Zerorez Technology for a Clean and Healthy Home with Scott Arkon

Interview Transcription

ADRIENNE: 
Welcome back, and thanks for listening to the Team Lally Real Estate show homeowner guaranteed sold program or we’ll buy it. I’m Adrienne and I’m Attilio. And if you have any questions, just give us a call at 7999596 or check us out online at Teamlally.com.

ATTILIO: 
Our guest today is from Arizona, he got into the flooring industry about 25 years ago he first ran into Zerorez when he had worked as a flooring inspector working with carpet mills. His job was to go around and look at flooring complaints, document them and fix them if possible.

ADRIENNE: 
After months of research on Zerorez, he learned of how the company was solving many issues in the industry. He started working with them and later bought one one franchise after another. Please welcome today’s guest, Scott Arkon.

ATTILIO: 
Hello Scott.

SCOTT: 
Aloha guys. How’s it going?

ATTILIO: 
Good good. What you what you got for us? Well first of all, explain to us the How did how did the name come about I Zerorez Oh, isn’t that great?

SCOTT: 
Yeah, like the greatest name. So Zerorez is I hope it’s obvious but it means zero residue and if you know anything about the carpet cleaning world or just cleaning in general nevermind just carpet cleaning our cleaning industry is just full of chemicals and when you when you have that as the problem and it creates a lot of problems you can you can eliminate that by not using the chemicals and that’s where that’s where we come in Zerorez means zero residue.

ATTILIO: 
yeah awesome and as an agent I can personally testify like we’re in court no we can we can share under oath under oath you guys did you have done my couch I one of those big sectional couches you guys have done that you guys have done my you know what I had some I caught myself in blood and you guys clean the blood up so like clean up because I couldn’t see instead of the police coming by going where were you on the night of December 16 between eight and 9pm because of my murder scene in my in my you guys cleaned it up and it was all gone off the bed and the carpet everything so awesome.

SCOTT: 
We’ve kept a lot of people out of jail. Yes. So

ADRIENNE: 
then you guys have done we’re helping people you’ve done my my travertine tiles like just made them look like brand new but all the grout lines beautiful. Yeah, my area rugs. Even my countertops. Yeah, because I had this weird to do that was around my my seat like hard water. Yeah. So when they say like different surfaces, not just carpets, like all sorts of different surfaces. Yeah.

SCOTT: 
Yeah. Sounds like you guys got the whole like,

ATTILIO: 
services that we all direct experience. Yeah, yeah,

SCOTT: 
we’re definitely known for carpet cleaning. It’s kind of what made us famous nationally, but but we do a lot more than that. Yeah, tile and grout is probably like our maybe maybe that’s the second biggest service that we clean so you had the travertine done and rugs. Rugs is probably if it’s not our second It’s our third it’s kind of carpet, tile rugs. Stone those are those are big ones. We also do a lot of upholstery. So chairs, couches, section one that doesn’t come up very often but it kind of like gives me the goosebumps is mattresses. We clean we clean mattresses and that’s one of the ones that once you kind of learn about skin and us how much skin we flake off in a year. I don’t know how people aren’t crazily calling us all the time to clean mattresses but that’s one I want to throw out there.

ADRIENNE: 
Okay we’re gonna we’re gonna be scheduling that one soon.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah, I think we got to schedule that one and then I like to talk about because if you know for you for your people you monk types or or maybe like, who was that? It was the odd couple who was the clean one. I forget what his name was you should know because you identify which one was Oscar the other one because Felix monks out there Felix monk from USA, the channel. You like everything clean and neat. And you know what I had? I’m gonna talk about this customer. I used to be a matte, wholesale manufacturer’s rep for Sanyo splits. And I got a call one day for this guy that was like super sensitive allergies and smells. So he he I literally went above and beyond he’s like, I was like, Are you punking me? Because he’s like, can I come over I can you open up one of the boxes for the fan coil unit, the one that’s inside the house, I want to smell it. And I thought I was being punked. But no, he was like super sensitive to smells. And you want to make sure that if he was going to have it installed, that it wasn’t going to be activating his allergies, talk about people that are sensitive to the chemicals and all of that. What’s What’s that big thing that you guys talk about this different which your cleaning process?

SCOTT: 
Yeah, so this is this is actually a big one, we probably get a call once a month, I’m gonna say from somebody that’s that’s very sensitive to VOCs or chemical smells. So our whole thing is we’re not using any kind of detergent, or surfactant, or a lot of these chemicals are very harsh in people’s homes at all. We are so unique because we make our own water. And I know that sounds like an insane statement. But what we’re doing is we’re taking normal tap water, we filter it, we put it through an electrolysis process where we add a sodium molecule to it. And that sodium molecule connects to the water molecule and creates a hydroxide and that hydroxide clean, just like a soap or detergent. But it doesn’t leave any of the residue behind because we’re not using chemicals to kind of make that water in the first place. So if you want to google it, if you’re really nerdy and you want to go Google it’s electrolyzed water. It’s used in a ton of industries. The medical industry uses it a lot for cleaning, the food processing industry uses it quite a bit. We were just smart enough to kind of figure out hey, this water fixes some of the chemical problems and we can apply it to cleaning in people’s homes and we were the first ones to do that. Yeah, so we’re coming in with that water. We’re cleaning that water or cleaning without water. And for people that have the chemical sensitivities kind of back to your point Yeah, is there isn’t a smell associated with it at all. So a lot of the times when people you know you you hire a cleaner whether it’s a house cleaner or whether it’s a carpet cleaner you know they’re there you’re you know they’ve been there because you walk into your house and you go oh wow okay that’s a it Smells

ATTILIO: 
Like Teen Spirit

SCOTT: 
it’s a mix of bleach and Fabuloso are the are the common ones that I smell. Yeah, but with our system it It smells like your house. It smells fresh. It’s this I love it like I’ve really fallen in love with that part of our system of no chemical smells.

ATTILIO: 
I think that’s important too because when we get homes ready for sale, and we love our pets Adrian’s got tons of pets she’s one cat away from being a crazy cat lady. I think you right at the edge right you got three one more and that’s it we

ADRIENNE: 
got some of them are like outdoor outdoor cats okay you call them point five What is it full time inside

ATTILIO: 
but yeah, he just comes by to check the mail but anyway the with the with the pets when you have pets you don’t notice the pet smell but I don’t have pets so I noticed the pet smell and so when you go to sell a house unless you’re going to sell it to a pet owner the but even pet owners would be like I don’t want the pet smell so it’s important to bring you guys in because you can help eliminate get rid of the pest smell. Yeah,

SCOTT: 
yeah with the pet ones. Yeah, I’m I’m passionate about this one. I haven’t been a pet home pet owner for many many years. Yeah. And my my wife we just got a Yorkie about two years ago Yeah, and I’m, I’m I’m struggling a little bit with this but the the pet smells really bothered me. About seven years ago as your as I actually got to develop a a product that’s a cleaning product specifically for pet urine. And we did this in up in Utah with a with a very specialized chemists chemical company, who we kind of had to go to them and say look, here’s our requirements, these cannot have these chemicals and um, they cannot be strong acids. I know the carpet cleaning industry is used to using this, this and this. You cannot develop a product that uses that. So we’ve actually come up with our own. We’ve been it was in testing for several years. It is amazing. And the beauty of it is it doesn’t leave the strong chemicals most most carpet cleaners or most cleaning companies are going to come in and try to get it out with deodorizers which is really just like tricking your nose right? You’re covering it you don’t smell anymore. Now you smell fresh. Cherries, I don’t know whatever fake chemical smell they choose to use

ATTILIO: 
with pee on top of them on top

SCOTT: 
it’s it’s slightly urinated cherry smell. Yes. Yeah. And with ours we’re actually Getting in and removing the source. So our whole system is based on I cannot fake it, I can’t fake removing urine will come in and we’ll flush it out from below. Because obviously, the physics of dogs peeing and carpet is the pee is gonna go down into the carpet, it’s gonna go down into the pad. Now, how do I get that out? Yeah, we have specialty tools that we can go through and flush without having to pull the carpet out or reinstall pad. It’s actually kind of amazing, honestly. I mean, if you’re, if you’re geeky like me, it’s amazing. If it’s someone who’s dealing with it, it’s probably just more of an annoyance, but, but we can fix it.

ATTILIO: 
Well, I think most people are like, I don’t want to you know, it’s like, it’s like a sausage factory. I don’t want to take a tour of the sausage factory. I just enjoy sausages. And they just want the end result, which is I want to come into my house and go, huh? Right.

SCOTT: 
But thank goodness, there’s a guy at that sausage factory who’s excited every morning? You gets to make sausage for you.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah. And and you know, here’s the thing with AI people, you know, we’re joking about this. And it is a serious thing for you that owns it and you want to have a clean smelling home. But we tell owners when you’re getting your home ready to sell you the To Do lists, branches off the human senses. What does your home smell like? What does it look like? And then the tactile stuff? I’m not saying people are coming in there with white gloves and they aren’t checking for

ADRIENNE: 
dirt, cleanliness, and that tells them like okay, if this home right of ownership is is dirty than like, what else? Are they not?

ATTILIO: 
What else can I take care of, you know, the AC filter the, you know, cleaning out the attic and taking care of pests. And

ADRIENNE: 
so incorporating Zerorez making money as part of the home? Yeah, it’s hot part of that home preparation. Yeah. is key to make you more money.

ATTILIO: 
We know tons of Realtors listen to their show, because they’re like, What is Team Lally doing? Well, we’re telling you right now, when we hire Zerorez to help, and they help homeowners get more money. There you go.

ADRIENNE: 
And in fact, we’ve got a home right now in Mililani, Mauka that they’ve got a carpet from there, which I think they purchased it originally in 2006. The carpet is surprisingly, in really good shape. We don’t see any stains, it doesn’t look like it’s been worn. So we just hold on, like, we gotta get Zerorez to come in here and just clean it and revive it. Yeah.

SCOTT: 
Can I share one story with like, really converted me. So part of our process is I basically I explained the water. But we also scrub the carpet, we have a machine that goes through and counter rotating brushes that lifts everything up. The difference with us and others is we don’t charge extra for that. And that’s a step that if you’re not scrubbing, you’re not getting all out. And I was at a house. This was probably about three years ago. And it was brand new customer welcome to new house. It was a new to to our client. But the client has always used Zerorez. So they move into this new house and they say the previous owner, they had the carpets cleaned, but they didn’t use you guys. So can you come in and get all the chemicals out? Yeah. And we’re like, oh, yeah, sure, absolutely. We do that once a while. And I got to be the person that actually did the cleaning. And I’m scrubbing the carpet, right? Yeah. And as you scrub if there’s any hair on the carpet, it’ll bring it up to the surface. Because the scrubbing machine that we use is way better than a vacuum. So it’s bringing all this like hair that I could not see when I walked into this house. I thought this is gonna be an easy job. Yeah, it’s so clean looking. And as soon as I started scrubbing, I think werewolves used to live there because handfuls and handfuls of dog hair came out of this carpet. And that is that kind of gives you an idea of how good carpet manufacturers are creating carpet that hides dirt. Yeah. So in your carpet is visibly dirty. It’s not dirty. It’s like absolutely filthy. Our process really goes down deep and pulled all the gunk out of the bottom and is able to get it out. So it’s kind of impressive.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah, and I think it’s kind of nice to if you’re a homeowner, I think a lot of times you make the big mistake of only doing that when we’re getting ready to move. And I think people like how often do you think people should be cleaning their carpets?

SCOTT: 
Oh, this is this is such a great question. So really, it’s based on two things. One, how good of a vacuum mirror? Are you? Yeah. So you know, I don’t I don’t know how many how many people you guys have in your families at home.

ATTILIO: 
Adrienne, would you got like three kids and nine pets?

ADRIENNE: 
Nine pets.

I’ve got a dog. And then the three cats, but two of them are outside the time. Yeah. And the three kids are teenagers. So like she is more like six because they’re like super messy. Yeah.

SCOTT: 
So you’re like me, I’ve got six people in the house. Right. So what the manufacturers are telling us is you should vacuum once a day, or I’m sorry, once a week for a person in your home in your high traffic areas. Yeah. So so for you and me. Adrienne, we’re gonna click we’re gonna vacuum six times a week. Yeah. Wow. How realistic is that?

ADRIENNE: 
Not at all? No.

ATTILIO: 
That’s why leaders come in every day that no

ADRIENNE: 
that’s why I don’t have carpet in my house. I’ve got I ripped it all out. And I just got the area rug. Yeah. And then you know, the travertine tile and then the vinyl plank? Well, I

ATTILIO: 
think a lot of people like the solid surfaces on the first floor, but they like the carpet on the stairs and second floor.

ADRIENNE: 
I just didn’t like the carpet anywhere because of my kids and pets. Yeah, she’s rubberized

ATTILIO: 
material for home.

SCOTT: 
Yeah, if we have time, I want to, I want to come back to that thought real quick. But yeah, but as far as like, how, if you’re a really good vacuumer you’re gonna go You’re gonna do great. Maybe you need us. Maybe you need us come out and clean every 18 months or four months. Yeah. But if you’re like me, I vacuum about once a week. Maybe it’s probably one of my kids is job’s done about halfway.

ATTILIO: 
You’re doing the air quotes. We? Yeah. Okay.

SCOTT:
So for me, for me, I get it cleaned every nine months. Yeah. So it’s really based on how good is your vacuuming practices? How many people do you have in the house? Yeah. So if that if that makes sense.

ATTILIO: 
I guarantee. I guarantee you. There’s people listening to us right now. They haven’t done it in years. And they need to call and make an appointment with you guys. And

ADRIENNE: 
then then set a calendar invite to have it done. Every nine months. Yeah. Or like if you’re super messy. Every six months?

ATTILIO: 
Yeah. Yeah. A lot of people come like December, January. Seems like Hawaii. We like to have our house clean for the new year.

SCOTT: 
Yeah, that’s super common. We get crazy busy. November, December. The new year starts us off. A little bit of a spring cleaning bump. But yeah, we’re about to go into the absolute busiest season for cleaners in general, for sure.

ADRIENNE: 
Do you guys, do you guys have any, any specials, any special sales, anything coming up that our listeners should be aware of?

SCOTT: 
Oh, you know what we always do? I don’t have my calendar in front of me. But but I’ll, I’ll tell you one right now. So yeah, month of September. We’re doing what we can to help Maui. So right now we’re doing a free room of carpet. And the way we’re doing it is if you donate I listened to your show, and you guys are always talking about like donate money. Donate stuff, we feel the same way. So we’ve kind of put up with American Red Cross, we have a link and if you go there and you donate $50 We’re gonna take a free room of carpet we’re gonna take a room carpet off the invoice Nice nice. For us a room carpet is $55 so I realized it’s not it’s not like it’s free. I get it. It’s more of a pass through but you’re helping Maui and we’re we’re getting to do a free room for you. So it’s a win win all the things that’s going on. Yeah, win win

ATTILIO: 
folks listen up to we need I am running for the council the office of clean carpets for Oahu my platform is stop the crunchy carpets. No more you know I’m elected every there’ll be a whole there’ll be a turkey and no crunchy carpets and every home on Oahu. Call Zerorez you gotta get because you know, I Scott I’m thinking figured it out. But we don’t put we don’t wear shoes in the house. So right away. We can tell if you got like icky carpets and then you know, I mean we go to people’s houses, they’re like, oh, leave your shoes on. We’re like, Oh, thank you. That awkward situation of like,

ADRIENNE: 
oh, especially if you’re not wearing socks.

ATTILIO: 
Like my pet peeve is I don’t like feeling stuff sticking to my feet and that’s that’s Hawaii that’s our culture. We take the shoes off. But the carpet is another piece of furniture because you go Thanksgiving. God I least five connect attacks. They’re laying on the carpet. We’re laying on the furniture. Does this Hawaii style so clean carpets is super important to us. People on Oahu away in Hawaii. I have in our culture. I

SCOTT: 
think so. Yeah. Because here’s the thing is like you’ve heard this right. Hey, we just had the carpets cleaned. Just take your slippers off. Yeah. But then But then you walk across crunch and what what’s in your head is I just gotta clean and every time I hear crunch or feel crunch all these chemicals. You know, they got rid of the dirt. They gave you a bunch of chemicals. Congratulations, you’ve wasted your money.

ATTILIO: 
Your carpet feels like a teenager with a number 19 hair gel in their hair.

SCOTT: 
Can I go back to one of your points? Yeah, go ahead. I thought I thought I thought you made a great point. Adrienne on replacing I pulled out all my carpet, right? Can I tell you one thing that’s maybe a negative on that a little bit? Just a hair is carpets the biggest filter in the house. So when we have things like, you know, molds and mildews or spores or dander, all these allergens, we’ve actually proven over decades of research. That carpet helps people that have allergies and asthma, less attacks.

ATTILIO: 
Nice. It is yeah,

SCOTT: 
you have to have clean carpet because if it’s dirty it’s like a dirty filter right yeah and you guys understand that better than anybody because you’re in the in the housing world right you got to have a clean filter to have clean air but you got to have clean rugs and you got to have clean carpet to have clean air in the house and and houses that take out all the carpet actually become these almost almost like triggers for people with asthma and allergies. So I know the common sense thought is get rid of the carpet because I have an allergy issue

ADRIENNE: 
really an unclean just keep it clean.

ATTILIO: 
Well

SCOTT: 
literally decades of research has gone into that and yeah, just keep it clean.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah and taking your shoes off before you go in the house. I know the research has shown you reducing the debris and even pesticides because we have we walked on pesticides on unknowingly outside that your you reduce tracking them into your home by a whole pile. So not only is it a cultural thing, but it’s good for your house. The other thing too with the the carpets is just that’s that’s the thing in Hawaii, people like we were we there’s a high probability that someone’s barefoot in there. They’re there and we’re not like Mr. Rogers where we change our shoes or anything. Or some people are on our cardigan sweater. So well actually, you know, wait, I have hardwood floors on the bottom floor. But I have my indoor slippers. You are like Mr. Rogers with your indoor slippers. My indoor Scott slippers is all nice and pristine. And then my older ones is all like It’s like paper thin. You know, you got the Scots they seem to last forever. But they’re like paper thin. I can almost read through my Scott’s. But I won’t give them up yet because they feel good on my feet. So anyway, so that’s Oh, the other thing, Scott. And you probably already know this, but we learned this from the carpet manufacturers that if you clean it more often the carpet lasts longer. Right?

SCOTT: 
Oh, yes. Well, if you clean it, right, yeah, yes, that’s a that’s a big key because there are wrong ways to clean. So hot water extraction is the method that all the manufacturers are big on. If you’re not rinsing with hot water, which is the Zerorez process, then you are going to make that carpet lasts longer with that process, doing it with other methods. Not it’s not that they’re it’s not that they’re terrible. I don’t want to poopoo on anybody here, but but there are methods that it’s cheaper for people to get into the business. So that’s kind of why they do it. And most homeowners don’t recognize the difference. They just know, carpet cleaners or carpet cleaners or carpet cleaners. And it’s really inaccurate. So one of the things with was the Zerorez to kind of bring it back to us is we’re Carpet and Rug Institute certified. We’re IICRC certified. These are things that nobody really cares about. Again, me is the the weird guy who’s passionate about this. We do a lot of training and a lot of schooling to make sure that we’re doing it right. And the manufacturers are proving us.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah, the other thing I wanted to throw in there was that the when the when we already talked Oh, this is what it was in the seller’s disclosure which all homeowners are required to fill out. There is a question there. I mean, sorry. In the purchase contract track, there is a section in there on cleaning and it does quote unquote say professional carpet cleaning. And going to the Safeway and getting the Rug Doctor does not count is not professional cleaning. And if you’re selling a home that’ll get kicked back and then we’re gonna have to go rushing brings the residents you can close on your home or face withholdings on that sale. One of the

SCOTT: 
worst days of my life was renting a Rug Doctor. Yeah. And I’m not even joking. I

ATTILIO: 
knew that we’ve been going to therapy for the last 10 years because of that.

ADRIENNE: 
So what happened with the Rug Doctor?

SCOTT: 
It took it honestly, I had one room. This was the insanity on this right? I had one room of carpet in my house. It took me five and a half hours to clean it Wow. All day.

ATTILIO: 
You see the thing, the thing fill up? Oh, it’s dirty. Then you go again, it fills up. It’s still dirty. It fills the reservoir here. Is dirty Actually

SCOTT: 
what it was? Yeah. And I probably spent like 80 bucks on the rental. And for that for that one room, I probably would have spent 100 bucks to have someone else come and do it. Yeah. So it didn’t save me any money and I lost an entire day. I met a guy about two years ago who we were doing kind of a home show with booth and he came up and and his wife he was dragged by his wife, which was kind of funny, and his wife prop to the booth and said, Tell them what you did. And it was exact scenario we’re talking about. We’re selling the house. He rented a Rug Doctor. He ended up getting the chemical in his eye from the Rug Doctor. Oh, and they went to the ER. She goes and she goes I told him to hire Zerorez Yeah, he told me he could do it himself. And she was like $1,600 later

ATTILIO: 
Wow. And now I have cataracts. Oh no, I should have hired so he still can

ADRIENNE: 
he still See?

SCOTT: 
Yeah, he had, he had a bandage on his eye and he said he’s fine. But there was a chemical burn. Again, not trying to like poopoo on a process here,

ADRIENNE:
but just hire the professionals. That’s what we recommend the chemicals they use are not safe. Yeah. So like as far as the time because you know, we’re talking about the Rug Doctor and taking all day when you guys come in there to do like, let’s just say it’s, you know, like, three bedrooms worth of carpet, a stair and the stairs, two bath home. Yeah, like, what’s the what’s the time that we’re looking at as far as right to take?

SCOTT: 
Oh, an hour and a half, maybe maybe two hours total? Let’s let’s say there isn’t any kind of like extensive pet issues that need to be taken care of. And it’s just general soiling? Yeah, hour and a half, two hours. Drive time for something like that is about four hours. If it’s heavy soil, maybe it extends as far as eight hours of drivetime. So you’re going to be dry by the end of the night. Yeah, it’s not going to be one of those things where it’s wet for two or three days. Gotcha. I know that’s kind of common. People have definitely experienced that. But yeah, I got one system.

ATTILIO:
So humid here. Yeah. Yeah. So awesome. Well, just like in anything, it’s all good things must come to the end. We’re coming to the end of our show. Was there anything else? Any other questions? Or maybe murder scenes that you cleaned up? They were pretty interesting. No, I’m just kidding. The any interesting stories that about

ADRIENNE: 
one minute share that you could share in 60 seconds or less? Yeah.

SCOTT: 
All of my stories are highly inappropriate. Worried. If I share some of you know, I’ll give you one. Okay. So we got to have so I’m a I trained technicians. That’s what I’ve done for decades, right. And I’m taking a new technician into a home. And one of the things we teach them about is when their spots and stains the things you got to kind of use your senses get down and look at it and maybe touch it. Is it is it sticky? Is it tacky? Is it is it crunchy? Where is it in the home? These are going to give you detailed of the stains and how we’re going to get them out. Right. What I didn’t tell him was when you’re in someone’s bedroom, don’t touch everything. Yeah. So I’m in there with a I’m in there with a customer and she’s kind of laying out some of the things and he’s done. They’re touching things. And there’s just kind of a no touch zone around beds. And I didn’t get to him in time that he was touching stuff. So if people are imaginary, or have this imagination, you can kind of tell what’s going on. That was a good story. We got to come back to the group and teach everybody there’s things you touch on things you don’t touch.

ATTILIO: 
And you just you’ll know the difference when you’re doing a slow motion dive like a hand grenade rolled into the room.

SCOTT: 
Oh actually the homeowner was the one that did it she went NO NO NO NO NO and then he was already

ATTILIO: 
yeah well thanks so much for that people please book call them up book an appointment is we’re coming to the you know, we’re getting our mattresses done beat the crowd and yeah, get your own clean for the new year for all those parties. No crunchy carpets.

ADRIENNE: 
Thank you, Scott.

SCOTT: 
Thank you guys,

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