Running a restaurant means that you have to abide by higher, stricter cleanliness standards. After all, you’re dealing with food and beverages. If prepared in an unclean environment and handled improperly, these can cause food-borne diseases and contamination.
Indeed, it doesn’t matter if the restaurant is in a hotel, an office high-rise, a hospital, or a building all on its own. You need to keep it clean and you need to do it the right way. Here are a few restaurant cleaning tips:
Hire Professional Cleaners
There are certain cleaning responsibilities that your restaurant staff can handle on their own. Wiping and sanitising tables after customers vacate them, mopping small spills, and keeping the paper napkin dispenser filled are just a few of the routine tasks that should be done during business hours.
However, for the more “serious” part of cleaning, it’s best to leave it to the hands of commercial cleaning companies. They’re better-equipped to keep a restaurant in compliance with all food safety, health and safety, and council compliance regulations. Not only do they have the experience, but they also have all the right equipment and supplies to keep things clean and sanitised in a more efficient manner.
What’s more, a commercial cleaning company has a more comprehensive to-do list that covers more than mopping the floors and wiping the counters. These include the following:
- Cleaning, sweeping and mopping the floors
- Polishing the floors, when applicable
- Cleaning and sanitising of bar areas
- Cleaning and sanitising of kitchens and food preparation areas
- Cleaning and sanitising of bathroom areas, including sinks, urinals, and toilets
- Replenishing and supplying of soaps, toilet paper, and other washroom consumables
- Spot cleaning of walls, ledges and skirtings
- Window cleaning
- Cleaning external premises, when applicable
Pay Special Attention to the Kitchen
Restaurants are all about food, food, food. That’s why you need to focus on cleaning the kitchen more than any other area in a restaurant. You should pay special attention to certain parts that you normally wouldn’t clean. These include the handles of pots and pans, the knobs or buttons of ovens and stoves, the handles of refrigerators, and the like.
Small they may be, but these surfaces are a hotbed for transferring germs from one person to another. This can result in contamination, not to mention diseases. You should also replace sponges, scrubbers, and rags when necessary. If these items aren’t due for a replacement yet, make sure to disinfect them properly before and after every use.
Focus on High-Traffic, High-Touch Areas
Outside the kitchen, there are also plenty of high-traffic, high-touch areas that you should disinfect regularly. Some of these include door knobs and handles, particularly the main door and the restroom door.
The cash register, telephones, credit card machines or portable terminals and light switches are also prone to touching, which means they should also be disinfected regularly. Pens and clipboards should also receive the same treatment since these are touched not only by your staff but also your customers.
Disinfect Countertops and Other Hard Surfaces
Things like countertops and tables are more likely to harbour bacteria and viruses since they have a bigger surface area. They also get into contact with more objects, substances, and people, so the risk of cross-contamination is greatly increased.
For disinfection purposes, keep a soft cloth and a bottle of food-grade disinfectant at the ready. Wipe down the surfaces at least twice or thrice a day, making sure that you’re following the usage instructions of the disinfectant to the letter. If there are any spills, make sure to clean them up thoroughly before disinfecting.
Minimise Mobile Phone Usage While At Work
As much as possible, your staff should minimise their smartphone usage while at work. Smartphones are some of the dirtiest objects that people come into contact with every day. Thus, constant usage can easily spread germs around the restaurant and onto the customers.
Make sure that your employees have a safe and secure place to keep their personal belongings, including their phones, while they’re at work. If you prefer, you can give them window hours when they can access and use their phones. However, make sure that they follow hygiene protocols before and after use. It’s also a good idea to provide antibacterial wipes or even a UV steriliser to kill germs quickly.
Keep Cleaning Supplies On-Hand
It doesn’t matter if you hire the best commercial cleaning company. If the people working at your restaurant don’t have a habit of picking up after themselves, the place won’t be as clean as you want it to be. Thus, it’s important to instill a culture of cleanliness within your staff.
One way to do this is to always keep cleaning supplies on-hand and put them where they’re needed. For example, make sure that you always have toilet paper, hand soap, and paper towels in the restrooms. You may also want to place bottles of hand sanitiser near the cash register, as well as the cupboards where you keep dishware and utensils.
Other supplies you might want to keep handy include:
- Bleach
- Food-grade disinfectant
- Disinfectant wipes
- Gloves for food preparation
- Stainless steel cleaner
- Glass cleaner
Your chosen commercial cleaning company can help you keep track of these supplies and ensure that you always have everything on stock. Meanwhile, you should emphasise to your team the importance of cleanliness and how to use products such as bleach and disinfectants to get the best results.
The bottomline is that restaurants need to be spick-and-span for many reasons: health and safety standards, aesthetic appeal, and property maintenance, among others. Hopefully, with these tips and secrets, you can easily maintain the cleanliness of your restaurant.