[jamie macdonald]

hi guys and girls.

recently got a contract cleaning a night club and the amount of chewing gum is immense, i have used various chemical products to help with the removal enhance being the best. and got myself a steam cleaner which does a great job but still takes time. the worst areas are of thick pile carpet. any ideas on anything that could be quicker ? or more effective that i'snt an extortionate price ?

many thanks

[Simon Gerrard]

The best thing I ever did was to tell clients we don't remove chewing gum.
The thing is, chewing gum removal is something you do on a daily / weekly basis and not just when the carpets are cleaned.
If you allow them to think it is your problem then they won't do anything about it in between cleans, meaning the carpet is only chewing gum free every now and again and not always, as it should be.
If you're going to do then charge extra for it, a lot extra.

Simon

[COLIN BRIGHT]

I charge £1 per piece extra (always puts them off)

[Doctor Carpet (Ret'd)]

Pretty much as Simon said.

When giving the quote, quote for not removing the gum but make the point to the prospective client that you are "guessing" that the gum removal is perhaps one of the main reasons they want the carpet cleaning. As such make sure you know how much more you are going to charge. And don't forget a dirty carpet will often hide quite a lot of gum which will only become apparent as you clean the carpet.

Going forwards, after all, you want to get this as a repeat job, offer to train the cleaning staff on the best way to remove gum. Make the point to the owners that the owners will be paying the cleaners a fraction of your bill in cleaners wages to keep on top of it; the carpet will look nicer for longer; your job will be so much easier (and perhaps cheaper) when you come to clean it again. And without the gum the client's premises will look far more attractive and cared for as well.

In summary, you may have to remove it this time-but get paid handsomely for it, but if you work well with the client you won't have gum to remove in the future and will have a (far nicer) repeat job in the future.

Rog

[Carpet Dawg]

I did a night club/bar recently that has black carpets throughout. The all the patches of white gum looked terrible after the clean. I didn't initially see the gum under all the blacktop and dirt.

[jamie macdonald]

many thanks for the replies 

this is a contract i have to clean the club 3 -4 times per week and the carpets every 4-6 weeks, i do keep on top of the chewing gum removal and do at least 3-4 hours once a week im hoping to find a way of cutting the time down so its more profitable (if possible) as using the steamer still takes about 1.30 mins per piece to remove and that takes up a huge amount of time. tbh i think i under priced the job but will learn from this for future reference.

thanks again for the replies much appreciated

[Matt Steele]

Scalp it with a super sharp stanley knife

[jim mca]

Window cleaners scraper