subject: Twists Carpet Yarn Scams [print this page] Some flooring salesman will show you a plush carpet or what looks like a plush carpet but really the twist of the carpet is less than meets the eye. A lower twist rate can look like a plusher carpet thus demanding a higher price from an unknowing customer.
Carpet twist level is rarely examined by consumers, but plays a major factor in a carpets level of performance. Carpeting that is made with higher twist levels have the tendency to hold their original appearance longer than carpets that are produced with a lower twist level. Lower twist products will untwist over time the more they are walked on. Thats why builders grade carpet looks so matted down after only five years even though you bought the house brand new. The lower twist carpet unravels giving the home owner a matted carpet look.
Twist levels are measured in how many turns per inch. Many frieze carpets are 7 to 9 turns per inch, while lesser quality carpets may have only 3 to 4 turns per inch.
A densely constructed carpet with a high twist level is better than a carpet with a lower twist. Some flooring salesman will knowingly show you a carpet that looks plusher than the next guy telling you its better since its thick but really its the opposite. They are showing you a cheaper carpet that looks fuller because the carpet is already flatting out. This carpet wears out twice as fast as a carpet with twice the twist rate. Yet the customer thinks the carpet that is tightly twisted is less quality because the lesser quality, less twisted, carpet looks plusher at the time of the sale. Flooring salesman take advantage of this ignorance all the time and the customer thinks they are getting a thicker carpet at half the price when really they are paying more for a crappier carpet nowhere near as good as the carpet with the higher twist rate.
The Carpet Seaming Scam
When customers push hard for a low, low price then some flooring salesman will give them the price they want just to get the deal over their competitors. Well what happens is the salesman shorts the job on the carpet order so much so that the carpet installer has to take all the scraps from all the cuts and seam them together like patchwork in order to finish your carpet installation. You can always tell when this occurs. When a job is shorted all the closets in the house take forever because the carpet installers are in the closets gluing together pieces of carpet to finish a job. They know the homeowner will never find out and the carpet does not come up for a long time since a regular non-walk-in closet has hardly any traffic. People reach over and take a shirt out they dont walk on the patchwork beneath their feet. Well wait give it two or three years, and the carpet will start coming apart after that. Long after the labor warranty has expired, there is nothing a home owner can do.
Golden Rule: Be reasonable with a flooring company if you push for too low a price you will get it and you will lose in some way.
