Why You'll Want Masking Tape On Hand Next Time You Vacuum

According to Onedesk, over 40 million vacuums fly off shelves annually, reflecting how much of an important staple they are for so many households. While vacuuming is a great way to clean your floors, it can sometimes leave undesirable marks around your home, for example, on skirting boards or walls. Even if you try to avoid doing so, wielding a clunky vacuum around can often result in unfortunate and unintentional mishaps as you try to clean deep into every nook and cranny. These scratch marks are undoubtedly annoying and are certainly a hassle to fix — and that's if you even decide to.

Thankfully, using some masking tape on your vacuum could help to eliminate the issue once and for all. What more could you ask for? Below, we'll take a look at how you can use this useful household item to your advantage while vacuuming. Let's dive into the details.

To try this trick out for yourself, all you'll need is some masking tape and the guilty vacuum in question — AKA, the culprit that's leaving unwanted marks in its wake. You could even try this out on all your vacuums if you have more than one. Now, for the method itself. All you need to do is grab some masking tape and stick it around the outline of your vacuum. If you're unsure of where is best, it should be the parts of your vacuum that crash against your interior the most; for example, the suction section at the bottom of the vacuum. Who knew masking tape could come in so handy? However, this doesn't give you free rein to send your vacuum crashing around your house. You should always try and be careful of the interiors of your home whenever you're cleaning to prevent scratches. After all, you don't want to be inflicting any unnecessary damage.

Naturally, you should be able to tell if this trick works over time as you begin to clean around your house. However, if you feel as though any more masking tape is needed, you can always add an extra layer to ensure that a good amount of protection from scratches is there. If you're trying to hoover in difficult areas, you can always try a vacuum hack that helps you reach hard-to-reach places alongside this masking tape trick.

While masking tape seems like a random choice of item to stick on a vacuum, there's a very good reason why it works so well for this trick. The masking tape creates a barrier between objects and the vacuum, so it takes the brunt of any movement and knocks that occur when you're using it. It almost acts as a "protective layer" in a sense, preventing any transfer onto areas of your home with ease. Direct contact is completely cut off. This makes it the perfect solution for preventing any dreaded vacuum scuffs. In addition to this hack, you should also ensure you're vacuuming your carpets and flooring correctly.

This task is a regular house chore for many, and, according to cleaning expert Scott Johnston in an interview with Home & Gardens, "ideally, you should be vacuuming your flooring at least once per week." However, some people do it less often than this. If you regularly vacuum, you can always replace the masking tape if you think it's beginning to wear down. This way, you can maintain a pristine home and prevent pesky marks from popping up.