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I recently sold my old Clio and bought a new Polo.

On my old Clio I had rubber mats on top of the original mats, which were super easy to clean with some water and maybe some scrubbing when they were extra dirty (including mud, beach sand, unidentified slime, etc)

My new Polo has a very different interior style. It's more classy and I'd like to keep it that way, so I don't think rubber mats are the way to go (or maybe they are...).

I'm looking for alternative ways to keep the floor of the car nice and easy to clean while keeping the look of the car as similar as possible to its original style.

JDługosz
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Davide
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2 Answers2

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Tailored floor mats are available for most popular cars in various materials including rubber and carper / velour style.

The beauty of these mats is that they can be removed and cleaned / washed outside of the vehicle. Vacuuming, carpet washing, jet washing, etc will usually return most floor mats to a pristine finish and when they eventually do become worn out, they can simply and inexpensively be replaced.

I would suggest getting the ones which are specifically tailored to your vehicle. The "generic" / universal mats can move around on the floor, curl up and interfere with the operation of the pedals.

We have three Volkswagens, two of which are equipped with tailored rubber mats. I personally prefer these as they are hard wearing and can easily be cleaned. I also have a tip for finishing these; black boot polish. Always brings them up like new.

In our other Volkswagen we have carpet mats which do the job but are now starting to wear and will need replaced soon (they have done over ten years of service). In all of our cars, the carpet under the mats looks brand new.

Also worth considering, you can purchase a tailored "boot mat" to line the boot / trunk floor with from many of the same places as sell the floor mats.

Steve Matthews
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I think you're at cross-purposes here and can't have both easy-to-clean and "classy" at the same time. You've moved upmarket and are not going to have the low maintenance that you get with rubber mats when you have carpet/reed/woven mats. Similarly, you cannot install carpet in your house and expect to have the same maintenance/upkeep/care schedule/techniques that you use for hard floors.

I would not do the mat-on-mat thing you did with your previous car. Most OE mats have attachments that keep them from shifting around, and adding another mat on top can lead to the top mat shifting and interfering with the pedals. Besides that, all you're doing is hiding the mats underneath and there's no benefit to keeping them in the car (other than marginally increasing sound deadening).

I would buy another set of OE mats for your car and use one set as your daily or "bad weather" mats and swap in the nicer, less-worn set when you want the car to look spiffier. Alternately, you can purchase "bad weather" mats to fit your car and only use them when it's rainy/snowy/muddy or when you go to the beach.

Scrappy
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