored (loss of color) from weak dyes that the spotter loosened.

The last couple are from too aggressive of cleaning on weak fabrics, it breaks the threads and we damaged the piece.


What I learned (it took some time to sink in to my thick skull) was you can't always be the hero like you can on carpet. :oops:

Upholstery is not like carpet, you can make mistakes on carpet and generally correct it. Upholstery is UN-forgiving, you make a mistake and you're less likely to correct it, you're recovering or replacing it.




8)
 
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We've replace maybe 10 pieces in our 33 years. Overwetting caused a few of the problems. Now , with internal jet tools we are much less likely to have that problem. A couple pieces were damaged when upholsterer's inks bled through the fabric during cleaning and could not be completely removed.

Fortunately, we've only had to replace 1 piece in the last 7-8 years. Luck will probably run out now that I've said that. The most careful tech will run into difficulties. Comes with the territory.
 

John Watson

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We had 4 pieces recovered in the past 16 years. 2 separate jobs.

Job 1: Rayon blend sofa and love seat, We used to pick up and plant clean
all uph. I cleaned in shop, beautiful job if I say so myself, Very profitable too, I thought at the time.. $40.00 per lin. ft. to clean, additional $120.00 to apply protector.

Crew delivered back to client at different address and during the course of transporting and placing in the formal living room. the skirts on both pieces, an arm of the sofa, and the outside back of the love seat got ever so slightly soiled I was told.

The crew, since they had carpets to clean at the new move in house decided to just spot clean the soiled areas with their stair tool.













Have you ever heard that rayon shrinks??? and when it shrinks it can really shred and tear in weakened areas???

Solution to Problem, I worked with a reupholster that did excellent work. Client agreed that we would recover with a like quality fabric of their choice and color. They agreed.

When the upholster went to pick up the pieces and show the new fabric swatches and colors, the client just wanted to know what the cash out value was to replace not recover???
They had gone shopping and found a new design to fit their new home.

I was going to get a special price from the upholster whom we had sent many thousands of dollars of work over our working relationship.
He was going to charge for the material only no labor. What a deal!

They wanted $3500.00 and they keep the old set. Period No more negotiations or they were just going to their lawyer and sue.

I called them up to ask what happened??? What was the cause of the turn about??? They had talked to their Niece who is married to a lawyer and they said he could get them what they wanted.


I offered them 2 choices, I would have the set recovered like they agreed in the beginning and they would just owe for the agreed upon price of cleaning and protecting Or I would pay them $1500 and pick up the furniture.

They agreed to the recovering, but, didn't want to pay for the cleaning.
I told them I was sorry and would have not charged for the cleaning had their lawyer not become involved. I got paid.




I had to go find a replacement employee for whom created the mess in the beginning.










Ed York saved me again, In the 80's when I took his Fiber Cleaning Schools of America courses he is adamant about placing every thing found during the pre-vacing process in baggies and returning to the client, sometimes adding a few coins if none were found. I saved but nothing of value so didn't return, just put on shelf. During the pre cleaning I found a piece of paper for their yard sale the week before we picked up their upholstery. Listed was a sofa and love seat set New cost $3500.00 sale price 1500.00 of which they did not get because it went unsold.
 

The Great Oz

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bryan
Not had to reupholster much, but techs sometimes get cocky and aren't thorough enough on their preinspection and pretesting. Unfortunately, the stuff we damage is always an expensive fix, as the cheap stuff is most easily cleaned without problems.


Has anyone ever heard of someone screwing up a piece due to old rotted cushion material wicking?. How about wicking from the brown paper cord. I suppose these would be from very old furniture. Would you choose to dry clean these?.

One thing I don't do is overwet the back of cushions. Just gets a quick pass with drymaster tool. A lot of times there is writing from a felt pen in the cushion material and would hate to have that wick.

You should be cautious when cleaning an antique knowing that there may be hidden problems, and don't be afraid to charge more to clean these.

Make sure you don't take responsibility for anything that wicks up from inside the typical piece of furniture though, whether color from adhesives, twine, cardboard, markers, old upholstery under new...

The responsibility for use of substandard construction products and/or procedures lies with the upholsterer or manufacturer.

For every problem that wicks through the fabric, there is an upholstery product that could have been used that wouldn't have wicked through. For example, Dacron batting is typically glued to foam and frame using an aerosol adhesive. This comes in clear, red and black. Manufacturers will use clear because they know the colors will bleed through the fabric when cleaned. Upholsters like to use colored adhesive because it shows up better for them, and they rarely get any feedback (blame) about the problems caused.
 

GRHeacock

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The damage from that silk velvet piece I mentioned above, was caused by the addition of some sodium perborate to the cleaning formula that would brighten what I thought was the nylon.

(Perborate forms peroxide, which damages silk)

OOPS!! The fibers that stick up, to form the pile, and was silk simply disintegrated, leaving a flat surface instead of pile surface. But not while I was there, it worked slowly, and was not noticeable while I was there.

Can't cover that up, or correct chemically.

DANG!!

I have been a silk specialist for a lotta years. But yes, I did goof on this one.

A close squeak on another occasion was in a million dollar home, in the conversation pit where 3 sides were a built in silk sofa facing a fireplace, I had done the the front base and one arm of one section, and started on the top back, when I saw black stuff wicking up from the front base, and as I watched, here comes black on the top of the one arm.

I got hold of the home owner, and showed the problem, telling him it was a black cambric material underneath the silk cover, supposed to reinforce the delicate silk.

I asked who had made the sofa. A local upholsterer I knew had done this before, using black cambric.

I told the owner to get the guy out, have him remove all the covering fabric, replace the black cambric with white, and recover the sofa.

Since the sofa was built in, it could not go into the shop for this work.

Then I would come out and remove the black bleeding and finish cleaning the sofa.

Which I did a couple weeks later, and yes, I do know how to charge for these kinds of services.

A close squeak, for sure. It could have gone differently.

Gary
 

alazo1

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Albert Lazo
Some good stories.

I was taught to have the customer sign a waiver for possible unforseen problems such as the ones stated. Though I've never done it, it seems like a good practice. Do any of you have signed waivers before starting work?.

But even with a waiver I wonder if it would hold up in court (if it ever went that far). Reason I say this is because most of the furniture that we wet clean comes with an S tag. You'd think once the cleaning method was disclosed that we would be responsible regardless.

Other possible problems from wet cleaning may be wrinkling and delamination from citrus products. I don't remember exactly but I'm sure I've had a few that have wrinkled a bit. Seems to be more of an issue in loose cushions and skirts. Nothing was ever said but I'm sure with the right customer (or wrong) they could have raised an issue.

Albert
 

steve frasier

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steve frasier
I have only messed one couch so far

cleaned it and got it dry and everything was great

then she says she wants it deodorized, had her sign off on it, sprayed it and it bled like a bad paper cut

I offered to buy it, cover it, basically do what ever she felt was right

never heard from her again

I good suggestion is to put money aside in an account for when this happens
 

Jose Smith

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Nov 4, 2006
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Hey Albert,

The ottoman I spoke of was recovered due to some colors bleeding as it dried.



I was taught to have the customer sign a waiver for possible unforeseen problems such as the ones stated. Though I've never done it, it seems like a good practice. Do any of you have signed waivers before starting work?.

I have spoken to a few attorneys that say, regardless of what our client signs, we are the professional and we should know the end result. Fortunately, I have not been in the position to find out.

There have been times when (and I'm sure Gary and others will have had this happen), I am 100% sure that something will go wrong. Either based on the history of the piece or something I see, I know damage may occur. But the client is so adamant about getting the piece cleaned they will approve cleaning even against your professional recommendation. In such a case, I would spell this out on your invoice somewhere and have her sign it.

Such a case occurred last year. One of my clients wanted me to clean her recently deceased mother's upholstery for an estate sale. These were rayon and about 35 years old with heavy soil. The fabric was already visibly weak. I told her what would happen if I attempted to clean it and that I could not be held liable. She agreed and signed something I wrote up on my invoice and what do you think happened? The fabric began to split, even taking every precaution you can think of for weak fabric. But taking an extra 10 minutes to inspect, alert her and have her sign that she was aware saved me from a possible Negative Moment.


Jose Smith
 

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