Your homes carpets deal with abuse on a daily basis. They have damaging foot traffic, spills, pets and a host of other factors to deal with. One factor that is overlooked is the damage that can be caused by candles. It may sound strange but candles can do a great deal of damage to your carpeting.

When you think about candle damage to carpet you probably think about a candle tipping over and burning the carpet or spilling wax on it. This would of course do a great deal of damage to a carpet but they can also harm your rugs in a far more subtle way. When a candle is burnt it produces smoke and soot. This soot when it cools will settle on your floors forming lines in your carpet around your walls and around furniture. This is essentially smoke damage and the damage can be irreversible.

If you find that you have candle damage you should call in a professional carpet cleaner. They can use professional quality chemicals to try to remove the candle lines. Your average over the counter spotter is not going to cut it. If you have light damage a basic carpet cleaning will probably take care of the lines. If you have heavy damage it may take more sever methods and you should expect to pay more for the treatment.

So what can you do for these stains. The best thing you can do is to try to prevent the stains from forming in the first place. Try to burn candles less. When you do burn them be cautious to cut the wicks down so that they produce less soot. Also try to buy quality domestic candles which burn cleaner because of the lack of impurities in the wicks and wax. Also try to keep an eye on your carpet and if you see candle soot lines starting to form have them cleaned as soon as possible. As the saying goes, "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." This is definitely true in this case.