I'm here to sing the praises of Anti-Icky-Poo, which touts itself -- accurately, as I have found -- as "the absolute best odor eliminator on the market." No connection to the company, just a very satisfied customer, and here's my sorry story (with a happy ending):
In the rush to evacuate for Superstorm Sandy, I threw a lot of stuff in the trunk of the car, including two gallons of milk in plastic containers. Unfortunately, only one of those gallons got removed from the trunk when we reached our destination. The other -- unbeknownst to me until it was too late -- remained in the trunk for several weeks. The milk, of course, turned sour, and it seeped out and lodged itself in the fabric of the trunk lining. The smell of rancid milk permeated the car -- it was awful! Nothing I tried -- various rug cleaners, solid and liquid; having the trunk shampooed by an auto detailer; etc., etc. -- nothing worked. More than a month later, the smell was still as bad as ever -- made worse by the chemical smell of rug cleaners on top of the stench of rancid milk. Now, if you Google get smell of sour milk out of upholstery, you will find a lot of advice -- a lot of it contradictory. The one thing that consistently got good reports was Anti-Icky-Poo, so I decided to give it a try. I sprang for a quart spray bottle of the P-Bath pre-treatment (an acid neutralizer which nicely removed the rug-cleaner odor) and a quart spray bottle of unscented Anti-Icky-Poo.
On the first application I used half of each bottle, mostly on the trunk (including the doughnut cavity and the doughnut itself), but also on the seat upholstery, which seemed to have absorbed some of the bad smell. Like magic, it reduced the odor from intolerable to barely noticeable. A few days later I applied the other half of each bottle, and it knocked out the odor completely! It was amazing.
There are two lessons here:
1) Do not, under any circumstances, leave milk in your car!
2) If, for any reason, you fail to observe Lesson #1, get Anti-Icky-Poo!
In the rush to evacuate for Superstorm Sandy, I threw a lot of stuff in the trunk of the car, including two gallons of milk in plastic containers. Unfortunately, only one of those gallons got removed from the trunk when we reached our destination. The other -- unbeknownst to me until it was too late -- remained in the trunk for several weeks. The milk, of course, turned sour, and it seeped out and lodged itself in the fabric of the trunk lining. The smell of rancid milk permeated the car -- it was awful! Nothing I tried -- various rug cleaners, solid and liquid; having the trunk shampooed by an auto detailer; etc., etc. -- nothing worked. More than a month later, the smell was still as bad as ever -- made worse by the chemical smell of rug cleaners on top of the stench of rancid milk. Now, if you Google get smell of sour milk out of upholstery, you will find a lot of advice -- a lot of it contradictory. The one thing that consistently got good reports was Anti-Icky-Poo, so I decided to give it a try. I sprang for a quart spray bottle of the P-Bath pre-treatment (an acid neutralizer which nicely removed the rug-cleaner odor) and a quart spray bottle of unscented Anti-Icky-Poo.
On the first application I used half of each bottle, mostly on the trunk (including the doughnut cavity and the doughnut itself), but also on the seat upholstery, which seemed to have absorbed some of the bad smell. Like magic, it reduced the odor from intolerable to barely noticeable. A few days later I applied the other half of each bottle, and it knocked out the odor completely! It was amazing.
There are two lessons here:
1) Do not, under any circumstances, leave milk in your car!
2) If, for any reason, you fail to observe Lesson #1, get Anti-Icky-Poo!
In fact, I discovered that it's advisable to wear rubber gloves when working with these products, especially the P-Bath. It does tend to wear down any skin it comes into contact with. The car upholstery was fine, though.
