If you own an office building, then you probably already employ a janitorial service to keep the office space as clean as possible. Unfortunately, an office can become quite congested with water, snow, salt, and other debris during the day. If your cleaning staff works at night to reduce disruption in the office, then you will be responsible for cleaning up the mess on the floors while the office is open. Keep reading to learn about a few tips that will help you to keep your floors clean and dry.

Place Entrance Mats

The vast majority of the moisture and salt that enters your office building in the winter will be dragged in on employee boots and shoes. The best way to deal with this mess is to invest in mats along the entranceway of your building. The mats should stretch between 20 and 40 feet along main hallways and 10 or 20 feet across secondary hallways to properly protect carpets and wood floors in the office. This way, they are likely to collect moisture and debris before shoes come into contact with office flooring materials. 

Mats placed directly inside the door should be scraper mat varieties. The best mats are ones made from nitrile rubber that resist deterioration from oil, fuel, and other contaminants that may get on the material. Pick out mats with raised rubber designs to scrape shoes, and find varieties with hollow channels if you have dozens of employees entering your building in the morning. This will help to collect all of the water and other debris that come off the shoes. Also, if you are concerned about slipping incidents near your door, purchase mats that have a silicone carbide grit across the top to help increase traction.

Rubber scraper mats should be placed along the first few feet of the entrance and carpeted mats should line the rest of the entrance. The mats should be made out of tough synthetic materials like nylon or polyester and backed with rubber. The top of the carpeting will collect dirt, water, and salt, and the rubber bottom will keep the debris from reaching the floor. It will also keep the mat from slipping. Keep in mind that these mats will retain a great deal of water over the course of several days. This means they need to be swapped out regularly. Work with a rental company who supplies the mats and have them changed about every 5 to 7 days before they are saturated to the point that they are no longer able to collect any more moisture or debris. The rental business will secure new mats for you and clean the previous ones off-site so they can be utilized again once they are dry. 

Use Salt Neutralizing Cleaners

While mats can cut down on the amount of moisture and salt that comes into contact with your hard floors and carpets, it will not completely eliminate the debris. This means you will need to clean your floors before salt can cause erosion or etching issues. For hard surfaces, make sure to use a salt neutralizing or salt dissolving solution to prevent floor damage. Look for a cleaning product at your local home store that is made to clean salt from different types of surfaces. These products will typically have active ingredients like hydrogen chloride or sulfamic acid. Place about two cups of the cleaning material and a gallon or two of water in a bucket and use your wet mop to clean the floors. You should do this about once a week to reduce damage concerns.

For carpeted areas, it is best to vacuum the carpets at least every other day to remove salt and moisture. Also, sprinkle a dry cleaning product across the carpets about once every week or two. A product that contains a cellulose-based material is best. This cleaning material will absorb moisture and pull debris up from the bottom of the carpet so it can be easily vacuumed away. If you do not want to purchase a dedicated dry cleaning product for your carpets, or if you need to release moisture daily, then plain baking soda can help draw out moisture and debris as well. 

For more information and tips, talk with your janitorial company or other companies in the area, such as Vancouver Executive Building Maintenance Inc..