Have you ever noticed when you got in your vehicle and something’s just not right?

And what I mean by that is that there’s a very unpleasant odor or irritating odor that is just in your vehicle, and you cannot ever get rid of it.

Say you try to cover it up with Febreze. So now it smells like Febreze and something else that you don’t know what it is. And that something that you don’t know what it is has got to be unpleasant to you.

You may think, if you don’t spend a lot of time in your vehicle, what’s the big issue?

Well, according to the AAA Foundation for Traffic Study, the average driver spends about 292 hours in their vehicle every year.

If there is an odor in your vehicle, there is a problem that is causing it…

WHY ARE CAR ODORS AN ISSUE?

Well, first and foremost, if there is an odor, that means that something’s not right in the interior of your vehicle. And this could be a multitude of things.

This could be mildew or it could be mold; it could be all kinds of bacteria that are growing in your vehicle. And it’s such a small confined space that you’re breathing and inhaling the air over, and over, and over.

Odors are an indication of a sign of bacteria building up in your vehicle. If you ever notice when you get in your vehicle and you open the door, and the smell that was in there before has grown, there’s a problem in your vehicle.

And that smell is never going to go down, it’s only going to go up, especially in the hot summer sun in Georgia.

If you have an odor in your vehicle, it’s definitely not a healthy environment, especially if you have young children. If you had an infant, a newborn. But if you’re bringing your newborn home from the hospital, very important that you don’t have any odors or smells or bacteria in your vehicle.

Some research studies have found that the interior of vehicles, especially the steering wheel, have up to 700 potentially dangerous germs per square inch.

Now, how bad is that? Well, that is nine times the germs that are on a public toilet seat, a public toilet seat, which is disgusting.

I mean, think about it, and you’re touching the steering wheel and then touching your phone, and you’re touching your baby’s bottle, your face, your tissue, your handkerchief. So the steering wheel itself is covered in germs.

HOW TO GET RID OF CAR ODORS.

So what are some of the ways you can get rid of odor, but also not just get rid of odor, eliminate germs and bacteria? Just because you get rid of an odor doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ve gotten rid of the problem. You’ve just eliminated the smell to the problem.

Here are some DIY solutions that you could try prior to contacting me for a detailed interior cleaning and odor removal services.

USING BAKING SODA.

Mild odors in a vehicle, say you left a Chick-fil-A in your vehicle overnight, and we all love Chick-fil-A, but leave one in your car one night and open the next door, it’s not going to smell as good as it did that day you bought it.

Something like that is fairly simple to fix. You could leave the windows down and sprinkle some baking soda on the carpets and vacuum it out, that smell would go away.

DON’T EVER LET TRASH BUILD UP IN YOUR VEHICLE.

Every time you’re getting gas or every time you come back to the house and you pull into the garage, just take all the trash out of the vehicle, any type of drinks, definitely any type of coffees or any type of drinks that are made with any type of milk, because that becomes a really big issue.

DON’T LEAVE SODA (OR ANY FOOD REALLY) IN YOUR VEHICLE.

In the hot summer months, very important, never leave sodas in your vehicle, like Coke or Pepsi or Sprite. Why? Because what will happen with the bottles or cans is that they will heat up and explode all over your vehicle.

I know because I have had many clients contact me to clean it up. And a lot of times some of the stains from the Coca-Cola do not come out of the headliner.

CHANGE YOUR CABIN AIR FILTER.

Every time I do a car odor removal, I always replace the cabin air filter. It’s something that you can DIY. The cabin filter inside your air conditioning unit filters all the air moving through the ventilation system, just like your house filter does for your home air conditioning. If you go to YouTube and put in the make, model, and the year of your car plus “replace cabin filter” – you can often find a video showing you to replace it yourself. It’s very simple. And why pay the dealership 120, 150 bucks to do this yourself?

I do recommend, when you purchase an in-cabin air filter, pay a little more money, because there’s always two choices, there is a less expensive and a more expensive. The more expensive filter has better filtration. A lot of times it has a baking soda additive or carbon which filters the air better. It stands up better, and it does a better job overall. And it’s only maybe a few dollars more.

DO NOT COVER UP THE SMELL! AND NO VINEGAR.

One thing you don’t want to do is, if you have an odor, try to cover it up with Febreze or a deodorizer or a new car smell, because that’s just making the situation worse. And definitely, definitely never try to come after an odor using vinegar.

I don’t understand why on the YouTube everyone says, “Use vinegar.” I will tell you this, if you have an odor in your vehicle, listen to me, if you can fix it yourself, do it. But don’t try everything… eventually, if it doesn’t work, you’ll need me to come in and do both odor removal and correct any damage done by the DIY methods. So it’s a lot simpler if you would leave it to a professional.

CAN AN OZONE MACHINE HELP REMOVE CAR SMELLS?

Whenever you’re going after eliminating an odor in a vehicle, it’s more than just having your vehicle detailed. It’s more than just running an ozone machine.

Ozone machines are great. They only work generally in one arena, cigarette smell. They don’t work for other smells like mildew, soured milk, they don’t.

There’s a dangerous line with an ozone machine. Long durations of ozone treatments will permanently change the smell of the interior to something that you’re not going to enjoy. And you cannot get that smell out.

Number two, long term ozone treatments have been known to damage electrical circuitry and computer chips. So be very careful; you can just have an ozone treatment and the problem will go away.

INTERIOR CAR DETAILING ON STEROIDS.

To really remove odors, you’ve got to get to the surface. And what I mean by that, you have to have a deeper-than-interior detail.

You need to have thorough carpet extraction with a commercial carpet rated extractor of all the carpets and the seats if they’re cloth.

We need to have a professional steaming of the headliner, all the controls, the steering wheel, all the controls, the dash, the windows. Everything in the vehicle needs to be thoroughly steamed, including a steam treatment of the ventilation system.

You also need to have the cabin filter replaced with a brand fresh new cabin filter.

In our process of the interior in the odor elimination, we use a product that is 99.9% antimicrobial. This is a great product. Not only does it kill the germs that are there, but it also lasts for a year. It actually gives you a year of germ-killing power, which is great, especially when you’re going into the cold season or the flu season, especially if you’re bringing a newborn home from the hospital, or you have a parent that’s got a jeopardized immune system or breathing problems.

And what we do here at US Auto Spa, we have a secret weapon that we use. And to find out what that secret weapon is, give US Auto Spa a call, (770) 380-3261, because let’s face it, isn’t your family’s health very important to you? Is not your own personal health worth it to you?

If you have a smell, an odor in your vehicle, or if you have just purchased a pre-owned vehicle that has a cigarette odor that is irritant to you, US Auto Spa is very successful in eliminating odors. We do not cover them up. Our goal at US Auto Spa is zero neutral smell. Don’t smell. It doesn’t smell like a deodorizer. It doesn’t smell like the foul odor. Zero smell, zero neutral smell across the board.