Make Sure Cleaning Your Facility in on the Schedule.
By Rick Schott Circle the author on Google+
It never ceases to amaze me. We get a call from a past customer that they are ready to trade in their old floor scrubber or sweeper. The customer tells us things like, “The old machine just isn’t getting it done” or “I have decided to get this place clean and keep it clean once and for all.”
While conducting the building survey we always take a look at the old floor scrubber for clues about how we can accomplish the given task better. One of the first things to look at is the hour meter. We want to know how much the machine is being used. It is very typical to find that a machine that is 8 – 10 years old has less than 500 hours on the meter. If you do the math it is easy to determine that the machine is being used less than an hour per week. Worse yet, new floor scrubbers and sweepers are usually run the most the first month or two of their service life. This means that they probably were run very little if at all in the later years.
The answer to this problem is simple: SCHEDULE CLEANING. The cleanest plants that I go to have a set time each day or week that the floor scrubber or sweeper is run. The benefits of doing this are obvious:
**Floor Cleaning gets done if it is scheduled. If the task of scrubbing or sweeping the floor is left to “when you have time” it will not be done frequently enough.
**Cleaning the floor is like every other type of maintenance. If it is done on a regular basis the job is easy. If left until someone complains or worse yet slips and falls, it may take a lot longer.
**Floor cleaning with a sweeper or scrubber is easier if everyone knows that the operator of the equipment will be coming through. Things can be moved out of the way in advance, aisles can be cleared, work areas can be tidied up to make things go quickly. Employees like a clean work area and will generally help facilitate an efficient process if they are given advance notice. If you run a large facility send out an email in advance for a while letting people know that the scrubber will be coming by.
Investing in a floor scrubber or sweeper will only pay off if you make sure the equipment gets used. Habits are formed after about 30 days. Get your company into the habit of having clean safe floors.
The floor care experts at Factory Cleaning Equipment, Inc. would be happy to help you get your program back on track. Just give us a call at 800-793-3790.
By Rick Schott
Circle the author on Google+.