Swiffer Carpet Flick - The Quicker Flicker Upper
Written: Aug 13 '05
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Light, easy-to-use, convenient
Cons: Cartridges don't last long enough in some instances
The Bottom Line: For small, crumbly messes between vacuumings, don't suffer and lug out the big guns... Just flick it up with the Swiffer Carpet Flick. Great time & energy saver.
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| logimom's Full Review: The Swiffer CarpetFlick |
Swiffer products have been a favorite of mine from the beginning, and I was thrilled to receive the new Swiffer Carpet Flick to try out. I'd just come home from yet another working road trip, and the last thing on my mind was cleaning anything - until I saw my new Carpet Flick on the doorstep. There my suitcases sat in the corner while I assembled my new "toy".
What's a Carpet Flick?
Swiffer Carpet Flick is a new on-the-spot carpet sweeper, designed for quick cleaning between vacuum sessions. It is meant for picking up things like crumbs, dirt, leaves, grass, glitter, and fuzz.
The Carpet Flick consists of an incredibly lightweight pole and handle, a bin, and a cartridge. The bin is approximately 7 inches square and a tad more than 1 inch deep. On the bottom of the bin, there are two red strips of textured material, which aids in flicking crumbs and other particles onto the top of the cartridge. This cartridge is nothing more than a thin card with an adhesive film on both sides - not quite as sticky as flypaper, but much stickier than a lint roller. There is also a handy hanging loop on the handle for easy storage.
Assembly of this product is so easy, a child could do it... and that's exactly what happened with ours. The pole sections snap together effortlessly. I assembled all but the handle section at the top, and my 3 year-old wanted to help. I handed him the pole and handle, he looked at it for a few seconds, and snapped it into place like a pro. The cartridges are just as easy to install. Simply peel the backing from both sides, insert into the slot on the bin with "this side up" showing, and lock into place by pushing the tab over the button on the bin. That's it... You're ready to flick.
Stop Sufferin'... and Start Swifferin'
The Swiffer Carpet Flick is designed for use on carpet - not tile, not linoleum - carpet. It tells you so all over the product packaging. Of course, this doesn't stop me from rolling it over my tile anyway. There is a reason it is called a CARPET Flick... it no worky so great on the tile. It does, however, work on both cut pile and berber-type carpets. Not sure how many folks still own shag carpets, but I can tell you it probably won't work as well on them. I have a shag-type bath mat, and the Carpet Flick had minimal effect on it.
The Carpet Flick does glide effortlessly over the carpets and maneuvers quite well, but I did notice that I had to put a little pressure on it and make several passes to pick up things. Another thing I noticed is that the cartridges don't last as long as I would like. The life of the sticky strip is definitely shortened with pet dander and fuzz. That's the first thing it will pick up, which totally devoids the bottom strip from picking up much else. It will still flick up a lot of bigger crumbs, chips, and whatnot onto the top of the cartridge when the bottom is full of hair, but the overall effectiveness is lessened somewhat. To be fair, I did crack out the Dyson and get all that stuff up and performed a couple of control tests...
Starting with a dander-free patch of carpet and the help of my all-too-willing 3 year-old, we created a variety of messes to "flick":
Cereal - (New cartridge, Fruit Loops and Cocoa Krispies) - Picks up well as long as the cereal hasn't been crunched up and ground in. with a little pressure and several passes it picks up the bigger crunchies, but the vacuum is necessary to get out what got pushed into the pile.
Leaves, dirt, grass - (Same cartridge) - Again, several passes and some pressure, but almost all of the leaves and grass came up, but only a little of the dirt. I believe in the process of picking up the bigger stuff, it helped work the dirt even farther down into the pile.
Chips - (Same cartridge, Sour Cream & Onion Ruffles) - Same results as the cereal... as long as it doesn't get pushed into the carpet pile, the Carpet Flick picks it up fairly well. It worked great at getting the chip crumbs off the sofa cushions, too. The sofa test wasn't intended... The youngun got a little peckish while the test was going on and got a few chip crumbs on the couch. 'Twas a nice addition to the testing, though.
Glitter & Sequins - (Same cartridge) - Needed pressure, several passes, and finally a fresh cartridge. We still needed the vacuum to get the glitter mess up. I give it a "D" grade for that. It did work quite well at getting all of the sequins.
A couple more incidental opportunities to test out the Carpet Flick:
Grated Cheese - My 8 year-old decided to take his taco for a walk and bits of grated cheese hit the floor along the way. He was able to get all the cheese up using the Carpet Flick with very little effort. Notice I said HE was able. That's what you get when you walk tacos around the house.
Nerds, the candy variety - I don't know who spilled the Nerds - no one would 'fess up, so I easily flicked them away. No problems at all getting them up.
How does this all stack up? Final thoughts...
In all honesty, I have a Swivel Sweeper that truly runs circles around the Carpet Flick - and it works on both carpet and hard floors. But frankly, not everyone want to pay $40 for a battery-powered broom (I like toys). The Swiffer Carpet Flick needs no batteries, and costs much less. In which case, the Carpet Flick is a refreshing change from having to drag out the vacuum for every little crumb. It works well enough for the purpose it was designed. It definitely saves time and energy from having to lug out the big boy for a tiny mess.
Another big plus in our home is it is good for our kids, especially our industrious toddler. He likes to clean anyway, and he's adopted the Carpet Flick as his very own. It is now his broom, which is kept in his closet. Yup, it's simple light, and maneuverable (and fun) enough for a toddler to use. I snicker and wonder how long it will take him to grow out of that, but like I say... Teach 'em right, teach 'em early.
The Swiffer Carpet Flick will certainly get lots of use in our home, and I'd recommend it for others as well.
© 2005 Donna Standridge
I'd like to thank Hass MS&L for sending this product and allowing me to test it out in exchange for a fair and honest review.
For even more information on the Swiffer Carpet Flick and other fine Swiffer products, visit online at www.swiffer.com
Recommended:
Yes
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Member: Donna Standridge
Location: Texarkana, Texas
Reviews written: 213
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Busy getting the new business going... Check out Saphoros Spa Essentials at www.Saphoros.com!
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