Nearly everyone has experienced it: that sickening moment when the glass of red wine on the side table tips over and spills all over your floor and upholstery, or when you bump into someone while holding a glass and it goes down your front. Fortunately, red wine stains can be cleaned up, but you need to act fast to keep if from setting. The quicker you can get to it, the more likely you are that it will come up without a permanent stain.
Although there are many ways to treat red wine, this is perhaps the quickest and easiest.
- Blot up any excess wine, getting the spot as dry as possible.
- In a spray bottle pour one cup of water and one half cup of hydrogen peroxide. Add soap. You can use
almost any type of liquid soap for this, so chose something that’s appropriate for the surface you’re cleaning. Make sure you chose something mild enough that it won’t destroy your leather upholstery, favorite shirt or other valuable article. - Spray the mixture onto the stain, and you’ll be amazed to watch the red fade away. What happens is that the peroxide, combined with the soap, bleaches out the color from the wine. This works not only with wine, but other dark liquids such as coffee, cool-aide and tea.
- Peroxide can continue to work like a bleach on the fabric in question, so you need to clean it. Clothes should be laundered immediately. A carpet or couch should ideally be cleaned using a wet-vac shampooer, but if you don’t have one, soak up all the extra moisture with towels. Use a spot cleaner, blot dry, and repeat. The idea is to clean all the peroxide out.
This is such a handy formula that it’s a good idea to keep some ready at all times. As soon as you spill a dark liquid, grab it and begin spraying. Just like that, your stain worries are over.
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