Tips To Use High-Traffic Carpets, Such As Halls & Stairs.

Choosing the right carpet is not just about choosing your favorite colors and patterns, particularly when choosing carpets for high-traffic areas such as your corridor, stairs and landing. That's something I've learned through bitter experience, because we have removed the threadbare carpet for the third time in ten years on our stairs.

Third time around I just wanted to find a carpet that would last and give it every day to cope with the pounding four pairs of busy feet. Therefore I leapt to the chance to work with Unified Carpets & Beds. They not only offered to help me pick a sturdy, hard-wearing carpet and underlay for my stairs and landing, they also offered to supply and install it!

Includes Carpets & Beds.

United Carpets & Beds is the largest franchised carpet and bed retailer in the UK, with over 50 franchised stores in the north of England, Midlands and Cardiff. There's also an online store for flooring, sheets, mattresses and accessories to buy. In addition, the website of United Carpets and Beds. is filled with helpful advice and tips for those thinking of buying a carpet, wood flooring or laminate.

Discover Our United Carpets & Beds.

A) FREE service to measure carpet.

Measuring stairway and landing carpets is not as easy as measuring a carpet for your living room. It becomes also more difficult when you have a turn like we do in your staircase. That's why United Carpets & Beds, Nottingham, was pleased to send Shane, an experienced member of their team, to do the calculation for me. While he was with me, I took the opportunity to test his expertise by asking his advice on the choice of stairs for carpet and underlay. Shane has been working in the carpet business for years, and knew his stuff for sure.

In addition to suggesting a small, thick twist pile in an 80/20 wool mix or 100 per cent polypropylene carpet to replace our 100 per cent threadable wool loop carpet, he stressed the importance of a good underlay for the stairs. He proposed a thick underlay, in the crumb-style. While it is not as springy as the foam underlay used in living rooms and dining rooms, its consistency and durability extends the carpet 's life on high footfall areas , particularly in vulnerable areas such as the nose of stairs. He also recommended, unexpectedly, to buy new gripper rods and not to use expired ones. That is because the spikes on old grippers appear to be blunt, which can cause the carpet to move and turn, which can affect both lifespan and performance.

B) Ask a professional.

Armed with the measurements and advice from Shane, I went to my nearest United Carpets & Beds store to pick up a few more ideas and select my new carpet. Our local branch can select from hundreds of carpets at prices to match any budget. We are not only selling carpets, either. We sell additional flooring options such as laminate, carpet, rugs, and fake grass. They also sell beds, mattresses and furniture if you are planning a cost-effective home renovation.

Until I was tempted to jump into selecting a color and texture based carpet again, I wanted to see what other suggestions I could get from Shaun, the store manager. He supported Shane's advice and affirmed the value of a strong, dense underlay. He suggested an underlay of the crumb-style Treadmore. He also reported that wool will be a good choice for stairs and landings to mix carpets and 100 percent polyproplyene ones with a thin, thick twist layer.

While wool carpets are ordinary, and some prefer their look and feel, today's polypropylene carpets are also strong contender. Nowadays, polypropylene carpets of good quality look fantastic, they are hard-wearing and many are stain-resistant. You may also use bleach to disinfect some of these. Shaun took me around the store and pointed out the ranges and types of carpets that would be ideal for areas of heavy footfall.

C) Make educated choices.

I consider two separate carpet types, one a wool mix, the other a polyproplyene 100 per cent. I was able to borrow the swatch books to help me pick a tapestry shade to match the paint on our walls. If swatch books are not available in store or online, you can order up to four FREE carpet swatches.

Although I liked some of the polypropylene carpets of 100 per cent, I preferred a beautiful 80/20 wool blend twist pile carpet. The Lakeside Twist Range is a British-made blanket, available in 16 basic colors and 2 stripes, widths 4 m and 5 m and 3 weights, 40 oz, 50 oz and 60 oz. I picked Pewter, a luxurious grey / brown carpet, weighing 60 oz in thick comfort. The Lakeland twist line is a hard-wearing fabric, ideal for high-traffic environments, as the hall / stairs icon on the label denotes.

I had booked a suitable date once I had selected our carpet and underlay, opting for the first appropriate rendezvous. It is the only slot where the arrival time can be estimated (between 9 am and 10 am).

D) Fitting our tapestry.

United Carpets & Beds are providing free fitting on all the carpets. There's a fee if you want them to dispose of the old carpet for you. We disposed of the carpet ourselves, using the time before our fitting date to paint our walls and skirting boards. Upon arrival our two fitters asked me to verify whether it was the right carpet. You may not think so, but that's a big step! I can still remember that when she learned that the fitters had installed a purple carpet in our bathroom, mother bursting into tears, rather than a chocolate-brown one, which poses two questions : 1. Why carpet a toilet? 2. Is chocolate-brown better than lilac?

Luckily, the carpet they showed me was the right shade and variety, so I was pleased that they were going ahead with the installation. Installation of new gripper pins, underlay and carpet took about an hour for the fitters. Not bad, given that our staircase has a turn in it. They've even tidied up, putting all the offcuts and rubbish in a few garbage bags.

E) What a turnaround!

We 're very happy with our amazing new twist pile carpet. It looks totally amazing! After years of making do with a threadbare carpet, we have redesigned our stairs and landings. Plus, our new carpet still feels comfortable and fluffy, even though we wanted a sturdy crumb underlay. We can say because as well as following all the carpet buying tips from United Carpets and Beds, we have followed their recommendations on caring for our carpet and implemented a strict 'no-shoe" policy. After all, even though we have chosen a hard-wearing carpet and underlay, it is important that we take care of it with daily vacuuming and cleaning and leave downstairs our shoes!

Check out my video if you are thinking about buying a carpet and underlay for your space, stairs and landing. I share my own carpet-buying experiences and list the top United Carpet tips for choosing a hard-wearing carpet for your home 's high footfall areas.


I developed a handy infographic, based on top tips from United Carpets & Beds to select carpets for high-traffic areas. Why not pin it so that you've got it ready to buy the next carpet?

When to choose a carpet for high-traffic areas such as corridor, stairs and landings. How to select the right underlay, layer, wool blend, stain resistant, for a durable # carpet

Over you.

Have you been aware of all of the issues you need to remember when choosing a high-traffic carpet? What do you think of the Top 10 tips for United Carpets & Beds? Will you have some carpet that buys successes or failures?

If you’re looking for more tips and advice on carpets, floorings and more, then check out the sunderland carpet centre Today.