Chlorine Dioxide: The Secret Weapon for Car Odor Removal and Auto Detailing in Edmonton

Chlorine Dioxide: The Secret Weapon for Car Odor Removal and Auto Detailing in Edmonton

Today we’re joined by Stephane Gautron, founder of Starfleet Detailing in Edmonton, to dive into a topic many vehicle owners overlook: professional car odor removal. From stubborn pet smells to cigarette smoke and mystery funk, we talk about the most effective ways to restore your vehicle’s interior and protect its value. If you’re in Edmonton and tired of masking odors with air fresheners, you’re going to want to hear this.

All right, so Stephane, thank you so much for being available for us today. Question number one: Stephane, what are the most common causes of lingering vehicle odors that you’ve seen here in Edmonton?

Well, I would say the most common would be smoke, food, pets, and mildew. We do get some mildew as well; those would probably be the most common. Yeah, especially with winter wetness—people, you know, bring slush and whatever into the vehicle, then it melts, dries, gets musty and moldy. That causes a lot of smell.

Wet Conditions Causes A Lot of Smells in Your Car

I’m sure you guys see a lot of that.

Yeah, we actually—one that people don’t really talk about is if you bring it to a detailer and they don’t dry your mat or your carpets, and then they put mats back on. By the springtime they wonder why their car stinks, and it’s mildew that’s been growing underneath their rubber mats because whoever detailed their vehicle didn’t dry it out properly.

Yeah, and that’s a nasty smell. Every time it gets wet it brings new smells to the car, makes it smell even worse.

That’s right.

Number two: what’s the difference between professional car odor removal and the DIY sprays or air fresheners that people pick up at the store?

Well, when you use a deodorizer you’re just masking over the smell; you’re not really getting rid of it. So when you get it done professionally you’ll be using—there are a few options, and I’ll tell you the ones we’ve been using up to now. So now we’ve got something that’s the best market, but before we would use enzymes to break down the bacteria and to break down food, and then we would use ozone to get rid of smell. But both of these are not 100 percent effective for various reasons. Some of it is just the time—you don’t have enough time on your hands. So if you’re using enzymes it’s got to sit there for a while for it to actually do its job. And ozone works well in the air, but it doesn’t penetrate very deep, so it doesn’t really sink into the seats or into the backing of the carpet; it’s kind of superficial. If you had several days it would be more effective, but like I said, usually we don’t have that much time. So those two popular ways of getting rid of odor are just not the best way to do it, and we do have something better.

How Does Starfleet Detailing Get Rid of Bad Smells in Vehicles?

What do you guys use to get rid of the smells?

So now we’re using chlorine dioxide. It’s something relatively new on the market—it’s been around probably for a couple decades, but its application was limited. It was mostly used for—MX basically, or for when it was viral, something serious; then they would use it. They would tent, like for example, you could tent a house, seal it well, put that in there as a gas, and it would kill whatever’s in there. But now, because they understand it more and with their testing and whatnot, we can actually use it in a smaller application like a car. So that’s what we’re using.

All right, awesome.

Can Smoke Smells Ever Be Truly Eliminated From Cars?

Now let’s talk about smoke and pet odors. Can smoke and pet odors ever be fully removed from a vehicle, or is it more about just managing the smell?

Nope, with this product it’s 100 percent guaranteed. It gets rid of anything. Let me explain to you a little bit more about chlorine dioxide. Sure. It’s considered a bactericidal, sporicidal, and fungicidal oxidizing agent, so it kills with oxygen. It’s two-and-a-half times more effective than chlorine, and chlorine, we know, is very effective—it kills bacteria and odor and mold—but this is two-and-a-half times more effective, so it’s really the best on the market and it’s not as harmful as chlorine.

Okay, so my product—when it does that reaction, sorry—when it does that reaction, basically chlorine dioxide penetrates the cell wall and reacts with the amino acids in the cytoplasm, which in essence kills the microorganism, and the by-product of this is just chloride, which is harmless to humans. So, as far as I’m concerned, it’s basically the best thing out there to get rid of odors, which are caused by bacteria.

Wow, that sounds amazing.

Starfleet Detailing’s Odor Removal Process is Unique

Walk us through the odor removal process. What makes Starfleet Detailing’s approach so effective?

Well, number one, we’re the only ones in Edmonton that use that, as far as detailing is concerned. If you go to the companies that do a lot of remediation for things like blood crime scenes, I think that’s what they use as well, but they’re way more expensive because their job is to treat things that people don’t want to deal with. Who wants to go into a crime scene where there’s blood everywhere and whatnot? People are scared of that. So it’s been used more in that approach, but now there’s a company in Ontario that has been able to refine it more for detailing applications when it comes to serious stuff, and that’s what we do. We do police vehicles; we get rid of blood; we get rid of drugs for the government. We use those chemicals to help us do that.

We are not the same as your regular detailer—we are the problem solver. Companies come to us to solve problems for them. As far as I’m concerned, we’re kind of like the last option out there for them. We pride ourselves in being able to attack any type of problem that someone may have with their vehicle. Now, that doesn’t mean that we don’t do regular detailing, but it does mean that we’re a one-stop shop. If you come to us, we’re not going to turn you away; we’re going to get rid of your problem. Most customers are really, really happy with us because we take on some big shoulders in being able to do whatever they need.

Yeah, I think that would be especially helpful for company vehicles and even personal vehicles that want to get rid of that cannabis smell from their car.

Yeah.

We do get calls from car-rental companies—sometimes they rent long-term, so they’ll have the vehicle for a month or two months, six months; I’ve seen that happen—and it comes back and it just reeks, and that smell will not go away on its own. So they bring it to us, we treat it, and everything’s good—back to rental.

Some Vehicle Odors Are Harder to Remove Than Others

Are there any specific types of vehicles—like ride-share, family vans, fleet trucks—that you see needing odor removal more often?

Well, it really depends. For example, if it’s a family van and they’re full of kids and they’ve got food everywhere, and then that food starts to fester, and they’ve got dogs on top of that—just, it becomes, you know, it’s very disgusting to say the least. And of course that’s going to be a different problem than a truck that’s just been smoked in. Now it’s a nicotine problem and it’s mostly odor and nicotine removal. We can treat any of those problems; that’s not an issue.

When it comes to the odor-removal service, how long does it usually take, and how soon can someone in Edmonton get booked in with you and your team?

We are entering our high season, so right now we are booked—I’d probably say till next week; we’re definitely booked into the next week. We are training a new detailer because we’re getting very busy. That being said, we are flexible. If we have somebody that has an emergency—like if a limo calls us and somebody was sick in there—we’re going to move things around to help them so they can get back to work right away. That’s the nice thing about the type of work that we do. We mostly do work with commercial companies; yes, they’re pressing, but they have some flexibility because a lot of times it’s routine maintenance, so they are flexible. And when it comes to an emergency—“We need this done right away”—we don’t just focus on commercial; we will do any type of vehicle. If it’s just a residential customer and they had issues with their dog, they call us up and we’ll also help them out.

Starfleet Detailing Can Come To You – Wherever You Are!

The nice thing about your business in particular—Starfleet Detailing—is it is mobile. You guys go to the homeowner’s place, and you are licensed and insured to go to commercial vehicle places. So you can go to trucking companies, cab companies, the RCMP, and different places like that and do the service right on the spot; they don’t have to come to you.

That’s right. But we also have a shop. I got a call this morning from one company and they thought they had to bring it to us, and I said, “No, no. We can go to you. We’re self-contained. If you don’t have room in your shop, we’ll work outside, as long as we have a place that’s clean—it’s not just dirt. If it’s dry, sure, we can work around that.” But you know how it is in Edmonton—the weather is so unpredictable—so if we could have a pad and we know that our tools are not going to get all muddy, we go to them. That’s really the best way to do it, because think about all the time lost driving vehicles back and forth to any shop, even if it’s close by. I mean, that’s loss of money if you have to pay one of your employees to drive two people—two cars—drop one off, bring the employee back. That’s such a big waste of time—probably 20 percent of the cost right there that you’re paying because you’re getting your vehicle worked on. So by us going to you, we have a flat rate and then a fuel surcharge depending on how far you are from our shop, which starts at five bucks—up to fifteen or twenty for the fuel surcharge. We do go up to an hour outside of town, so it’s very convenient for the customer.

Yeah, that’s pretty fair.

Getting back to the odor-removal service—does a vehicle owner have to be concerned about the odors returning, or is there any kind of spot treatment you do?

They shouldn’t. It treats whatever problem they have on hand. Now, if you have a dog and it smells like dog, we’ll treat it—the odor will be gone. But if the dog goes back in and keeps dirtying it, it’ll come back. We treat from the moment backward, not forward, so it’s not like the chemical stays there and keeps treating the odor; it’ll come back if you keep attacking it with the problem, which would be, for example, the dog. As far as effectiveness, it’s 100 percent effective—it’s not 99.9; it’s 100. This product will kill anything—COVID, any type of virus, bacteria—because it honestly kills any cell.

Getting Rid of Bacteria and Viruses

Sounds like pretty dangerous stuff too. Do you guys have to wear protective gear with this?

Yeah, for sure. We have to wear protective gear: a respirator, and we like to wear the face shield. We gear up as biohazard, and we’ll treat the vehicle, but it flashes off fairly quickly, so it’s not something that’s lingering in your car and will keep being dangerous. Within an hour it’s not dangerous anymore. When we’re talking about dangerous—like, for example, if you put it on your skin, it acts almost like peroxide. You know how you put peroxide on your skin and it turns white? The peroxide oxidizes your cells, so it turns white. But is it dangerous—are you going to get something? No, you’re not; you’re just basically killing that first layer. That’s kind of what this does as well: it oxidizes, it kills the cell.

The biggest issue is breathing it in; it’s not going to scar your lungs, it’s just going to irritate them, and obviously you don’t want to irritate your lungs. But it’s not something that’s going to cause cancer or anything like that; it doesn’t linger, it doesn’t get absorbed into your body. It flashes off pretty quick. That’s why it’s such an effective bacteria and virus killer—it treats the problem very quickly and it’s not an ongoing hazard.

Awesome. Love it.

Have you ever had an odor-removal case where you were surprised by the before and after?

Anybody that has an odor problem—it’s bad. They don’t come to us for a light, little odor; it’s always, “I’ve tried everything, and it’s driving me nuts.” That’s the problem we come across. So there is a major difference when we’re done. Once you’re done, you go back in and it just smells fresh. It’s hard to describe; it doesn’t have a bleach smell, it just has an odor-free smell. It’s kind of hard to describe because we’re always smelling something—you go in there and it smells like nothing. It’s weird, but it’s a good weird. After that, if you want to put your little deodorizer in and you want it to smell like perfume, go ahead—it’s not going to affect future smells.

That’s great.

I think that’s a very remarkable product, and anybody could benefit from it because, you know, cars—we’re in them a lot, especially for commuting back and forth, or if it’s your office you want that thing smelling fresh. Even people who do a lot of driving—big trucks—they’re living in that thing. They’re sweating in it, they’re using a bathroom sometimes, they’ve got a kitchen in there, a microwave, and it could just make your truck smell a whole lot better, especially because they have a sleeper. You can clean the sleeper and make it smell fresher and better—all of that.

Why Is Odor Removal Important For Vehicle Owners?

So let’s break it down for someone in Edmonton who’s on the fence: why is investing in car odor removal worth it, especially before selling or trading in their vehicle?

For sure—if you’re going to be selling your vehicle, you should get a detail. Number one rule: get a detail. If there’s a lingering odor, it’s worth investing. It’s not a whole lot of money. A lot of people think, “Oh, it’s kind of expensive.” It’s not. Sometimes you don’t realize—you think, “I’m going to buy some air freshener and tire for five bucks, ten bucks,” so they think, “That’s what it should cost to get the odor remediated in your car.” But these are—not dangerous chemicals, but they are chemicals that you, first of all, cannot find at the end; it’s only for professionals because there are some warnings you have to abide by.

So for a product that’s only available through professional means, that has some dangers to it—minimal, but somewhat dangerous as a lung irritant—yeah, you’ve got to know what you’re doing. And number two, it takes time: you’ve got to bring the car, we treat it, we air it out, you come pick it up. And that’s if a car is clean. Now, if the car is dirty, you’re not going to try to sanitize the dirt, so you’ve got to remove all the grime and grease and food. You should detail it first and then we address the odors.

If you’re trying to sell your car—when they analyze the value of your car, or even if you’re just selling it to an individual—if they go in there and all they smell is strawberries and flowers and it’s overwhelming, nauseating, they’re like, “Okay, they’re trying to mask something.” But if they go into your car and it’s clean and it doesn’t stink, they think, “Okay, this guy takes care of his car.” In their mind that car suddenly goes up in value, so now they’re willing to give more for your vehicle.

Call Starfleet Detailing for More Details!

If it’s your dealership and you’re trying to sell a vehicle and it’s got some weird odor, you’re not going to be able to sell it for as much money as you’d like. Either way, it’s a win-win situation because you’re not paying a whole lot. Our packages start—if you get it detailed and you’re trying to treat the odor problem—it’s $125 more. Think about that: you’re investing $125 more that could result in you getting thousands more for your vehicle. That’s a good investment. And yes, if you buy a vehicle and it smells, you can barter it down, then come to us and we’ll treat it and get rid of the smell for you. So it’s a win-win.

Right on. I love it. Well, thanks so much for spending some time and really giving us some great information on the odor-removal service that you guys have just recently started. I’m looking forward to seeing how that can help, not only myself but other people in Edmonton, get some odor removal—getting rid of that smoke smell or pet odors from their car. Food as well—man, so many people eat in their car and it stinks! Hopefully it can help many more Edmontonians get rid of those awful, nasty odors from their car.

Thanks so much, and I guess we’ll talk to you next time.

All right, thanks.