[spraying]
[scrubbing]
Bruce Gershon: Today, we're going to walk you through
our restoration of a pair of Ugg boots.
The process starts by checking the boots in.
And then we go to the cleaning process,
where Danny will be doing what we call prespotting.
He's using a steam gun
to try and clean the soles the best possible.
So, the steaming of the soles
is mostly to get the grit
and little pebbles and grime off of the soles.
It's really effective
in knocking that off
that the washing process
or the wet-cleaning process alone will not do.
When Danny is doing the brushing,
this is with a soft nylon-bristle brush
and our formula of soap,
a surfactant with oil and a solvent.
It will help break down that hard-water mark,
and the products that we use
will not disturb the color.
After Danny finishes the prespotting,
we will go right to the machine,
where we have formulas set up
for this type of cleaning.
Danny: OK, in they go.
Bruce: These Ugg boots are probably
generally washed at around
75- or 80-degree temperature.
You have to have a little bit of warmth in there
for the surfactants,
the soaps and the oils to work properly.
Danny: 20 minutes later,
we're ready to take them out.
Bruce: When we take the boots out of the machine,
there is a bit of a hopping-back,
shrinking-back process that happens
in this wet cleaning.
Uggs have a tendency to stretch out
when you're wearing them,
and so we are trying to
stretch them back out a little bit
but more shape them,
and then he's taking little
terry-cloth rags that we have
and putting them in the toe
so that the toe will keep a nice round shape
when they dry.
When Danny is finished shaping the boot,
he'll put them on the drying rack,
and they'll usually stay on the drying rack
for 24 hours to 36 hours.
After we get the boots off the drying rack
and they're totally dry,
Missy will take them and use a 3M pad.
They make several different grades of these pads,
and this one is a light- to medium-coarseness pad,
and it's perfect for what we call shaving,
or brushing the sheepskin to bring up the nap.
When the suede wears,
it will literally wear the nap off of the skin,
and so one of the things that we wanna do
is brush that nap back up
and make it so that you don't see where it was worn.
Danny: Now we're gonna spray them up.
To the spray booth.
Bruce: Missy is spraying the boot
with what we call a neutral suede oil,
for rejuvenating the suede.
There are water-repellent properties
to the oil.
And at that point,
we added a little dye to the oil
to help camouflage that very slight trace
of the hard-water mark
that we were trying to eliminate.
After the oiling and the drying period,
generally an hour or so,
we will come back and brush up the nap,
and in doing this, we're inspecting
to make sure that the color is even
and we've rejuvenated the suede,
the nap, the velvety look.
Sometimes in the wet-cleaning process
the fur will pick up little teeny bits of the suede,
and so she will brush that fur
to remove any of that suede lint
that might've gotten on the boots
in the wet-cleaning process.
So, the final step is the water repellent.
The water repellent that we use on the Uggs
is designed to help protect them
from moisture and wet-type stains.
It won't make the boot waterproof.
That's pretty much impossible,
but it will go a long way
to making it repel spots and stains.
And then they will be inspected,
and if they go through the final inspection process,
they're ready to be packaged
and shipped off to their owner.