Floor Matting Systems - Protecting Your Investment at the Front Door

By: Briana Smith |  May 22, 2014

Entrance matting should be the first thing that you come across when you enter a building. Why you may ask? 80% of the dirt & debris that enters a facility comes from walking in the door on the bottom of our shoes. Your entrance matting system is the first line of defense in protecting your floors and improving indoor air quality. An effective entrance matting system can potentially stop as much as 95% of dirt, sand & moisture at the door.

Here’s what you can do to protect your investment in your floors, your matting system & the cleanliness of your facility…

Using the Right Type of Floor Mats for Your Facility’s Entryway

An optimal entrance matting system should be a combination of three types of floor mats: scraper mats, scraper/wiper mats, and/or wiper mats. This is typically referred to as the 3-mat system. The way you design your matting system will depend on your local weather conditions and what types of soils generally get tracked in your facility.

Scraper mats are made of a durable material that has a textured top surface, which allows for aggressive scraping action. These are mats that should be placed just outside the entrance to your facility to remove most of the heavy soils from being tracked in.

Scraper/wiper mats come next, and they are constructed a little differently. Scraper/wiper mats are the workhorse of the three mats as they are designed in a way that allows shoes to be ‘brushed’ from multiple directions causing even more dirt, as well as moisture, to be caught. The most effective of these mats are bi-level mats that let soil & water filter below the shoe level within the mat. They can be used either inside or outside the front door, although most are used inside. Again, depends on the needs of your facility.

Wiper mats are meant to trap the last bit of hair, dirt & lint that the other two types of mats may have missed, and should only be used inside. These are like taking a towel to brush the last bit of sand from your feet once you’ve left the beach.

Remember, it takes more than two steps to remove dirt from shoes, so you need to have at least 15 feet of matting once you walk in the door for it to be effective!

Keep Location & Weather in Mind

An urban office building may require a more flexible type of matting material, as opposed an industrial facility where the occupants may have need of something more heavy-duty. Same goes for regions that routinely experience inclement weather. Entrance floor mats are going to capture much of the salt & ice melt that may be on the roads & in parking lots due to snow & ice. Anyone who has ever had to clean salt & ice melt from flooring knows that the more you can keep off of your floors in the first place the better. Sometimes you may even have to adapt your matting system depending on the season. The right entrance mat will even prevent slips, trips & falls!

Maintain Your Entrance Mats through Periodic Cleaning

Good quality floor mats can be expensive, but they are worth it if you take care of them properly. Add the cleaning of your floor mats to your weekly, bi-weekly or interim cleaning schedule depending on the amount of foot traffic you get in your facility & weather conditions. Most scraper mats are easy to clean, just pull up the mat and sweep away everything below the mat. Scraper/wiper mats require a combination of vacuuming and shaking out, as the dirt & sand get trapped at the bottom, which is what makes them effective. Wiper mats can just be vacuumed. Not only will your mats last longer & stay in better condition, but you’ll prevent your mats from becoming saturated with dirt, which will keep it off of your carpeting and hard floor surfaces. Did you know that one square yard of carpet can garner as much as one pound of dirt a week with as few as 150 people walking through the entrance of your building?

The Andersen Company breaks down the 3-mat system:

Plan Ahead – Check the Condition of Your Entrance Mats Seasonally

The best time to replace your mats is before the weather turns nasty. If you routinely check the condition of your mats you can tell when you need to start swapping them out and plan accordingly. Once inclement weather has arrived it becomes a pain to switch out matting, especially during a deluge. Oftentimes certain mat sizes, a certain mat color or a custom logoed mat will have to be specially ordered, which can take anywhere from 2-8 weeks. It pays to prepare in advance!

Having the proper entryway matting system will pay dividends, and the better you take care of your mats, the longer they will last effectively stretching your investment in them even further. The best part is that your matting will do the heavy lifting in keeping dirt off your floors, which will also extend the life of your flooring material (carpet, tile, hardwood, laminate, natural stone, etc.) as well & make it easier for your cleaning staff to keep up with daily maintenance.

Briana Smith is WAXIE’s Social Media & Product Branding Specialist and spends quite a bit of time skimming the news for what’s new in cleaning, sustainability and technology while managing all of WAXIE’s social channels. She especially loves posting about #teamwaxie activities & conversing with customers on Instagram. Briana has a Bachelor's Degree in Communication Design from California State University, Chico.

READ MORE:
Andersen Company: 3-Mat Entrance System
Ask Sadie: The Benefits of Matting Programs
CleanLink: Prevent Slips, Trips and Falls with Matting
Matting’s Role in Proper Floor Maintenance
The Importance of Matting