Even the most careful eaters and drinkers know the feeling of watching in slow motion as that glass of wine slowly tips over toward your brand-new clothes. Stains happen, but they don’t have to ruin your outfit permanently.
A high-quality laundromat can help you remove even the toughest stains—but what you do right after the stain happens is the most crucial part.
Discover effective strategies for removing tough ink, wine, and chocolate stains at your local laundromat in this life-saver guide for students, professionals, and families who rely on laundromats for clean, stain-free clothes.
Understanding Stubborn Stains: The Basics
Any stain can be annoying, but certain products are difficult to remove. This is due to the chemical composition of a stain and your clothes. Stains come from pigments (or colors); in wine, the tannins carry this color.
The molecules in tannins actively bond with many fabric molecules, creating atomic connections that are difficult to pull apart. Most challenging stains are non-polar, so they do not bond with water, so they don’t come off when you rinse the clothing.
Ink Stain Annihilation at the Laundromat
Ink stains are some of the most difficult because, as mentioned previously, they fall into the water-resistant category. You may be able to rinse some ink out with water, but most of it will bind to fabric fibers.
Pre-treat the ink stain as soon as you notice it; the longer it rests, the more molecular bonds it forms with the clothes. Blot the stain to lift as much as possible. Then, rinse the item and apply a detergent—ideally, one that targets stains.
You can repeat this process if some stain remains. A warm water cycle at the laundromat can help to lift ink, but avoid hot water to prevent baking the stain in. Check to see if the stain has been removed before using a dryer.
Pre-Treating Ink Stains: A Step-by-Step Guide
Pre-treatment is the most crucial step in treating ink stains. You can use rubbing alcohol or hand sanitizer, as both contain the correct chemical composition to grab and hold ink.
Place a paper towel underneath the stained area, then apply the alcohol. Let it soak for up to 15 minutes, then blot the ink away as much as possible.
Winning Against Wine Stains
Wine is perhaps the most annoying of the problematic stains because it’s the one most likely to be left to dry; after all, if someone drinks wine, they might not be as focused or interested in immediately cleaning their clothes as they may otherwise be.
First things first: do not scrub at a wine stain. The pressure from scrubbing a wine stain forces the liquid more deeply into the fabric. Attach to the stain immediately by using dry ingredients, such as baking soda or cat litter, to absorb as much of the wine as possible.
If a stain remains, try hydrogen peroxide. Whatever you do, don’t use heat! This will lock the chemicals into their bond with the fabric. Wash your clothes in cold water for two cycles and then check the stain.
Chocolates’ Challenging Marks: Effective Removal
Unlike the other two stains discussed so far, chocolate poses a challenge not due to its inherent dyes but because of its oils. The oil and protein content is naturally hydrophobic, meaning washing with water doesn’t work on chocolate.
Thankfully, there is a simple solution: dish soap. The grease-busting properties of dish soap are made to bond with oils so that they can be rinsed off of dishes, and the same concept applies to clothing.
Remove any excess chocolate you can, then use dish soap and scrub. In this case, scrubbing helps (as opposed to situations such as red wine) because it pushes the detergent into the entire stain.
Give the soap five minutes to bond with the oil molecules, then rinse. If the stain is not entirely gone, try flipping the clothing inside out and soaping again from that side.
Then, wash in hot water, which will help to liquefy the oils and get the final remnants out.
Your Partner in Stain Removal: Tiny Bubbles Laundromat
How you tackle a stain as soon as it happens significantly impacts whether you can get it out of your favorite clothes, but so does how you wash it afterward.
The team at Tiny Bubbles understands how to get tough stains out of your clothes, even if they’ve dried, and we can help you choose the ideal settings to revitalize your garments.
You’ll want to use new, well-maintained washing machines that will agitate your clothes and work hard on stains, not old models that barely spin—and Tiny Bubbles has you covered.
Stop by Tiny Bubbles to get help with your challenging stains and address any other laundry needs.