Have you ever had periods where you left your floor dirty, stained, and full of crumbs and grime? Then you finally get around to vacuuming and then mopping the floor with a wet, soapy mop. If so, you know what a huge difference a clean floor makes to your home.
A clean and tidy floor makes your entire home appear cleaner and more organized.
Some floor types are more forgiving to clean than others and are not as easily damaged, while other floor types require the right washing and care to maintain their charming character. That's why we've created this guide on how to choose the right floor soap, depending on the type of floor you need to clean.
This guide is not exhaustive but covers the most common floor types. You are always welcome to contact us if you are unsure which type of soap to use on your floor at home.
Achieve a beautiful, streak-free, clean floor – with the right floor soap
It actually makes a big difference to how clean your floor looks after washing, that you use the correct floor soap and, not least, that you dispense it in the right quantities.
Once you have chosen the floor soap that suits your type of floor, the next important step is simply to carefully follow the instructions on the product packaging.
What you need when washing floors
When you're about to wash your floor and create beautifully clean surfaces, you'll naturally need some accessories in addition to the floor soap itself. You'll need a good, large bucket and an efficient and clean mop or mop set, along with the corresponding mop handle.
Floor soap for raw and untreated wooden floors – soap flakes or special soap
Untreated wooden floors absorb an extreme amount of dirt. They are charming, but also quite susceptible to anything spilled, which they soak up.
It's important to adequately saturate your raw wooden floor. A saturated wooden floor gets a healthy, natural look, and it's much more resistant to spilled liquids like coffee, cocoa, and red wine, other dirt, and daily wear and tear.
Therefore, you should choose a soap that correctly and optimally saturates your raw wooden floor.
For light wood types – for example, an untreated pine floor – you should choose a white-pigmented soap, which is not suitable for a wooden floor of darker wood, where you should instead choose a floor soap with a natural-pigmented color.
Is your untreated wooden floor dry or greasy?
Before you begin washing your untreated wooden floor, it's important to check whether the wood feels dry or actually appears greasy.
The floor is dry: If the floor feels dry, it needs to be thoroughly saturated. You can easily do this with ordinary soap flakes, which are effective in protecting against, for example, grease stains, because they saturate the floor.
The floor feels greasy to the touch: If the floor feels greasy, it could be a sign of excess soap, and washing it with soap flakes won't necessarily make it cleaner or more pleasant. In this case, you need a dedicated and specially developed floor soap for untreated wood, as we mentioned in the section above.
Floor soap for treated/oiled wooden floors – they love special soap
Oil-treated wooden floors are incredibly beautiful, especially when maintained correctly. Additionally, the oil helps protect the wooden floor, making an oil-treated wooden floor very resistant to stains from coffee, cocoa, red wine, and mud.
You must ensure that this protection is maintained in your wooden floor. The best way to do this is to always use a special soap, and you should do it approximately every two years. You can also wash it with soap flakes, but in the long run, this will give the oiled wooden floor a grayish appearance.
An important note to interject here is that all-purpose soap can be used for many things and is effective in many places, but you should never use all-purpose cleaner on your oiled wooden floors. All-purpose soap dissolves grease and will therefore dissolve the oil and dry out your treated wooden floor, making it look dull and losing its protection against grease and dirt.
The only case where all-purpose soap can be beneficial is if the floor needs a deep cleaning of grease and discoloration or has been saturated with soap flakes for several years. It is really important that you then oil and care for the floor correctly.
Daily maintenance of oiled wooden floors
Natural wooden floors are more exposed and sensitive to scratches and minor damage than many other floors. Therefore, it's a good idea to keep the floors clean. If you have a robot vacuum cleaner, it can conveniently remove small stones, crumbs, and other dirt that has been tracked in from outside.
The cleaner and sand-free you keep your oiled wooden floor, the longer it will remain beautiful.
Floor soap for unglazed tiles or natural stone
Unglazed natural stone and tiles – like untreated wooden floors – can act almost like a sponge for all dirt and liquid that lands on them, as they lack the glazed surface to protect themselves.
They should be washed with soap flakes to become saturated and protected as best as possible. You can also get special soap that saturates and cares for the tiles, but this is usually a bit more expensive in the long run.
Floor soap for vinyl and linoleum
There are floor soaps specifically designed for vinyl and similar floor types such as linoleum, laminate, and lacquered floors.
Linoleum, which unlike vinyl is a natural material, however, requires that you never use a soap with a pH value above 9. Therefore, you must not use soap flakes on a natural linoleum floor. This risks creating a greasy surface, especially if your linoleum floor is surface-treated with, for example, PUR. In that case, it cannot be saturated by the fats in natural soaps such as soap flakes. These will settle on top and form a greasy film.
However, it is important to remember that laminate flooring cannot tolerate too much water. A thoroughly wrung-out cloth – with, for example, an all-purpose cleaner – should be used. If water gets into the underlying layers of the laminate flooring, they will absorb the water and bulge up. It is virtually impossible for them to dry out and level themselves again.
Buy floor cleaning products at Fnugfri.dk
We have everything you need to get a beautiful, clean floor, regardless of your floor type. Whether you have oiled, untreated, or imitation wood flooring, we have floor soap, care products, and mops that do the job.
As if that wasn't enough, we also place great emphasis on our customers receiving the right guidance when purchasing cleaning products from Fnugfri.dk. Therefore, you are always welcome to ask if you are in doubt about how your floor can be cleaned best, last longest, and be cared for in the meantime.
For example, see our selection of floor soaps and care products.