# Berber Carpet, Olefin/PET vs. Nylon/Wool **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 17, 2006, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/berber-carpet-olefin-pet-vs-nylon-wool/376846 "2006-10-17T22:27:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Can\_Handle\_the\_Truth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Can\_Handle\_the\_Truth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Can_Handle_the_Truth)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2006, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/berber-carpet-olefin-pet-vs-nylon-wool/376846/1 "2006-10-17T22:27:11Z")
My mom is about to buy new carpet for her house; she’s considering buying a berber carpet made of PET. I found [this website](http://www.carpetdyeing.com/berber.html) which says “Whatever you do, don’t buy berber made of Olefin or PET, because it’s crap. Buy nylon or wool instead.” I’m always suspicious of websites like that, but I don’t want to take any chances. If anyone knows the straight dope on this issue, please share it! Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2006, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/berber-carpet-olefin-pet-vs-nylon-wool/376846/2 "2006-10-17T22:51:45Z")
I only have one experience with “Berber” and it’s secondhand. A friend had it installed in a new house and she had every problem mentioned on the site, except for the fire. Maybe she had the Olefin stuff. She said it took her old carpet ten years to look that bad. ---
**Author:** ![myskepticsight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/cc9497/32.png) [@myskepticsight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/myskepticsight)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2006, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/berber-carpet-olefin-pet-vs-nylon-wool/376846/3 "2006-10-17T23:03:57Z")
My parents got berber in the house about…mmmm…8 years ago? It must not be the cheap crap because it looks great still. They rent a steam cleaner once a year and the stuff still looks pretty new. But they also don’t have pets, and us kids were past the age of spilling Kool-Aid and stuff when it was installed, so no real stains ever happened. I’ve never noticed it unraveling anywhere or anything. If it was, my dad would have noticed by now because he spends a lot of time laying on the floor (with his back issues he prefers it sometimes). I like it because our old carpet looked so worn. Matted. The berber in the house now doesn’t show the little raised pattern as much as it used to but it doesn’t look old because of it, just looks like there really wasn’t one. ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2006, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/berber-carpet-olefin-pet-vs-nylon-wool/376846/4 "2006-10-17T23:08:57Z")
My only contribution is to note that berber is awful if you have small pets whose nails are small enough to catch in the little loops. My pugs’ nails were forever catching in it. ---
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2006, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/berber-carpet-olefin-pet-vs-nylon-wool/376846/5 "2006-10-18T10:41:35Z")
There was berber in a house we bought a few years ago, and we hated it. It’s scratchy on your feet, gets runs everywhere, and if something happens to a section of it, you can’t replace just that section like you can w/conventional carpet, you have to replace the whole room. We replaced it (it was only a year old, and looked like complete crap) with frize, which is very soft and forgiving, and loved it.