Cleaning and restoring handbags: Killing the germs should be part of the process
By: Stu Bloom
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A professional cleaning of your handbag should involve killing the germs hiding inside your handbag
Handbags are a breeding ground for germs
You use the bathroom at the supermarket, grab your handbag from the hook on the door, wash your hands and continue shopping.
Think you’re safe from germs just because you washed your hands with anti-bacterial soap from the convenient dispenser?
Well, think again.
Because, according to studies, the toilet seat in that bathroom probably has fewer bacteria than the handbag you just handled!
Consider these 2 studies, for example…
A study by the University of Arizona found that one-third of the handbags in their study had fecal bacteria present. In fact, some of the handbags were 100 times dirtier than the average toilet seat. While a bacteria level of 200 is considered safe, most of the handbags had bacteria counts in the tens of thousands, and a few had bacteria counts in the millions.
Another study by Nelson Laboratories in Salt lake City investigated the cleanliness of woman’s handbags. The results were eye-popping. The handbags in the study tested positive, not only for the presence of bacteria, but for bacteria of the worst kind such as pseudomonas (which can cause eye infections), straphylococcus aurous (which can cause skin infections), and E-coli (which can cause food poisoning).
Of course, this makes sense when you think about it.
You rest your handbag on the floor or seat of your car, on the floor of a restaurant, cafe, bar or movie theater, on the counter at a retail store, on a desk top at an office, on a kitchen counter, and a host of similar locations.
Bacteria transfers from these surfaces to your hands and to the exterior of your handbag. And from your hands and the exterior of your handbag to the interior of the handbag when you dig for something.
All of which points out the need to clean clean both the exterior and interior of your handbags on a more frequent basis.
Handbag cleaning must incorporate sanitizing
At RAVE FabriCARE, we clean many different brands of handbags, many different styles of handbags, in many different colors, with many different finishes, manufactured with many different materials (leather, exotic leather, patent leather, suede, fabric, canvas, nylon, vinyl, etc.) and combinations of materials.
And how do we deal with bacteria that’s likely to be found on both the exterior and interior of all these handbags?
Here’s how…
After the handbag has been entirely cleaned, we re-clean all the non-leather and non-suede parts of your handbag — again — with a specialized antimicrobial cleaner.
[ctt template=”3″ link=”0mJv8″ via=”no” ]A professional handbag cleaning should always incorporate killing the germs hiding on the exterior & interior of your handbag @ravefabricare[/ctt]Our pH neutral, biodegradable cleaner contains surfactants, citrus and hydrogen peroxide. It’s a combination
- degreaser,
- deodorizer (kills odor-causing bacteria),
- sanitizer (kills 99.99% of common bacteria, including Staph, Salmonella, Strep, and E-coli) and
- virucide (kills 99.99% of specified viruses, including Herpes 2, Influenza AZ/Japan, HIV-1 and Hepatitis B).
Unlike other handbag cleaners, our handbag cleaning comes with a bonus: A deodorized, sanitized and virucided interior and exterior.
We think that’s just being thorough. Others call us paranoid.
So be it.
What’s been your experience destroying germs on the interior and/or exterior of your handbags, purses, wallets and/or backpacks? How did you first become aware of the problem? What process did you use? Please share your comments below.
Photo credit: pixabay.com/gimono
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Filed Under:
Handbags, Purses, Wallets & Handbags
Author
Stu Bloom
Stu Bloom is Founder and President of RAVE FabriCARE. RAVE FabriCARE, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, cares for fine garments, household textiles and accessories and serves clients throughout the USA and Canada. Stu is the author of various ebooks on these subjects, all of which are available from www.ravefabricare.com/freestuff. He is an evangelist for true quality cleaning and is a contributor to and editor of True Quality Cleaning, RAVE FabriCARE’s blog. You can find Stu on Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn.
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Additional Resources:
https://ravefabricare.com/services/handbags-purses-wallets-backpacks/
https://ravefabricare.com/do-it-yourself-handbag-cleaning-exercise-caution-with-cleaning-products/
https://ravefabricare.com/dont-dry-clean-your-handbag-purse-wallet-or-backpack-ever/
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