Excellent experiences
TC Facilities Management’s (TCFM) Fiona Ellingham shares how one of the UK’s leading FM companies provides cleaning to many leading brands, and provides a great customer experience across thousands of sites.
Contract cleaners are often referred to as a silent army who provide a welcoming, tidy and safe site as part of the overall customer experience.
Whilst there are many aspects to consider, there are four key considerations to be taken into account to ensure that the customer’s experience is a great one:
Schedule of cleaning
A main issue for any site is weighing up the level of cleaning that’s required. Deciding which is right for your business is an important factor worth careful consideration from the perspective of being able to maintain a brand’s reputation. Much will depend on level of footfall, the size of the site, operating hours and the type of business you are.
In retail stores where food produce or general groceries are sold, a ‘clean as you go’ approach would be advisable, meaning a need for on-site cleaners who can respond and react to any spillages. In larger sites with customer toilets, adding on-site housekeepers will enable these to be kept fresh and clean by adopting protocols such as hourly checks of colleague and customer toilets to ensure all are satisfied with cleanliness. Displaying a log sheet showing toilets are checked hourly is just one simple method to provide visitors with confidence about hygiene standards.
The other option is to adopt an ‘out of hours’ or ‘night- time cleaning’ approach, where a thorough clean can be completed after business hours.
Equipment
All sites are diverse spaces and each different area has distinct cleaning requirements. To cope with high footfall, choosing the most efficient materials and products for the job is essential.
Choosing a contractor who has good relationships with equipment partners is important as, in TCFM’s experience, those partners have been able to work with their customers to help design equipment to address individual challenges they are facing.
Consolidation through the use of multi-purpose cleaning products is the most cost-effective and efficient choice for retailers. Particularly when sites are in prime locations on the high street and back-of-house storage spaces are often only small, consolidating cleaning products means that less space is required to stock them.
Training and colleague engagement
A number of contracts with some of the largest brands in the UK were recently secured. Making sure new staff members know how to use the equipment and chemicals
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is paramount. It's not just doing that in line with any health and safety legislation, it's also ensuring that merchandise and assets are protected.
TCFM use a training record system to help track and maintain each colleague’s training completion. This includes training on the use of equipment used within the store, which can include scrubber dryers or effective use of a janitor’s trolley.
Sustainability
Society is now more conscious than ever about the impact the production of goods has on the environment, with many engaging with brands who have commitment to safeguarding it. With this in mind, many brands have adopted operational requirements that they in turn insist their cleaning contract adopt.
Over recent years, TCFM has adopted a number of cleaning approaches that use limited chemicals and water, partnering with equipment suppliers who have strong environmental credentials.
Whichever approach is adopted, reviewing the cleaning standards on a regular basis is important and helps businesses find the right solution for them.
Conclusion
Few things are more important than the first impression on customers — whether they’re new or returning. Working together with your cleaning contractor, like TCFM, will enable any business to help create the ideal customer experience, one that customers will appreciate and from which your business will benefit.
www.tcfm.co.uk
twitter.com/TomoCleaning
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