How to Maintain Commercial Floors During the Winter

In many areas of the world, bad weather conditions – such as excessive rain, snow, and hail – pose continuous challenges, and that includes maintenance challenges. Specifically? Floor care. It’s easy to forget, but floors can take a beating when the weather gets colder because of all the damaging substances people bring in on their shoes. For example, melted snow mixed with residual salt can leave marks that are difficult to clean. Plus, floors that aren’t well maintained can also be downright dangerous to walk on. Yes, falling and hurting yourself is just as easy to do inside as it is outside. Thankfully, there are steps you can take to make sure your floors stay safe and clean. Let’s dive right in.

Reseal Your Floors

Snow and ice (and the salt used to get rid of them) can leave the floors inside your facility looking run-down, and they can also wear down your floors faster. So how do you prevent this from happening? That’s simple. To prepare your facility for colder months, reseal all your hard floors. It’s best to do this before or after winter. Otherwise, water, humidity, salt, and other contaminants may interfere with the stripping and refinishing processes. Another thing to keep in mind is that cold weather can affect a floor’s finish, potentially resulting in cracking and peeling.
If you missed this step, though, it’s not the end of the world. Just leave it for the spring. What you can do while you wait is hire professionals to scrub the floor and recoat it. This will give your old floors the protective layer of finish they need to stay in good shape.

Buy an Entrance Mat System

Once you’ve resealed the floors in your facility, it’s time to buy a good entrance mat system. Having mats will help protect your floors from water and dirt, thereby cutting down on your facility’s maintenance needs. There are many different types of professional mats designed with facilities in mind, so be sure to shop around and find ones that work best for your needs. The so-called scraper mat is a great option to have in your entryway because it can remove 90% of all dirt on shoes and also dry them. You should also consider putting a wiper mat in front of other doorways that have a lot of traffic inside. This mat works on dry shoes only, but it’s useful because it collects any leftover dirt that the scraper mat may have missed.

Bottom line: Mats are an effective way to maintain your facility’s floors during the winter months. But, keep in mind that setting them up can be time-consuming. Since they are bigger than “normal” mats, you might need to relocate some items from your facility, so consider bringing in professionals to handle the setup for you. Just like you need professionals to relocate heavy equipment, you may also need to call in professionals to set up heavy, extra-large mats too.

Regularly Use Floor Neutralizer

Even great mat systems can’t save your facility from all water, dirt, and salt residue. Long, severe winters can leave your floors in rough shape. Contaminants like the ones mentioned above will first leave behind whitish marks all over your facility and make it look dirty. If left unchecked, though, they can slowly but surely start “eating away” at your floors and seriously damage them. Once stains, holes, and scratches are visible, there’s nothing left to do but replace the floors.

And we don’t have to tell you that replacing floors is expensive and time-consuming. That’s why prevention is so important. One effective floor care tip is to use high-quality floor neutralizers regularly during the colder months. A floor neutralizer works better than other floor cleaners because it’s specifically designed to tackle things like salt residue, soaps, chemicals, etc. At the same time, though, it’s gentle on your floors – no matter the material. For best results, start using floor neutralizers in the fall to get a headstart. Try incorporating this with your other fall maintenance, and you’ll see a difference in how your floors look in the years to come. It’s better to prevent damage before it happens than to have to go back and fix it later on, and floors are no different.

Clean on a Regular Basis

In order to have clean, safe floors for everyone who works at or visits your facility, do all the previously mentioned things regularly. But that’s not all. It may sound basic, but it’s worth mentioning: To effectively care for your facility’s floors during the winter, make sure they get thoroughly cleaned often. For example, floors should be vacuumed and mopped after every shift. And, depending on the type of facility you have, your floors may also need to be steamed once a day. Another thing to consider is that, in order to have clean floors, your equipment should also be cleaned on a regular basis.

In short, maintaining a clean, safe facility necessarily involves making sure your floors are ready for heavy traffic and potentially-damaging substances like salt, dirt, and ice. If taking care of this maintenance yourself makes your head spin, though, consider hiring a cleaning service to do it for you. Professional cleaners are trained to take care of all cleaning-related tasks and ensure you’re left with spotless and safe floors – no matter the season.