The selection and placement of your commercial entryway matting is far more important than many cleaning professionals and building engineers realize. Installing the right entryway matting system in the right location can significantly help keep a building cleaner and healthier, as well as reducing the overall cleaning and maintenance costs throughout the entire building.
One of the most common mistakes that facility managers make when buying entryway matting is specifying mats that are simply too small to effectively trap soil and moisture. Using mats that are too small for their intended job is like trying to dry yourself off with a face cloth after a shower – it’s going to get soaked and stop working long before you’re finished!  The Carpet and Rug Institute recommends at least 12 to 15 feet of entryway matting at office building entrances, and 20 to 25 feet for grocery stores or hospitals.
But you might be thinking, “My building doesn’t have 20 feet of space inside my lobby for matting!” That’s okay! An ideal entryway matting system actually starts outside your building. Scraper matting can do the initial “heavy lifting” of cleaning foot traffic outside your entrance – choosing something with flow-through capability (like Cobra) helps keep the mat working well even through the nastiest of weather. Inside a vestibule, an indoor scraper mat like Kermode is a great choice. Once fully inside your building, finish the job with a dryer/scraper like Grizzly FX to absorb the last bit of water and dirt from incoming traffic.
One way to determine if the proper entryway matting has been installed is to see how they are wearing over time. If there is excessive wear after a relatively short time, or if the area just beyond the mat is wet and dirty in inclement weather, a different type of matting and/or more matting might be necessary. In general, more is better when it comes to matting. The more coverage you have, the cleaner and healthier the facility will be.
