Easy to Clean Restaurant Floors

A tremendous part of owning or running a restaurant is cleaning it. Federal and State laws insist on cleanliness, but most owners or managers of a restaurant also have a personal desire to make sure their restaurant is the epitome of a sanitary restaurant. Those flooring salespeople who visit restaurants which are in need of new flooring will tell you that the first question posed to them is “Is this an easy to clean restaurant flooring?”

Chances are that the flooring salesperson will tell this restaurant manager or owner about the propensities and benefits of having totally seamless flooring. The salesperson will emphasize how anything that is not seamless poses a losing battle with cleanliness, and that the reasons are that food and dirty water will gain access to the subfloor, and then it festers there. The salesperson will guide the owner/manager toward further understanding what goes on underneath that flooring, pointing out that it means that yeast, bacteria, microbes and even viruses are replicating, not to mention mold, as well as fungus. Thus eventually there exists a very nasty and foul odor emanating from the flooring which then pervades throughout the entire restaurant. The owner/manager usually takes this one step further and murmurs something to the effect: “then my chances of receiving a passing inspection grade on my restaurant go down the toilet!”

Granted no respectable salesperson would have used such graphic language to describe what happens next, but aside from the language used, the owner/manager was totally correct in their dire assumption. After all it has happened time and again to all manner of restaurants, some even 5 star restaurants, and some without a star to their name.

The salesperson would next undoubtedly explain that even the best MMA (methyl methacrylate) flooring can experience this since it takes only a tiny point of entry such as perhaps a miniscule pinhole for the entire sub flooring in any restaurant kitchen to be fully compromised. Hopefully by this point, the salesperson will introduce Silikal into the stew pot, informing the owner/manager that the full kitchen floor always must be fully and strictly seamless to adequately prevent insects, bacterial and mold infestation hazards.

The salesperson can then point out that Silikal does not utilize MMA for easy to clean restaurant flooring, but actually utilizes its own trademarked enhanced MMA, and that’s a whole different kettle of fish. Reiterating how easy their Silikal restaurant flooring will be to clean all the while showing the owner/manager pictures of other restaurants whose Silikal floors gleam with such a clean feeling, what should happen next is that the owner/manager will undoubtedly want to know where to sign.

Pity the poor salesperson who has not even had a chance to talk about how long the flooring will last, or how it contains absolutely no VOCs, since all that can be done at this point is point to where the signature should be affixed. Too bad for the salesperson, right?

Colorful and Functional Flooring Choices for Architects

What is an architect other than a designer who designs buildings from the ground up? Included in that design is often the architect’s vision of what the floor should not only look like but how serviceable that flooring will be. Thus divergent architectural flooring choices are often needed and desired by an architect. Often an architect wishes to combine texture with colors yet still maintain the absolute functionality of the floor, and that’s where architectural flooring choices are of extreme importance.

Following the designs of the walls and where they will go, floors are then the leading component considered in any interior design scheme. This is because they offer the architect a tremendous platform to develop their vision and feel of whatever environment they are creating. Imagine a retail store selling expensive clothing. Having a fashionable floor may actually give that certain store a very competitive edge – for it becomes part of the fashionable ambiance desired by the store owner. Having that kind of floor may even impress the consumer, and because it is a fashionable environment, chances are that it might even encourage someone to make a purchase.

For example, today the techniques of making flooring appear to be of imported marble will lead someone to think it is marble when it is actually a product of tremendous technology. There are several beautiful natural stone textures available, including river rock flooring. Few seamless flooring systems are able to provide increased cleanability, low maintenance, wear resistance, and yet offer outstanding aesthetics. It is surprising that any flooring preserves the look it had when it was brand new, and retain that look over a tremendous amount of time without needing to ever be replaced.

What is interesting is that no matter the requirements of any consumer, be it that retail store, an entire shopping mall, or even a veterinary office, there is a perfect solution for any of those because the architectural flooring choices have grown at a staggering rate. The technical properties of flooring systems have also grown, so that color availability or appearance can be easily met.

There are, however only a few companies that most architects have confidence in to deliver this kind of flooring, and that is Silikal. First, Silikal has a ton of different flooring products that seem to fit into the designs that architects envision. Those products are not only beautiful in their own right, but also can be laid quickly and efficiently. In addition, the Silikal products are “green” which is important to the construction industry, as LEED points are available for using Silikal. However, the biggest reason for utilizing Silikal flooring is its longevity. Architects realize that Silikal is their only choice for flooring that can potentially be there just as long as their buildings.

Flooring That’s Dependable

There are a myriad of ways that flooring can be dependable. For instance if the floor has got to be unable to generate static such as in a control room, then the users who work in that control room need to be able to depend that the floor will be totally able to form its continuous plane of conductivity. Those who work instead somewhere that requires containment area flooring will have to depend on that flooring to never allow whatever it must contain to seep out and perhaps contaminate areas that cannot be allowed to be so contaminated. Taking this one step further, imagine how dependable flooring must be in a decontamination area, where the tiniest of leaks can carry contaminants to even the countryside and thus to its residents.

On the other hand dependable flooring may also be totally necessary in an automobile repair bay. After all mechanics handle all manner of slippery items from grease to oil, and other slippery substances that could spell a slip and fall and cause harm to the mechanics. Thus, an auto repair bay surely needs dependable flooring.

Have you ever seen the damage that forklifts can make to flooring? Often it is because the forklifts were somehow abused, but when forklifts must work over cracked flooring for example, that could easily cause a number of mishaps that could be prevented if the floor was dependable. Often these mishaps can even cause damage to the forklift itself if a piece of flooring causes axle damage or if it is thrown into the engine, then it can also cause the engine to fail, sometimes even resulting in a fire. Thus it is important that flooring be extremely dependable where forklifts are utilized.

Also dependable flooring is necessary no matter where utilized if the general public is going to be allowed on that floor. The amount of suits won by people who tripped and fell due to damaged flooring in a retail establishment alone is flabbergasting.

Now consider flooring in a kitchen utilized by a large restaurant. If that flooring is allowed to crack and peel or is not cleansed properly, it is a recipe for not only suits but also disease caused by the infiltration of dirty water under flooring such as tiles that fester and can cause a myriad of problems for the restaurant. We will not even mention the restaurant possibly not receiving a clean bill of health for its unreliability in being able to clean its floors properly.

It has often been said by the consumers who utilize Silikal flooring that it is the most reliable and dependable flooring possible. The first reason of course is that Silikal flooring is monolithic, thus never allows anything to seep under or through it, and finally because Silikal flooring lasts and lasts no matter what kind of punishment it has to take. This is why it is considered potentially lifetime flooring as well as incredibly reliable and dependable.

Flooring For Various Types Of Commercial Buildings

Commercial buildings include various structures such as stores, manufacturing facilities, offices, schools and even jails. Thus, when it comes to making a choice for any flooring for commercial buildings, one finds that there is frequently a variability of elements that will have to be considered. These range from the cost of the materials that one is thinking of having put down to considering how well suited the chosen materials will be to one’s particular settings and what applications one is going to choose. Because commercial buildings have higher traffic levels than many other buildings, it is also of dire importance to establish the product’s durability as well as its strength, and to also look carefully at any required maintenance procedures the flooring will need.

Often commercial building flooring is made of modern materials such as MMA, which is the shortened name of methyl methacrylate, thus it’s so much easier to say MMA. The problem with MMA is though that it naturally creates small openings after it has been laid down as flooring. These small openings are pinhole sized, thus not easy to see at all. The biggest snag is that even though they are pinhole sized, they will still allow all manner of dirty water inside those tiny holes of the flooring which then seep under the flooring, and eventually there is a large quandary being presented. This large problem consists of disagreeable odors emanating from the floor, tiny pieces of flooring coming up, and diseases and mold beginning to prosper under the MMA flooring. When scientists located this pinhole problem they began to investigate how MMA could be scientifically altered so that the pinholes could no longer appear after the MMA was put down.

These scientists were currently employed by a flooring company in Germany by the name of Silikal. The work was not easy, in fact they tried any number of additives to the MMA to solve this awful drawback to MMA, and at last they had it! Now, when you read up about Silikal, you will notice that they do not solely use MMA, but instead use the protected product they call their enhanced MMA. Silikal is the only flooring company that uses enhanced MMA, thus they are the only flooring company to not have those tiny pinholes eventually appear in their flooring to cause those embarrassing and possibly very expensive problems.

Thus, while the majority of buildings already have concrete flooring, having Silikal put upon that concrete is actually a low cost outlet for any commercial building flooring. The best news though is that when using Silikal its propensity for being long lasting is greater than any other kind of flooring. Silikal commercial building flooring can potentially last a lifetime, which is certainly very encouraging to anyone needing commercial building flooring.

Eco-Friendly, Non-Toxic, Tough Floor Coatings

Mention tough floor coatings to someone and they might nod and say “Oh, yeah urethane floor coatings.” However if you truly seek tough floor coatings, what is known as urethane concrete is certainly not the best product for a tough floor coating. Urethane floor coatings are not long lasting at all, therefore can they really be called tough?

The answer is very unlikely, as urethane floor coatings are not as long lasting as some other tough floor coatings. Then too, polyurethane floor coatings can be very dangerous. The inhalation of its fumes as it is being installed can make people rather sick. And even further along, when the product is supposedly totally dry, it can give off what is known in the flooring industry as off gassing. What that means is that those sensitive to its toxins may have physical effects from it that are very unpleasant. So, all in all those seeking tough floor coatings need to stay away from polyurethanes.

One further disadvantage to the use of polyurethanes is that the product is possibly going to yellow. Let’s face it yellowed urethane is not a pleasant sight, especially in a commercial establishment. Partly because so many people used urethane floor coatings in the past, urethane has definitely received a bad name all around. It is unfortunate that so many did use it and now wonder what to do with their flooring. Many did not know, meaning that they were totally unaware that urethane floor coatings are considered very old technology, and that there are so many better products out there than urethane.

One of those better products out there is Silikal. Silikal is definitely not a urethane product. When Silikal is installed, no one needs to leave the building or leave for three blocks around due to the fumes if they are sensitive to such odors. Silikal is a cement floor covering reactive resin system, and that makes all the difference in the world.

Back to not having to evacuate people when Silikal is installed, few realize that Silikal is completely VOC free and it contains absolutely no solvents. VOCs are volatile organic compounds, and thus it is important to utilize flooring that has no VOCs. It is part of Silikal’s green solution to make sure there are no VOCs in its products. You see, Silikal is definitely environmentally friendly.

By saying that Silikal contains no solvents, do keep in mind what solvents are. For instance other coatings may contain acetone, glycol ethers, ethyl acetate, and perhaps aliphatic hydrocarbons. None of these are considered good for inhalation by humans.

And so also keep in mind that there are no stronger or tougher floor coatings than Silikal. Silikal is beginning to be considered as potentially lasting a lifetime, because often Silikal will outlive a property it has been installed within!