C.H.E.S.S. ARTICLE - CLEANLINESS

Better tenant satisfaction starts in the washroom

Believe it or not, your washrooms can make or break the relationship with your tenants. And, because tenants are your top priority, that makes washrooms one of the most important aspects of your building¹. Unfortunately washrooms are among the top three generators of tenant complaints. In fact, one U.S. building tenant states, “I tend to judge the office building by how well kept the bathrooms are during the course of a day. If the bathrooms aren’t maintained as the day progresses, then I think building management is not doing a good job and I often call building facilities with a complaint."²

What’s in a smell?

One recent study found that users define a "clean" restroom as sanitary, organized, healthy, smelling good and looking good³. While it can be easier to maintain visual cleanliness, foul odours are a more insidious problem to tackle.

Your sense of smell tends to tell you things that your other senses don’t. In fact, when your nose picks up bad smells, it alerts the brain to potential danger, such as food that could make us sick or chemicals that could harm us⁴. In the case of odour in the washroom, it warns us of a lack of hygiene that may have you coming in contact with illness-causing germs.

Here are some tips on how to keep your washrooms smelling great, keeping your tenants satisfied and maintaining or even increasing your building’s occupancy rate.

Sniffing out your options

Eliminate the source

Create a thorough, comprehensive washroom cleaning schedule, and have workers mop floors with a disinfectant that contains deodorizers or an enzyme cleaner. They should also clean the insides of urinals and commodes once a day at the least⁵.

While a cleaning schedule is easier said than done, some odours are easier to eliminate. When floor drains dry out, they sometimes can let foul sewer gas escape into the washroom. Have a worker pour a cup of water down the drain every month, and that can help reduce the chances of sewer gas escaping.⁶

Improve air quality

Install an air-care system in your washroom to supply fresh or filtered (particulate-free) air to the washroom. There are also ozone generation, UV, plasma and photo-catalytic options⁷.

Add some fragrance

fragrances is a quick, easy way to mask odours and have your washroom smelling great. However, you may want to use fragrances with caution; some employees don't like them - and up to 64% of managers said employees have told them they are sensitive to fragrances.⁸

Trap the odours

A new type of odour control removes odours from the air by absorbing and locking them up. Placed near the source of odours in the stall and by urinals, this new technology uses layers of different materials to remove a wide range of odours (including the ammonia smell from urine), to help keep restrooms naturally smelling clean and fresh.⁹

Removing odours – the first step to big washroom changes

Addressing odours is a good place to start, since the top complaint among users is that the office washroom "really smells bad".10 Once you know what to look for and how to target it, it’s easier for improve on what your washroom needs the most. Use this guide to identify the problem areas, and your tenants will be in for a more pleasant washroom experience.

You can also take the online C.H.E.S.S. Test to assess your how you measure up in washroom management and have a Kimberly-Clark Professional* representative give you a FREE consultation to identify areas of opportunity.

Reference:

1. Challenger Omnibus Topline Report, Slide 8
2. TBD : AO-Washroom-TENANT ARTICLE with REFERENCES-v2.doc
3. KCP Cue Frame study (NEED REFERENCE LANGUAGE)
4. Ah, Sweet Skunk! Why We Like or Dislike What We Smell http://www.dana.org/Cerebrum/Default.aspx?id=39206
5. www.cleanlink.com/hs/article/How-To-Identify-The-Source-Of-Foul-Odors--17198
6. www.facilitiesnet.com/maintenanceoperations/article/Restroom-Remedies-Keeping-Odors-Under-Control-Facility-Management-Maintenance-Operations-Feature--1733#
7. Odor control FAQ, slide 15
8. http://www.cleanlink.com/sm/article/Bad-Smells-Leave-Bad-Impressions--17646
9. Washroom Odor Control System Performance Data, June 2015
10. “Survey Finds Increasing Public Restroom Dissatisfaction.” Medical Construction and Design. N.p., 18 Sept. 2013. Web. 04 Mar. 2014

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