A wad of hardened, dried gum can really put a crimp into how your carpet looks. And, not only has the gum been dropped onto the carpet, it has probably been ground into the fibers by being inadvertently stepped on. While you may think that this is a hopeless situation, there are ways to get gum from your carpet with a minimum of effort.
Attacking Gum in Your Carpet
There are a number of home remedies that can be used to attempt to pry chewing gum out of your carpet and restore its appearance:
- Ice cubes in a plastic bag should be placed over the gum to harden it. This will take about half an hour, at which time, the gum should be rigid. Use a spatula to lift the frozen gum off the carpet. You can repeat this if necessary and clean up any residue with wintergreen oil.
- Peanut butter is sometime used to remove gum. Being careful to apply smooth peanut butter only to the gum, allow it to soften the gum and then use a butter knife or spatula to lift the gum off the carpeting.
- A blow dryer can be used to heat the gum by melting it. You will also need some plastic wrap to act as the ‘sponge’ for the melted chewing gum. Use the highest setting and as soon as the gum begins to liquefy, use the plastic wrap to mop it up. You will probably have to repeat this several times, and if any gum is left, wintergreen oil can be used once again.
In most cases, there will be some gum still left in the carpet, so be sure to have some wintergreen oil or eucalyptus oil on hand to remove this. Gum will often leave a sticky feeling on the rug but fresh lemon juice will help to remove this.
Use any of the above methods to remove stubborn chewing gum from your carpeting and if your home treatments do not satisfy you, you may want to contact carpet cleaning professionals to finish up the job for you. Professional cleaning services will be able to provide safe and effective removal of gum without harming carpet fibers.
Chewing gum may not be as difficult to remove from carpeting if you try the listed tactics. Take them step by step, and you’ll probably be surprised at how much nicer your carpet looks.
