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Stevie Black: This is Stevie Black with McDougall Interactive and today I'm sitting down with Dave Mouradian of Melrose Oriental Rugs located in Melrose, Mass. We're going to discuss rugs and carpets and how to buy a rug. So Dave, when a customer walks in your front door what's the first question that they typically ask?

Dave Mouradian: Well, typically when a customer walks in the door they don't know much about oriental rugs. They want me to give them a brief history about oriental rugs and they want to learn about quality. That's my favorite customer. Knowing the quality and knowing how a rug is made and knowing what makes a good rug from a bad rug, those are critical things to know when purchasing an oriental rug.

Stevie: So quality is job number one, as they say. What are some of the indicators that delineate a good rug from a bad one?

Dave: There are three main things that you need to look for when you are buying an oriental rug. Many people that know very little about oriental rugs what they tell you to do is look at the back of the rug and see how tightly woven it is. That's usually the first question or comment that people have: is it tightly woven or not tightly woven? Well, that's very important part of the quality, but there are other things that are also important, like the quality of the wool. Sometimes when you have a tight weave rug, they don't use as much wool in each knot so it can look like it's a very tightly woven rug, but the way the knot is constructed, it's not as tight as it feels. That's why really the most important thing that we try to teach people is to feel for the density - how quickly can you work your thumb from the front of the pile into the back of the pile and knowing that it's going to last a long time and have a good density. It's not the thickness, because sometimes poorly woven rugs are very thick and sometimes very finely woven rugs are thin. Not that, but how quickly can you get your thumb working into the back of the rug. That's the density. That's what we try to push people into as an important factor.

Stevie: Why do you think that quality is one of their primary concerns? Is it because of the industry rug buying in general perception of the public or is it because they feel like a rug is an investment. Therefore, they need to really be aware of high end, middle end and low end?

Dave: I think that's exactly it. People when they walk in the door and they are trying to decide which type of rug they are going to buy, a machine made rug or a hand made rug or a hand tufted rug. They know there is a lot of price differences. If they are going to buy a hand made rug, what makes it so much more expensive than the other options and why is it important to buy this type of rug?

Stevie: You mentioned hand tufted, hand woven. What are the differences between those different styles of weaving? Why are they important in terms of the value of the carpet?

Dave: The more hand made and hand knotted it is the more work that is put into the rug. It takes a lot longer and costs a lot more to do that. A hand tufted rug, you can go out today to most Oriental rug stores and they have what's called hand tufted oriental rugs. When you look at the face, it looks exactly like a hand knotted Oriental rug. It's when you look at the back and you see the material on the back of the rug and what that material is doing is it's just hiding the glue. These rugs are just glued together. They have a tufting gun where the shoot the wool in through the back of the rug. They put a latex adhesive and a piece of burlap or cotton material to hide that and it makes it look nice and neat. The face looks like the same, but in the long run it is just a glued together rug and over a period of time, it's going to fall apart or the glue dries out. That's one of our biggest problems when we see those types of rugs. They come in for cleaning. We try to explain to people that this is not a hand knotted rug, it's a hand tufted rug and that's where a lot of times the glue dries and the rugs break apart over a shorter period of time.

Stevie: Rugs are also made out of different kinds of materials. There's obviously wool, but there are some cottons. There are silks. There are other kinds. Do you see much of that in your own particular business? And do you steer people away from certain kinds of materials, based on traffic or where it is in the house?

Dave: We definitely try to steer people. We just sell wool oriental rugs. Sometimes they can have some silk highlights or silk flowers in them, which add to their beauty. But in general wool is the best. But within wool there are a lot of different qualities of wool. Sometimes you have a drier wool, depending on where the wool was from, where the sheep were grazed. What part of the sheep does the wool come from? These are all important factors when they use the wool. The shoulder of the sheep is a lot more durable or the belly of the sheep where the sun doesn't shine on it as much. Those have more lanolin. The more lanolin in the wool the better, because it makes the rug wear less because it is more flexible.

Stevie: In you opinion is there one country or one region that's making the better rugs and other countries that are notorious for making more inferior rug products?

Dave: That's a very much a question that people use all the time. I hear that question every day. People think about their grandmother and you have to own a Persian rug or a rug made in Iran. That's the same thing. Years ago that was the truth. Persian rugs, they made the best rugs. When these countries like India, China and Pakistan started weaving rugs they weren't doing a very good job. But over the years have progressed they have made better and better quality rugs, more tightly woven. They use better products. They make better designs. Nowadays, the Persian rugs, many times they are the lowest quality rugs. When I go to the market to buy rugs, they're more pushing these lower quality Persian rugs because they want to try to fool people because it has a Persian tag on it. People just assume that it's a really good rug. But in reality, each one of these countries makes very, very good rugs. And they all make very bad rugs. Again, it goes back to quality, looking at the tightness of the weave, the quality of the wool, but more importantly the density and the construction, not buying a hand tufted, but a hand knotted rug.

Stevie: Ultimately, Dave, as much as you could explain all this to your customers, the customer standing in your store looking for a rug for the living room or the dining room, what have you, maybe a runner on the stairs. So maybe you can tell us just a little bit about your process. Explain the steps that you take to introduce a customer to the various kinds of rugs and how you go through the process of finding the right piece for their house.

Dave: Well, of course the first most important step is either to give us a call or to email me and we'll be in contact. The second step is for me to come to your house. That is where it makes things so much easier. If we start from the beginning and I come to your house and we talk about the size and I look at your colors. I look at the window lighting or how your furniture is set up. We go back and forth and you explain to me the purpose of the rug. If it's a family room rug and you want a rug that is going to be durable or a rug that's going to be in a second bedroom that you don't need to be as finely woven or as good of quality. We go through all these different questions so that we can get to the next step in the process, which would be me coming back to your house, bringing the different sizes up. Then you come to the store and then we bring the rugs to your house. You get to live with them for a period of time. This is a process that works best for us and you, the customer.

Stevie: Now, I've heard you talk before that many people buy a rug that is the wrong size. And from what I understand that's a fairly avoidable mistake. How do you help your customers avoid making that mistake?

Dave: Well, again, with the home visit it makes it not a problem. Many times people for a dining room go buy the wrong size or for the living room. What we do is look at your situation. You want to make sure in a dining room when you back up the chairs the chairs stay on the rug. Or in a hallway you want to make sure that a rug is not going to end in the middle of a doorway. In an office you want to make sure that the rug is big enough so that the chair stays on the rug when you pull it back. These are all important things that we can get over with quickly while I'm at your house, rather than coming to the store and finding that the perfect rug that you love being the wrong size.

Stevie: Now, we've talked a little bit about size. We've talked a little bit about quality of the wool of the rug and the densities and these kind of issues. Maybe you could talk a little bit about what the best way is to determine what color the rug should be.

Dave: Well, again it's going to be me coming to your house and looking at what you have for lighting, what you have for wall color and what you have for furniture, material in your sofa and your chairs. The easiest is to come and purchase the rug first. And the rug is something that you are going to have for a lifetime. The draperies, the wall color, the furniture, that will change over a period of time. We pick a rug that you love and you build from there. You build and you say, I want to pull this little bit of blue out for a chair. Or I want to pull this burgundy out for some pillows on my couch. Those are different ways which we can help you go in the right direction for color. But trying them in your house. We've had people come in. I was just in Reading the other day and they didn't know what color they wanted. So we brought a light color. We brought an ivory background. We brought a red background. And we brought a black background. They got to live with it and got to see it in the daylight and they got to see it at night. The way the windows were it wasn't a sunny side of the house. They decided that they wanted that ivory background with a black border and they were going to have a green sofa. The walls were a tan/gold color and it looked beautiful when we were done. But that's the process. By trying different things, seeing them in your house, that's when you make the right decision.

Stevie: So, yeah, I can see how the side of the house that doesn't have sun how the black carpet probably, even if it's what they may have had in their mind's eye, might not have worked out so well in practical use. Speaking of practical use, what's the most common example of people buying "too much rug" for the situation?

Dave: Well, when you say "too much rug" in the size, that would mean like a lot of times people in a bedroom, they want to buy the rug for the whole room. They want to get out of the bed on both sides of the bed and be standing on the rug to keep their feet warm. But putting a rug under a bed is one of the worst things you can do. That's probably the most often place we find moths, under beds. Because bedroom rugs don't get dirty. So it takes so long for you to actually move the bed and turn the rug or bring the rug in for cleaning it gives the moths a chance to dig in. they start eating and before you know it you're having a problem in your whole house. But a lot of times people can use the term "too much rug" for too much quality, too. Like you want to get the better quality rugs where they get the highest usage. This is a common problem that people have. They have these living room/dining rooms that no one goes into and they want to put the best rugs there. They have the family room where the dog is in there, the kids are in there, and they use it every day, all day long, and they want to put a rug... I don't want to put a good rug where we are every day. It will get ruined. Well, it's really the opposite. This is pretty important that you put the best rugs where they get the most use because they last the longest. They are indestructible. You want to put the finest rug where they have the fine silver and the china, but no one goes into that dining room three times a year. It's not necessary to put the finest rug in that room. You want to put it in that family room and then it will just last forever.

Stevie: That's a really good point and something that my mom learned very early on. She bought a number of rugs for the house and she always put the top quality rug right in the living room where everybody came and went. And it's still there, 40 years later it's still the same carpet. So I agree with you there. Now, you talked a little bit about the bed on top of the rug. It's not getting moved around. And probably pests, it's a good spot for pests like moths to get in there and start to do damage to that rug. Are there any other places that furniture can cause those kinds of problems?

Dave: Well, moths like dark, still areas. So the biggest problem that we find is when people have a piece of furniture where the actual wood goes right to the floor all the way around. A lot of times a dining room hutch, if you get a rug that's too big for your dining room and you have the hutch that sits on that corner of the rug... I've actually went to a house in Melrose the other day that we didn't see. We went to pick up the rugs for cleaning. We didn't see a moth anywhere. This house was crystal clean. I mean, it was unbelievable. We moved this corner of the hutch and the actual space where the hutch was on top of the rug was completely gone. All we saw was the foundation of the rug. The foundation is made out of cotton, typically. So the moths don't eat the cotton, they eat the wool. And the whole little corner of the rug was completely gone and the rest of the rug was completely clean of moths. It was the dining room where they use it three times a year. It's not necessary to clean it as often or turn it as often. And we went to move it and it was completely infested.

Stevie: Wow.

Dave: So just to back up again. Any room that you just want to try to avoid to put furniture that goes right to the floor, like that doesn't let any air or light or movement to the rug. That's when moths will come.

Stevie: It's good advice for sure. Speaking of advice, now once the customer has come to a conclusion about the size, shape, color or a carpet that they are interested in, do you have all these kinds of carpets, all these sizes, all these colors in your own inventory? And if not, how do you approach those issues?

Dave: Well, just on the way here I stopped at a house in Andover where they called me up to the house, asked me what size they needed. I had suggested a 12 foot round. And 12 foot round is not a very common rug. I had one in my stock. It was the wrong color that I thought was appropriate for them. But I wanted to bring the size. So I brought the size over and husband or the wife they had agreed upon the size. What I did was, when I go to the market where you buy the rugs, I go to about 20 to 30 different importers. So I'm doing the shopping for you. And I know what kind of colors and designs that you are looking for. I can bring you back a selection. What I ended up bringing was four different 12 foot rounds, which are virtually impossible to find. We put it in this room and they ended up choosing one of the rugs. So, I do the shopping for you. It's no obligation. It's just that I can go, after being to your house, after talking to you about colors, and talking about size, we can go and give you a selection of something that would be as difficult as a 12 foot round.

Stevie: Now, you have talked about your in home consultations. That is free of charge?

Dave: Yes. Absolutely.

Stevie: Now, is it common that people will in that first consult visit ask you to come in and talk about one room or one situation where they want a carpet and begin to build a wish list for other areas in the home?

Dave: Sure that's one of the things we will do first over. We'll look at all the different areas throughout the house they are thinking about an Oriental rug, stairs, hall, living room, dining room, wherever they have a need for a rug. We'll go and we'll talk about size and placement. They'll write all these things down, so that when they become ready for these rugs they'll at least have the size ready to go. But yeah, they'll zero what I would always try to suggest doing one room at a time. And then we can build from there.

Stevie: Dave, it sounds like the thousands of home visits that you've made have given you the unique ability to understand unique patterns and needs of any household. In the many years that you've been in this business, you've developed a gift for finding the right solution for each individual challenge. Now that customer has bought an oriental rug, what's the best way for them to protect their Oriental rug investment over time?

Dave: Well, proper maintenance is important. Of course, when you buy a rug from us, we're going to make sure you have the correct type of underlayment, the correct padding for the usage. And we'll explain to you when we come to your house, when we see the area, if it's the family room I'll probably say, this is an area where you should rotate your rug. This is an important thing that never gets done with people. I see it all the time when people bring their rugs in for cleaning. One end of the fringe is completely worn. The other end is brand new because they had it under a couch or in an area that didn't get use. It's important to rotate your rugs periodically. So maybe in an area like a family room you rotate it every two years, maybe clean it every four years. Each individual situation is different. Also with the type of rug, certain types of rugs need to be cleaned more often if they are more loosely woven. They are more susceptible to wear with the grit and the fine particles that get to the bottom of the pile of the rug. The other thing that people do often is they use the vacuum on the fringe of their rug. That's something that we try to tell people to avoid. The fringe is only made out of cotton in most cases. And by vacuuming it up, it chews the fringe up. Over a short period of time that can be worn off. It can be sewn on again, but it's never like the original because the original is part of the foundation of the rug.

Stevie: Now, you and I talked before about hand washing. I guess for our listeners, can you take it to anyone and get a rug hand washed?

Dave: No. there's very few people that clean oriental rugs the correct way. The most important thing is turning the rug upside down, vibrating or knocking the dirt loose and then you can give it a hand washing. These guys that drive around in trucks, most often... You open the book and look on the Internet everyone is an expert on oriental rug cleaning. Well, most of these guys they just clean the surface and that's the end of it. You get a surface cleaned rug but deep down dirt, deep grit is still in the rug.

Stevie: So now you are telling us that you clean you rugs on the premises at your store at your location.

Dave: Right. Probably about 75% of the rugs that we do we do right in our actual location, but we do have a warehouse the next time over that we do some of the cleaning also. It's our own warehouse, but it's just that we do some of the larger rugs that need special attention we do over there. Each rug comes in and we pick up rug. It's all individual. It's not like it just puts it in a big pile. Whatever the rug needs to be done the right way we do it.

Stevie: Now are there any other pitfalls to be aware of when trying to protect your investment, repair, any other items?

Dave: Sometimes we see people that if they have a lot of strong window light, they got to be careful. Any rug will fade over a period of time, depending on the sunlight so you have to be aware of that. If you see any loose strings or things starting to get worn you want to address those quickly so that it doesn't get worse. You want to always make sure you have the proper padding under the rug so.