Welcome everyone to today’s Blog on buying a rug at a Thrift Store. I have to preface this by saying buying rugs at Thrift Stores is not something I usually do. However, when outfitting an entire apartment basically from scratch you have to make some compromises.
You can see in the picture above that there are three rugs all in the same color family. When outfitting a space where the rooms flow into one another it’s a good idea to choose a color palate and work with the same colors in each space. This allows you flexibility in placement of furniture, accents, etc. and allows you to change things around without having to purchase new items.
The color palate in this case uses greens and yellows, and we will be adding some earth tones and neutrals.
The first rug is a yellow background with white lines creating a geometric pattern. You can see that all the carpets are spread out on our driveway. We swept away all the plant material and the driveway was just cleaned so made a good surface to clean the carpets. This carpet was one that was already owned by my daughter so we won’t include it in the cost of the carpets. It just needed cleaning with a carpet cleaner rented from a local store. Any spots were first addressed with Resolve Spot Carpet cleaner before using the carpet cleaning machine. It’s a 5′ X 7′ size.
The second carpet is 8′ x 10′ and was purchased from a local Thrift Store for about $20. When looking at carpets be sure to take the time to have the store employees help you lay the rug out so you can check it for wear and tear, stains, and any other imperfections that would make the rug unacceptable. In this case the carpet was in good condition. It had a few spots that I looked at carefully to be sure they could be removed by cleaning. It needed a good vacuuming and then a thorough cleaning with a carpet machine. (you can see the machine in the background) It came out really well. The background is a nice medium green with a geometric pattern outline in white.
This rug took a couple of passes with the machine to ensure that it was clean. Similar rugs of the same size are much more expensive than the $20 spent on this one.
The last rug is another 5′ x 7′ in size. This is actually a wool rug with a thick pile. It combines the colors of the other two carpets in a leaf design. When I looked at this rug in the Thrift Store I was surprised at how spot free it was. There were a few small stains but they were on the surface of the pile and I was pretty sure they would come out with cleaning. It also needed a good vacuuming and then a thorough cleaning with a carpet machine. I used Resolve on the spots and then the machine for general cleaning. It turned out really well. This rug was $18. It would have been much more expensive to purchase from a retail store.
The two thrift store carpets were a total of $38.00 and the rental of the carpet cleaning machine and the cleaning fluid came to about $50.00. The total was $88.00 and we were able to clean a third rug as well. When you are furnishing your apartment or a permanent home there are a lot of expenses. Saving some money with Thrift Store finds can really help your budget and your decor.
When purchasing Thrift Store Rugs be sure to check them for stains, tears, too much wear, etc. Plan to rent a carpet cleaning machine to thoroughly clean the rug before bringing it inside. Assess any stains prior to purchase for ease of removal. Some stains like pet urine, red wine, and others are really difficult to remove. Also pet-stained rugs carry an odor that is difficult to eliminate. When we lay these rugs in the apartment I’ll show you another trick for freshening the rug.
Good luck at the Thrift Store this week.