Prepping your commercial facility for summer with deck coatings
While they may not get as much attention as your walls or roof, the decks and flooring inside and surrounding your commercial building are just as important to maintain, both for customer appeal and long-term maintenance of your investment.
Particularly for outdoor areas, the fall and winter months can be hard on your decks and flooring. In addition to the usual foot traffic, these areas are exposed to the elements and can easily become damaged through moisture, dirt, and grit, or rapid temperature changes.
Reasons to check your decks
Throughout fall and winter, environmental exposure—either directly in outdoor areas, or indirectly with customer foot traffic—can damage not only the appearance of your floors and decks, but also the coatings that protect the substrate beneath.
A dull, cracked deck area or floor is a turnoff for customers who are considering doing business with you. In addition to aesthetics, safety is a primary concern for many decks and floors. If you’ve had anti-skid or slip-resistant coatings applied to balconies, patios, stairwells, or pool decks in the past, the quality of these coatings may have suffered in harsh weather conditions.
Finally, cracks or worn-out areas in your deck and floor coatings allow water and chemical seepage, which can damage the underlying substrate, including concrete outdoor decks and other customer areas.
Summer solutions for deck coatings
If your commercial facility contains areas that will have safety issues when they’re open to customers for the summer, now is the time to contact your commercial painting contractor to assess the condition of your anti-skid coatings.
For high-traffic floors and decks, you’ll want them to look great for the summer while also keeping your substrate protected. One popular solution for decks is elastomeric coating—its exceptional elastic qualities allow the paint to stretch and “bounce back” when temperature changes cause the underlying substrate to expand or contract. Elastomerics are also excellent for waterproofing and weatherproofing.
When you’re going over your commercial facility in preparation for increased summer traffic, don’t neglect your decks!
