Bob Buchanan said:
Was wondering if calling in a carpet cleaning company would help. I am shopping for a carpet cleaning (can't afford a wood floor as yet) - and was going to ask about the stains
My experience with carpet/upholstery cleaning companies has been really bad. Many years ago, we bought a brightly coloured chesterfield with a pattern on WHITE background. When the white started to look a little gray, we called Stanley Steamer, the carpet/upholstery clean people. After doing a test, they determined that the colours of the pattern would bleed so they did some sort of sponge and foamy shampoo nonsense which left the chesterfield looking no better than before they started.
So . . . with nothing to lose, I bought a carpet/upholstery 'steam cleaner' i.e. more accurately a water-extraction unit, from Sears. For those not familiar with these units: they pump hot water and upholstery shampoo/detergent into the fabric and immediately suck it all up into the dirty water tank.
So . . anyway, we gave it our best shot. The worst that could happen, is that we would have to toss out an ugly white chesterfield that was no longer white! :-\ The chesterfield came out looking like new, and since the shampoo was sucked up immediately by the extractor, the colours never had a chance to run.
That was 40 years ago, and we've always had white chesterfields since then!
We have been through three water extraction units (avoid Bissell crap) since then; and our current one, a Hoover, has been the best of all!!
http://hoover.com/products/details/f5912900/steamvac-spinscrub-turbopower-carpet-washer/
The Hoover 'shampoo' designed for the unit does a really great job, but when it comes to difficult 'high traffic' areas, you need extra strength spot cleaner. While Hoover vends such a product, it doesn't do nearly as good a job as Zep High Traffic Spot Cleaner available at Home Depot for half the cost.
It is pretty much an annual ritual around here, that I 'shampoo' every square inch of fabric in my rig with our Hoover water extractor unit, which keeps the interior of our 14 year-old rig looking like new, and smelling like new!