How to Clean Stubborn Pet Hair Off Upholstery

We have a large golden retriever and five indoor cats…

…so I think you can safely say that all of our rugs and upholstered furniture exist in a state of being partially shredded from cat claws, and they all sport a beautiful sheen of pet wool. At all times. Always. Forever. No escaping the carpet of pet fur everyone in the Freeman home.

Because we are crazy cat people, we naturally try to stay away from fabric in our décor. We don’t have ANY carpets in our house, just hardwood, tile, and one single wool throw rug. We have no curtains in our home, just blinds. And most of our sofas and chairs are wood and leather. And so on and so on.

I have one upholstered armchair in my office, and two wingback upholstered chairs in our dining room, and when it comes to cleaning house, I try to just pretend these chairs don’t exist. I give them the obligatory once over with the vacuum, followed by a generous dousing with Fabreeze, and then call it a day, because anyone with pets knows that pet hair in upholstery is no frikkin joke.

So when I saw this new cleaning tool, Bump It Off by the Goddess of Gadgets, (CLICK HERE to check out the website), I thought I would give it a try.

A quick description of Bump It Off from the website:

Bump it Off is a reusable silicone sleeve that fits on your hand in four different configurations, enabling you to concentrate scrubbing power in the palm of your hand or on your fingertips. With gentle silicone bristles on one side and smooth bumps on the other, Bump it Off has endless cleaning applications in every room of your home!

Laundry — Use with laundry liquid or stain remover to loosen and lift stains. Gentle on fabrics!

Kitchen — Safely scrub dishes, pots and pans without scratching. Won’t mildew like kitchen sponges!

Pet — Groom pets, and lift pet hair off upholstered furniture like magic!

Body — Cleans, massages and exfoliates in the shower or bath, and kids love it too!

• Easy to clean, dishwasher safe (top rack)
• 100% silicone
• Resists stains and odors

I was primarily interested in this cleaning sleeve for cleaning pet upholstery and grooming my pets, but was interested in giving the other suggested uses a try as well. So I spent the last week giving each of the uses a go!

My Thoughts on the Bump It Off Cleaning Sleeve

First and foremost, this gadget is worth every penny simply for its ability to pull hair out of upholstery. No joke!

The accepted housewife wisdom of the day states that clean pet fur out of upholstery you:

1. Lightly dampen the upholstery with water or a cleaning solution.
2. Use a sponge or a gloved hand and rub at the fur, praying for loose strands to obey your sheer will and come out of the woven fabric.
3. Clean up with a vacuum.

Now here is why I love this Bump It Off sleeve. The texture of this little gadget does NOT require step one above.. no cleaning solution or dampness required The texture of the silicon alone is able to pull out fur that is embedded deep into the fibers of upholstery, pulling hairs that are only exposed a teeny tiny bit out onto the surface.

And it doesnt just pull it out to be rubbed back in like sponges have a tendency to do.. once the hairs are out, the rubbing friction of the silicon sleeve rolls the hair in on itself into a little matted wool ball so that it does not get back into the fabric.

You do not even need step three above, because there is no repetitive wringing out of a damn sponge or wiping off hair gloved hands to clean as you go… you just rub it all to the surface and then you can just pick up the wads of hair balls after rubbing. Of course, if you DO combine the gentle rubbing of the silicon sleeve with a vacuum that can pick up dirt and other fun particles that exist in a house with kids and pets, then you have an upholstery cleaning match made in heaven!

Starting out with a small section of fabric. You can see there are some pet hairs here and there..

The more you rub, the more pet hair just appears, being pulled out of the fabric! MAGIC! Gross, gross, magic.

After cleaning a 6 inch by 6 inch patch of upholstery that doesn’t even look THAT hairy, you will basically have enough cat fur to knit your own sweater, or make your own mini felted pets. Also, note the shredded upholstery because everything you own is a cats nail sharpener. EVERYTHING.

So for pet hair alone, these are pretty much the brass knuckles of cleaning. Only, ya know, silicon.

Now I really, really, REALLY wanted my cats to love these as a grooming tool. But they just did not know what to think! Even as they kind of seemed to enjoy the strokes, they were still weary and giving us that WTF look that cats excel in.

We plan on chasing the cats around and cornering them with silicon sleeve rubbing loves for a couple more weeks before we throw in the towel and go back to boring old hand only pets. But in the meantime, check out this look on Yen Sids face when we tried introducing him to the Bump It Off:

Wraith is the only cat who appears doesnt act like we are trying to shave him when using the Bump It Off..

We also tried using the sleeve to assist with cleaning the counters, and cleaning dishes, but I wasn’t too thrilled with the action there. It was nice to gently scrub stubborn food off without having to squeeze out a sponge that’s soaking up food particles, so I can definitely see it having a place in the kitchen sink, but I think it still really shines as an upholstery and laundry aid.

Lastly, using the Bump It Off in the shower for massage or exfoliation… definitely a good use! Unlike bath sponges or brushes, the silicon sleeve wont harbor bacteria, and are great for rubbing body lotions on cellulite prone areas.

But still… I gotta come back to how awesome this is for pets and pet upholstery! (One track mind much, no? haha) Seriously happy to have this gadget in my cleaning closet now. Overall a great project with many uses.

[Disclaimer: There are no affiliate links in this review. I am an independent product reviewer. I only review products I am truly interested in. I don’t accept payment for reviews. The products I take the time to jabber on about are either items I have personally purchased, or the product has been provided for review after me incessantly nagging for a sample. All of my reviews are unbiased regardless of how the item was obtained.]

Interested in learning more about the Bump It Off cleaning sleeve? CLICK HERE to visit the website!