Corn Carpet and Rhino Carpet - What are They Talking About?

Triexta Carpet is the first new carpet fibre to hit the market in 50 years. It’s a great product because it’s durable and the latest incarnations look and feel as good as high-end nylon carpets.

You might be more familiar with Triexta’s brand names, SmartStrand and Ecoplus - you may even know it as “Corn carpet” or “Rhino carpet”.

No, we’re not kidding! So where did the terms Rhino carpet and Corn carpet come from?

Rhino Carpet

Question: What do you get when you put carpet in a rhino enclosure for 2 weeks?

Answer: An awesome story to sell stain-resistant carpet.

Think of the messiest possible environment where carpet is likely to get the most damage. No, it’s not your kid’s bedroom. It’s in an animal enclosure – you were close, though!

SmartStrand carpet manufacturer, Mohawk Industries installed its carpet in the rhinoceros enclosure of the Birmingham Zoo for 2 weeks then had it cleaned. The results were mind-blowing, with the carpet looking like new after a thorough clean.

It was marketing magic, and a great way to sell a product while proving its power. Here’s the Youtube video of their SmartStrand challenge.

To further prove their point, Mohawk Industries ran a Zoo Challenge too, including elephant and camel enclosures in the testing as well. The Mohawk team carpeted the areas, let the animals do their thing for 3 weeks and then cleaned it afterwards. A little gimmicky, but the results are pretty impressive.

Corn Carpet

We’re always looking for ways to help the environment. Did you know that triexta carpet can be engineered with up to 37% corn sucrose? This replaces a large amount of the oil derivative products typically used in synthetic carpet fibres.

Ecoplus Carpet, created by company Godfrey Hirst uses this technology and in doing so, generates 63% less greenhouse gases during the manufacturing process than an equivalent nylon carpet.

Does Ecoplus or SmartStrand carpet have any drawbacks?

While the carpet isn’t made from corn husks (yes, carpet salespeople have misinformed customers about this), it does use renewable energy and less greenhouse gases, reducing your environmental footprint in an impressive way!

While we love this product, we do disagree with Godfrey Hirst’s advice that it just needs to be cleaned with cold water. Godfrey Hirst is actually referring to spot cleaning stains with cold water, but the warranty does require professional cleaning every 18 months.