Why Floor Reflectivity Matters for Your Warehouse Flooring

The fin­ish you choose for your ware­house floors can have a big­ger impact on your bot­tom line than you might at first real­ize. Indeed, floor pro­tec­tion and dura­bil­i­ty aren’t the only ben­e­fits gained by seal­ing your floors with high-qual­i­ty coat­ings. Opt­ing for a glossy floor fin­ish can increase safe­ty, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and ener­gy effi­cien­cy in your ware­house. Let’s fur­ther reflect on these three key rea­sons floor reflec­tiv­i­ty mat­ters for your ware­house floor­ing.

Three Ben­e­fits of Floor Reflec­tiv­i­ty for Your Ware­house Flooring

Improved Vis­i­bil­i­ty and Safety

Work­ing in a ware­house comes with cer­tain risks. Lad­ders, high-pow­ered equip­ment, and heavy objects can all result in acci­dents and injuries. These occu­pa­tion­al haz­ards are exac­er­bat­ed in poor­ly-lit, hard-to-see areas. Sim­ply put, the dark­er your ware­house, the less safe it is for every­one inside. Con­verse­ly, bet­ter vis­i­bil­i­ty equals improved safe­ty, help­ing peo­ple avoid obsta­cles and nav­i­gate spaces with lit­tle trou­ble. Floors with high Light Reflectance Val­ues (LRV) (e.g., an epoxy-coat­ed or pol­ished con­crete floor) nat­u­ral­ly bright­en up spaces by allow­ing light to bounce around sur­faces rather than get absorbed and dulled. A material’s LRV is rep­re­sent­ed by a num­ber between 0 and 100, 0 mean­ing zero light reflec­tion (or total absorp­tion) and 100 mean­ing com­plete reflec­tiv­i­ty (noth­ing reach­es an LRV of 100, but qual­i­ty mir­rors come close at around 90 – 95).

Boost­ed Morale and Productivity

While too much light can become grat­ing, bright spaces tend to improve one’s mood, where­as dark­er spaces can make one feel gloomy and tired. No mat­ter how much a par­tic­u­lar employ­ee loves their job, work­ing day after day in a grim set­ting will take its toll, ulti­mate­ly reduc­ing morale and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. Keep­ing your ware­house bright with high­ly reflec­tive floor­ing nat­u­ral­ly improves morale across the board, which in turn keeps pro­duc­tiv­i­ty lev­els high. A reflec­tive floor is far from the only fac­tor that increas­es morale and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, but it cer­tain­ly makes a dif­fer­ence in these regards.

Ener­gy Savings

It takes a lot of elec­tric­i­ty to light up a ware­house, espe­cial­ly if yours runs ²⁴⁄₇ or close to it. There’s no way around some of these ener­gy costs, but there are also a num­ber of ways to reduce your elec­tri­cal bill. Switch­ing to ener­gy-effi­cient light­bulbs like LEDs and installing auto­mat­ed/­mo­tion-sen­si­tive light switch­es is a good start. Updat­ing your indus­tri­al floor­ing with high-LRV coat­ings is anoth­er cost-sav­ing step. After all, the more reflec­tive your floors are, the less ener­gy is required to ful­ly light your ware­house. Floor coat­ings with LRVs between 60 and 70 are ide­al, reflect­ing enough light to sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduce ener­gy out­put with­out over­whelm­ing the eye. Qual­i­ty con­crete pol­ish­ing can increase a floor’s LRV to about 70.

Shin­ing a Light on Your Ware­house Flooring

When it’s time to ren­o­vate your warehouse’s floors, reflec­tiv­i­ty might not be top of mind. How­ev­er, mak­ing adjust­ments to your floors that increase their LRV can great­ly improve work­er safe­ty, morale, and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, all while sav­ing your busi­ness ener­gy costs. At Kaloutas, our con­crete pol­ish­ing con­trac­tors and floor­ing experts work close­ly with each client to opti­mize sched­ules and min­i­mize down­time. We’re com­mit­ted to safe­ty, effi­cien­cy, and long-last­ing results in every­thing we do.

To learn more about us and all that we do, con­tact us online or give us a call at 978−532−1414 today!