How do you reduce crystal violet staining background on plates? - (Jun/19/2013 )

I'm trying to stain and quantify MSC CFU-Fs using crystal violet, and for the most part, the assay works very well. The issue however is that the crystal violet usually stains the well itself to a significant degree. If this background happened all the time, it wouldn't be a problem, but I often get a random well that does not leave any background stain at all. That makes it very difficult to draw any conclusions from the extracted dye quantification when some wells have background and others don't. Is there any way to reduce or prevent crystal violet background? Washing with water as recommended in every protocol I can find doesn't help at all. Thanks!

If water does not work your can try some other organic agents, e.g. alcohol. But you should try to find suitable substances, altough alcohol might work.