In the competitive world of retail, you may not believe it but every aspect of your grocery store matters and this includes the restroom.
While you might focus on product quality, pricing, and customer service, one typically overlooked area, the restroom will significantly impact your customers’ experience. By upgrading your store’s bathroom facilities can begin to see some of the benefits that will extend far beyond your customers’ basic hygiene.
If you’re not sold just yet, continue reading and remember, a modern, well-designed restroom will enhance your store’s image, improve customer satisfaction all around, and eventually boost sales. If you decide to prioritize the washroom, you show your customers that your committed to giving them a fully comfortable and convenient shopping environment.
Let’s explore the numerous advantages and benefits of upgrading your grocery store’s commercial restroom and the ways it will positively impact your business and your bottom line.
Enhanced Customer Experience and Satisfaction
Upgrading your commercial restroom will dramatically improve the overall customer experience in your grocery store because a clean, well-maintained, and modern restroom leaves a long-lasting and positive impression on your patrons. It shows you care about quality, and cleanliness, and ultimately about them.
Improved Comfort and Convenience
By installing updated fixtures and amenities, you can make your customers’ restroom visits more comfortable and convenient.
Consider adding the following:
- Touch-free faucets and soap dispensers
- High-efficiency touchless hand dryers
- Well-lit mirrors and vanity areas
- Spacious bathroom stalls and urinals with sturdy doors and locks
These basic improvements will make a huge difference in the way your customers perceive your store’s attention to detail and commitment to their comfort. Once the renovation is complete, you’ll get tons of compliments by your customers and your employees will thank you too.
Accessibility and Inclusivity Considerations
With washroom upgrades. you can install features to ensure its accessible to all customers, including those with disabilities or special needs.
This may involve:
- Installing grab bars and lowered sinks
- Creating wider doorways and bathroom stalls
- Adding baby changing stations in both men’s and women’s restrooms
- Installing tilted mirrors for those in wheelchairs
- Implementing non-slip flooring for increased safety
- Providing height-adjustable adult changing tables
- Incorporating clear signage with braille for visually impaired customers
The idea is to make the space more inclusive to all visitors and show them that you value all your customers and their different needs.
Enhanced accessibility will lead to increased customer loyalty and positive word-of-mouth recommendations, which is almost always guaranteed to attract new shoppers to your store.
Health and Hygiene Benefits
An upgraded commercial restroom usually provides for improved hygiene capabilities too, which both benefit customers and employees.
Improved Sanitation
Modern restroom fixtures and surfaces are designed with hygiene in mind and make accessibility to hygienic products more accessible.
They often feature:
- Antimicrobial materials
- Easy-to-clean surfaces
- Improved ventilation systems
- Touchless fixtures (faucets, soap dispensers, and hand dryers)
- Self-cleaning toilet seats
- Hands-free door openers
- Strategically placed hand sanitizer stations
- Automatic air fresheners
- Toilet paper dispensers with built-in sanitizing mechanisms
- UV light disinfection systems for high-touch surfaces
- Waterproof, seamless flooring to prevent moisture accumulation
- Disposable toilet seat covers and dispensers
All these features combined or separate will help reduce the spread of germs and create a more sanitary environment for all users. You can potentially see this hygienic improvement reflected in a reduction of employee sick days too.
Reduced Maintenance and Cleaning Time
Having to perform less and easier maintenance tasks would be another goal of a restroom upgrade. Upgraded restrooms generally require less maintenance and are much easier to keep clean.
This can lead to:
- Decreased labor costs
- More efficient use of cleaning supplies
- Consistently cleaner restrooms throughout the day
- Longer-lasting fixtures and materials, reducing replacement frequency
- Automated cleaning systems for certain fixtures (e.g., self-cleaning toilets and sinks)
- Improved odor control, reducing the need for frequent deodorizing (customers highly appreciate a well scented bathroom)
- Streamlined inventory management for restroom supplies
By investing in high-quality, low-maintenance fixtures, your restroom stays cleaner and with a lot less effort which frees up staff for other important tasks.
Energy Efficiency and Cost Savings
Long term cost savings is also important for business owners looking to upgrade their commercial bathroom space. Upgrading usually leads to significant long-term cost savings because of improved energy efficiency and reduced water consumption. All pluses.
Water Conservation
Modern plumbing fixtures are all specially designed to use water more efficiently without sacrificing performance.
Consider installing:
- Low-flow toilets and urinals
- Sensor-activated faucets
- Water-saving aerators
- Dual-flush toilets
- Waterless urinals
- Greywater recycling systems
Before and after a restroom reno, the largest costs are water and electricity costs. With these upgrades you can dramatically reduce both your store’s water and electrical usage, get lower utility bills and create a ‘smarter” environmental footprint.
Energy-Efficient Lighting and Ventilation
If possible, and if your budget allows for it, try incorporating energy-efficient lighting and ventilation systems into the renovation. These can even further reduce your operating costs.
Some popular options include:
- LED lighting with motion sensors
- Energy Star-certified exhaust fans
- Natural light sources, such as skylights or light tubes
- Occupancy sensors for automated lighting control
- Heat recovery ventilators (HRVs) for improved air quality
- Solar-powered lighting systems
- Smart building management systems for optimized energy use
These are the kind of improvements that take the renovation over the top but create a significant impact on everyone that uses the restroom.
Not only can you see lower energy consumption, but you’ll create a brighter, and more inviting restroom environment for your patrons which leads to overall customer satisfaction and your bottom line.
Install equipment with high energy efficiency will also demonstrate your commitment to environmental sustainability.
Modern Bathroom Equipment for Enhanced Functionality
The equipment you choose will also create a big impact on your customers and employees and will significantly improve their restroom experience.
Try Installing High-Performance Hand Dryers
Touchless hand dryers take the cake when it comes to commercial restrooms. By investing in a top-of-the-line hand dryer, you can substantially reduce paper waste and the spread of germs or bacteria.
As an example, Xlerator hand dryers are highly known for their rapid drying times and energy efficiency, so we would advise you take a good look at them and some of the other high-end hand dryers on the market including:
- Dyson Airblade models
- Excel Dryer ThinAir hand dryers
- World Dryer VMax vertical hand dryers
- The sleek Frost hand dryer models
For more information, see why it’s important to have quality hand dryers in commercial washrooms.
Touchless Fixtures
This is a must as much as is reasonably possible. By incorporating touchless fixtures, you will improve hygiene, user comfort and user experience.
You can consider installing:
- Sensor-operated toilets and urinals
- Automatic soap dispensers
- Motion-activated paper towel dispensers (if not using hand dryers)
- Motion-activated hand dryers
- Motion-activated light switches
- Motion-activated door opening capabilities
- Motion-activated faucets
Touchless fixtures reduce the spread of germs and create a more hygienic environment that your customers and staff will definitely notice and appreciate.
If you select modern, high-quality bathroom equipment, your restroom will be more functional and reinforce your store’s commitment to quality and customer satisfaction.
Invest in Your Store’s Future
Once you’re ready to make this upgrade to your grocery store, first consider the following steps:
- Assess your current restroom’s condition and identify areas for improvement
- Set a budget for the upgrade project
- Consult with professional designers and contractors who specialize in commercial restroom renos
- Choose high-quality, efficient fixtures and touch-free equipment that align with your store’s needs and values
- Schedule and plan the renovation to minimize disruption to your store’s operations
If you have the means, don’t wait to. get started and reap the benefits. Your customers’ experience, your store’s image, and your business’s long-term success depend on it.
