5 Steps to Cleaner Floors for Your Facility
Floor maintenance solutions from Staples
Jeffrey Beland
Senior Facilities Marketing Manager
Clean and well-maintained floors are the foundation of any facility.
That's why smart and experienced facility managers make their floors a
priority.
Establishing and following a floor maintenance plan is the key, and
we've put together five steps to help you create one that's right for
your facility.
- Identify your floors' purpose.
- Determine your budget and worker resources.
- Identify the optimal floor finish.
- Acquire the necessary floor maintenance equipment.
- Attend to the particular maintenance needs of carpet.
Step 1: Identify Your Floor's Purpose
Start by asking a simple question. "What purpose should your floors
serve?"
Here's the obvious answer:
"My floors' purpose is to serve as a surface on which building occupants
can walk and work."
But your floors can serve a much higher purpose than that. For starters,
your floors can
optimize occupant and visitor health and safety, namely by minimizing the risk of slips and falls.
Next, your floors can also
enhance your facility's appearance. People
tend to notice the condition and appearance of floors, and they place
judgment - both good and bad - on how clean and shiny those floors are on
any given day.
A third purpose that's gaining traction with many facility managers is
improving sustainability practices. Your
floors are the largest surface with which workers and visitors will come
into contact. If your facility has sustainability goals, maintaining your
floors with eco-friendly products and procedures will go a long way to
achieving them. You can decide on multiple purposes for your floors.
However, it's helpful to give priority to one of them. Doing so now will
help you make some tougher decisions later.
Step 2: Determine Your Budget and Worker Resources
Next, consider how much money you can spend and the number of cleaning staff members you can allocate for floor maintenance. There's an excellent reason for this step:
Floor maintenance can take up to 80% of your workers' time and cleaning budget.
Estimate how much of your annual operating budget you can devote to
floor cleaning products and equipment. Then evaluate your cleaning
staff to figure out who should be assigned to floor maintenance
(because floors aren't the only area of your facilities that require
attention). Our recommendation is to assign your most productive
cleaning staff team members to floor maintenance.
Along with your floors' purpose that you identified in Step 1, here's
why you need to have an accurate idea of the staff members and dollars
available: your floor maintenance plan will be focused on the finish
on your floors, not the actual floor type.
The floor finish you apply to your commercial floors will ultimately
determine how often your janitorial staff will need to complete
maintenance procedures.
Step 3: Identify the Optimal Finish (That Best Fits Your Floor Purpose, Budget and Staff)
Floor finish protects and extends the life of the floor. The finish leaves
an attractive appearance and provides a slip-resistant surface. Think of
the floor finish like a football player's helmet - he won't survive well
out there without protection. And neither will your floors. It's that
simple.
However, choosing the right floor finish for your facilities is more
complex due to the factors you'll need to consider:
The Four Factors of Choosing a Floor Finish
- Floor Type
- Gloss/Shine Quality
- Maintenance Requirements
- Sustainability
The 1st Finish Factor: Floor Type
Resilient flooring is an umbrella term for materials that aren't as hard as natural stone and hardwood but also not soft like carpet. When you press into a resilient floor, it gives a little and then returns to its normal shape. Resilient floor materials include:
| Vinyl Composition Tile (VCT) | Lots of colors and patterns available |
|---|---|
| Luxury Vinyl Tile (LVT) | Can look like wood, stone or ceramic |
| Vinyl Asbestos Tile (VAT) | Mostly floors built prior to 1980 |
| Asphalt Asbestos Tile | In really older floors built 1920 - 1960 |
| Sheet Vinyl Flooring | Similar to LVT |
| Linoleum | Not the same as vinyl flooring |
| Rubber | Commonly used on sports floors |
| Cork | A "green" biodegradable flooring option |
Non-resilient flooring is commonly referred to as "hard surface" flooring. It's made up of organic, inflexible and hard surfaced flooring materials, including:
| Natural Stone | Many types need a sealant to prevent staining |
|---|---|
| Wood | Tends to absorb liquid, which can cause warping and swelling |
| Brick | - |
| Ceramic Tile | Water resistant, but it can chip |
| Concrete | - |
The 2nd Finish Factor: Gloss/Shine Quality
How shiny do you want your floors to be? The answer to that question will influence the finish you choose. A floor's appearance varies on the amount of luster or sheen produced when the light reflects the surface at a certain angle. There's even an industry scale for it:
The Floor Finish Shine Scale
High gloss: The shiniest and most reflective finish
Semi-gloss: Moderate amount of shine that is reflective just enough to be noticeable
Satin: Medium to low sheen and serves as the median point of sheen levels
Matte: Very low sheen level that has virtually no light reflection
The floor finish you apply to your commercial floors will ultimately determine how often your janitorial staff will need to complete maintenance procedures.
The 3rd Finish Factor: Maintenance Requirements
This is where knowing the number of cleaning staff members and budget you have for floor care (Step 2) comes into play. All floor finishes require some maintenance, such as vacuuming and mopping. Maximum floor appearance is achieved when the floor coating is clean and smooth. Over time, soils penetrate the protective coating and cause the film to become rough, less slip resistant and less reflective.
Some floor finishes need a lot more TLC, such as frequent, high-speed burnishing to maintain their shine and strength. Other floor finishes require no buffing or burnishing at all.
So, back to Step 2. How many people can you assign to your floors? Can your budget include the purchase and/or upkeep of a floor buffer and burnisher (or multiple machines if your floor space requires it)?.
Here's a good rule of thumb to follow
The greater the shine on the finish, the more staff and budget you'll need.
If you have a limited staff and budget to maintain a building with heavy foot traffic, your best bet is to go with a harder, more durable (but less shiny) finish to reduce the amount of labor required to maintain it.
The 4th Finish Factor: Sustainability
If you're an FM working in an industry with green certification requirements, the floor finish you choose can help your company meet those green standards. For brevity's sake, we'll skip the deep science lesson on what constitutes a green floor finish versus a non-green option. Here's the most important thing to know:
"Green floor finishes do not contain zinc."
Zinc is one of many metal ions used by floor furnish manufacturers to create big networks of crosslinked polymer chains that help to make floors more durable. But excessive levels of zinc can be harmful to the environment and to people.
So, if you want a floor finish that satisfies green mandates and even helps your company obtain LEED™ certification, choose one that's certified by Green Seal® or SaferChoice®. They don't contain zinc or any heavy metals but are still formulated to shine as brilliantly and last as long as conventional finishes.