Awesome little machine - if you can get over the price!

My home has generally included some form of stain removing/carpet cleaning device over the past 10 years. With 2 cats, a dog and 2 little children. It has been a necessity. Often the device in my home has been a Bissell. In fact, none of us would have survived the potty training years if it wasn't for the Bissell Spotlifter (I believe these are out of production).

About 6 months ago, I bought the Bissell SpotBot to replace a Bissell Little Green Machine I had that had met its final days. I was hesitant because of the extra cost (at the time about $50 more). I was afraid the extra was just for the gimicks the machine had that would prove to be not so special. But a friend had mentioned she LOVED her SpotBot, so I gave it a whirl. I'm glad I did!

I bought the SpotBot originally to deal with some mishaps my dog was having while on anitbiotics. However, by the time I brought the machine into the house, the mishaps were done and the machine sat in my house for a while in the box. Lucky for the machine - I have a 5 year old daughter. In one of her bouts of independence, she got out some of my old makeup to play with. I didn't really mind until I saw that she had managed to create three large burgundy circles of eye shadow on my off white carpet. You have to love kids.

Now my carpet is not the greatest - we are a military family and our carpet is a hand-me down (as often as we move, it's too expensive to always buy new carpet). The carpet is in bad enough shape that I have every intention of tossing it when we move (I am the 3rd owner of it). But I couldn't live with burgundy circles on my floor. They just stood out too much. So, I pulled out the SpotBot. I figured this was as good a test as any.

The SpotBot is simple enough to use. You fill the one tank with water and cleaner(s) (depends if you choose to use the OXY formula). You place the SpotBot over the stain to be cleaned and then push a button. You can chose between a "Surface Stain" cycle and a "Set Stain" cycle. The first runs 3 minutes, the second runs 6 minutes. I chose to use the Surface Stain cycle and I generally do use that one. Once you have pushed the button, the machine goes to work and you can literally walk away and do something else (just like the ad shows). The machine will beep when it is done running its cycle. What the machine does during the cycle is alternate between spraying solution on the spot, scrubbing it in a circular motion and sucking out the fluids from the carpet.

All I have to say is this thing is awesome! Not only did it remove the makeup - it cleaned the spots down to the original color of the carpet! So much so, I now had 3 very clean spots on my carpet and had to end up taking another throw rug from someone to cover that up. Granted, for the 3 spots, I had to run the machine probably 5-10 times. But only because the spots were bigger than the area the brush cleans. They were fairly large spots - about the size of dinner plates.

Since then I have used and loaned the SpotBot out many times. I have loved the results every time (so have the borrowers)! It does an awesome job! I'll say it again. It even manged to get brown tempra paint out of a carpet in my classroom! Paint that had been there for over a year.

I really only have 3 complaints about this machine. One the brush area could be larger. Although I guess that would make the machine much more cumbersome. And it is simple enough to move it over and run the cycle again. Two, the machine uses a LOT of solution. I went through all the sample solution and the bottle of OXY that I had bought with the machine just cleaning the makeup circles. I used nearly the same amount cleaning the area carpet at our school (in 2 classrooms and it wasn't that many stains). But perhaps all the solution it uses is why it does so well - it is something I'm willing to live with! My last complaint about the machine is the manual cycle. There is a manual brush and cycle that you can opt to use. But from what little I have tried, it's pointless. It doesn't do well at all. This was disappointing to me because the manual brush on my Little Green Machine did so much better. But again, I can live with this.