Woman says floors stayed dust-free for a month after she cleaned with used tea bags
Cleaning fans have been using black tea to clean and polish wooden floors for years, and enthusiast Kristina Rak recently shared her own impressive results.
Cleaning the floors can be a tedious task, especially when dust seems to settle instantly. Additionally, wooden flooring poses the challenge of scratching and dulling over time.
Instead of relying on traditional cleaners, Kristina Rak from the Cleaning Tips, Tricks and Hacks Facebook group discovered an innovative method using a common kitchen scrap: used tea bags. Specifically, she found black tea to be "amazing" at cleaning hardwood floors, requiring only 10 minutes.
Black tea has been a centuries-old remedy for polishing hardwood, effectively cutting through grime and dust to add a sheen.
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Kristina shared her experience: "I just cleaned my wood floors with black tea and it worked amazingly! It disinfects, removes dust and shines up the wood fantastically. I didn't see any dust for at least a month."
She noted the benefits: "It definitely made them shiny and even added a nice colour to them, and it smells so nice!"
Kristina's method involves brewing eight tea bags in one gallon of boiling water, then allowing it to steep for 10 to 15 minutes before cooling to room temperature. Afterwards, she mopped as usual.
The secret to black tea's effectiveness lies in its polyphenolic compounds, which inhibit bacterial growth, thereby disinfecting the floors. Moreover, the tannins in black tea not only clean but also stain the floors, revealing their hidden potential as a natural cleaning agent.
Tannins, the substance that often leaves stains on your tea cups, are slightly acidic and can help break down dirt and grime while mopping.
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More importantly, they also produce a light brown stain, which can enhance the color and richness of your natural hardwood floors. The intensity of the color depends on the number of tea bags you use.
Using eight bags should be enough to highlight the color in medium-brown floors.
For lighter floorboards, five or six bags should suffice; for darker floors, you might need to increase the count to 10 or 12.
However, this cleaning trick should only be used on natural hardwood and not laminate flooring. The tea could damage laminate, so it's best to avoid using it.
