Building Maintenance

Spring is on the way, and it is now time to think about all the tender love and care your office or home has been missing out on during the cold winter months. Instead of relying on reactive care or fixing a problem when it arises, why not take the initiative and maintain your equipment even while it’s running at its best. This will save you money in the long run, and often you will see immediate financial benefits as well.

Also consider that occupants of the building, whether they be employees, customers, your family, or anyone else, will appreciate being in a space that is safe, clean, and up-to-date. Even beyond financial, health, and safety reasons, don’t forget that the appearance of a building has an effect on people, some who may never even step foot inside the door.

We spoke with local Lincoln experts in building maintenance about important reasons to keep your office, warehouse, home, or any other building running in tip top shape. The benefits of preventative maintenance are many, and in particular, we’d like to highlight three.

Economic Benefits

The first is that maintaining a building will save you money in so many ways. Buildings that are continually maintained are much less likely to need sudden expensive repairs. Buildings that are left unmaintained can begin having problems that create a snowball effect. First, a hole is left unrepaired, leading to a leak in the ceiling which causes mold in the floorboards which weakens the structure of the building, and on and on. No one wants to deal with these kinds of problems.

Thankfully, the solution is rather simple and much more affordable than dealing with the effects of letting a building go. Proper maintenance of any building includes regular inspections so that deteriorated elements can be discovered and repaired. Scheduled maintenance and system updates are essential to maintaining the efficiency of your building. Scheduled maintenance will keep systems operating at maximum efficiency, minimizing downtime for repairs and better maintaining optimum environmental conditions. Breakdowns can lead to expensive repairs and unscheduled downtime of equipment, which can result in a loss of revenue for businesses.

“What most people need to realize is that the price of doing nothing and relying on maintenance all the time is far more expensive than regular, timely, preventative maintenance,” Matt Rowe, a building services sales engineer with Engineered Controls told us. “Despite the importance and relatively low expense of maintaining building efficiency, most building owners, approximately 55% in the United States, rely on reactive maintenance programs to care for their equipment. This means they wait until their equipment fails completely before initiating corrective action. Realistically, reactive maintenance is not maintenance at all and should be called repair work.”

As a leading building control technology contractor, Engineered Controls’ goal is to provide customers with products and services to create efficient, safe, and comfortable building environments. Engineered Controls offers complete turnkey building control solutions including system design, new construction and owner-direct retrofit sales, installation, repair service, and preventative maintenance work for smart buildings.

“Engineered Controls offers planned service agreements to assist building owners with these items,” Matt said. ”We customize these agreements based on building use and staff to assist in keeping these systems operating properly. There is a great benefit to having a trained technician looking into the system periodically. They can identify possible issues and provide solutions prior to them becoming a problem.”

Preventative maintenance should be important to business owners for a variety of reasons:

• Asset protection and preservation
• Energy use reduction
• Financial impact
• Staff efficiency

Maintenance costs take up a large percentage of expenses for most facilities, which means it’s worth looking into ways to optimize maintenance repairs to reduce unnecessary costs. Maintenance costs can amount to nearly as much as utility costs and even up to one-third of total operating expenses for a facility if not regularly maintained. If you maintain proper function for all your facilities through reputable workers, you will also have proper documentation for insurance and legal agencies. If someone claims to get hurt or injured due to improper building maintenance, that could lead to a hefty lawsuit. Maintaining your building maintains your reputation and credibility as a property owner.

Health and Safety Benefits

In their Operations and Maintenance Best Practices Guide, the U.S. Department of Energy states that effective facilities maintenance “is one of the most cost-effective methods for ensuring reliability, safety, and energy efficiency.”

They also list the following as being among the many health and safety benefits of proper building and equipment maintenance:

• Increasing the safety of all staff, as properly maintained equipment is safer equipment.
• Ensuring the comfort, health, and safety of building occupants through properly functioning equipment providing a healthy indoor environment.

In regards to health and safety, one of the most important aspects of building maintenance is cleanliness. If you’re looking for help getting your building to the level of cleanliness you and your employees deserve, ServiceMaster Professional Building Maintenance is the perfect place to call.

We talked to Co-owner Jon Paolini about his recommendation to give a particular amount of attention to the cleanliness of your carpets at this time of year.

“As winter changes to spring, it’s important to get a carpet deep clean. Your carpet traps the salt residue from sidewalks and roads and bonds them to the carpet fibers. Your everyday vacuum won’t be able to get it out, so you’ll need to get it industrially cleaned,” Jon said. “This also helps maintain the life of your carpet.

Salt can dry out carpet fibers, leaving them frayed and damaged. It’s in your best interest to get your carpets professionally cleaned so they last longer, feel soft and clean, smell fresh, and look amazing.”

In general, it’s important to maintain the life of your floors.

“If you don’t take proper care of your floors, specifically your carpet, you may not be in line with the manufacturers’ specifications. If this happens, you won’t get the full life out of your floors and you may even void your own warranty,” Jon advised.

ServiceMaster Professional Building Maintenance also provides nighttime and daytime janitorial services, upholstery cleaning, window cleaning, and more. ServiceMaster utilizes a documented inspection system for every clean to ensure quality control. They also offer ongoing training for their staff to make sure they are all updated on the best methods to clean and disinfect any space.

For the benefit and well-being of your employees, it’s important to provide the best cleaning services available so your work environment is at its best. From slip and fall prevention to cross-contamination protection, a janitorial service could protect you and your employees or tenants in more ways than you know.

Another area of building maintenance to consider in regards to health, safety, and the happiness of occupants is your septic system. Poorly-maintained septic systems can cause unpleasant issues, especially when they’re backed up.

Southwick Liquid Waste has decades of experience in the septic industry. They do everything from pumping grease traps to septic tank pumping, installation, and repair. They even provide inspections to assess the state of your septic system. Southwick offers both residential and commercial pumping services with the largest capacity truck in the Lincoln and Omaha area. They utilize technology, maintenance, and education to provide the most cost-efficient services to their customers.

Visual and Aesthetic Benefits

Not only does cleanliness and upkeep create a safe environment, it also enhances the appearance of your building. First impressions can be difficult to change, and the image of a dirty building will definitely stick in the mind of a potential employee or tenant. Maintaining a clean and well-cared for work environment is something you won’t want to cut corners on.

Maintaining the appearance of a building sends a message that the owners and occupants of the building care—and not just about the building, but that they generally care and pay attention to details. Those who then enter the building are much more likely to treat it with care as well. Who wouldn’t want to send that message to the world!

While Morton Buildings specializes in reconstructive services and building maintenance at all levels (seen an unseen), they always do an excellent job making everything look tight, clean, and ship-shape—they take the appearance of your building into consideration whether or not the service you need is aesthetic.

When you are looking for services to improve the appearance of your home or office, they are perfectly prepared to take the external appearance of your building to a new level or restore it to the beautiful state of its former days. Dan Nyberg, sales training manager, told us more.

“As the leader in post-frame manufacturing and construction, Morton Buildings specializes in new construction of residential and commercial facilities,” he said. “In addition, we also offer repair and renovations services for Morton and non-Morton brand of buildings. Both of these services use the highest quality materials to deliver a low-maintenance, durable, and energy-efficient structure. Our repair services team consists of experienced, local Morton crew members that use quality Morton materials on your existing structure to make it look new again. Popular repair and renovation requests include: door repairs and replacements, door conversions, gutter repairs, trim repair, skylight installations, re-skins, additions, and insulation packages.”

Morton Buildings is a 100% employee-owned construction company that focuses on every project’s long-term, stable plan. They have a commitment to being a leader through innovation, service, and quality.

“If you’re planning for a personal storage building, horse barn, farm storage building, home, office and warehouse, insulated workshop, a commercial facility, or anything in between, now is the time to take advantage of discounted pricing on new buildings until February 29!”

Renovating your building, remodeling your office, or even just changing out some of the decor keeps your workspace or home fun and exciting for all who enter the door.

The turning of the seasons from winter to spring is a great time to offer your home, office, or other buildings some extra attention, though we recommend continual maintenance throughout the year! Turn to local building maintenance experts to get the best-quality services available!