Keep your Kitchen clean – Worktops, Walls…Ceilings?

If you own a business, you will know the importance of following the health and safety regulations. It is almost as important as looking after your customers and providing a good quality service. Those firms that do not follow the health and safety regulations face the danger of big fines and being shut down.

This article is aimed at helping both work at home mums who use their kitchen as part of their business as well as firms to maintain business premises that comply with the raft of hygiene regulations that are designed to protect people from disease. For firms involved in the food or medical industries maintaining hygienic premises is essential. Those companies involved in looking after and educating children have to be very aware of the health laws and comply with them to the letter.

By paying attention to detail and taking advantage of new hygiene products, firms can make the job of keeping their premises clean and complying with regulations relatively easier. Firms that build their workspaces out of the right materials can considerably simplify the process of keeping their business premises hygienically clean. Using easy to clean walls, and work surfaces as well as installing hygienic ceiling cladding in kitchens makes keeping everything clean far easier.

The advantages of using the right materials for walls and work surfaces is self explanatory, but the benefits of using hygienic ceiling cladding are not so obvious. Take for example a busy kitchen in a restaurant or canteen. Anyone who works in one will tell you that the ceilings in these kitchens get very dirty. This is because the steam that rises from cooking pots carries dirt and grime up to the ceiling area. Over time, that grease and grime can easily build up on a ceiling making it difficult to clean easily and safely.

In most countries, dirty ceilings in a kitchen are seen as a health hazard. This is because condensation builds up on the ceiling panels and in time that condensation drips down into food and onto work surfaces. There are high levels of germs in this condensation. That is why in the UK and in many other countries all ceilings in a food preparation area have to be cleanable.

Most traditional ceiling materials are porous, so over time the dirt and grime is absorbed into the actual ceiling materials. Once that happens it is impossible to remove it. The only way to make the ceiling hygienically clean again is to replace the ceiling panels. Naturally, this is not a sustainable approach, which is why it is important to install ceilings that are made from easy to clean materials.

The best material for ceilings that are to be used in food preparation areas, clinics and schools is PVC. It looks good, is smooth and is easy to wipe down. However, not all types of PVCceiling claddingare suitable for use in a kitchen environment. You need to buy the right grade of cladding. It has to be able to withstand high temperatures, comply with the fire regulations and needs to be able to withstand cleaning with harsh chemicals.