safe kitchen environment for staff, barstools kept across the counter
By Paul Shewry Fire Doors • General Information • 0 Comments

How To Create a Safe Kitchen Environment For Your Staff In Your Restaurant

Workplace illness and injuries cost restaurateurs around the country millions of pounds annually in terms of both productivity and compensation. This means you need to ensure that you prioritise creating a safe kitchen environment for your staff. 

Be it a quaint coffee shop or a large fast-food franchise, a commercial kitchen is a high-risk and unpredictable environment to work in. Add to this the ongoing pandemic and there are various areas that restaurants need to work on to ensure complete safety of everyone present. 

Fortunately, it is fairly easy to maintain a safe kitchen environment for your staff. Let’s take a look at some easy to implement safety tips for commercial kitchens!

1. Install Fire Doors

In a fast-paced commercial kitchen, fire is a constant hazard that puts your staff at risk. There are a number of reasons why a fire could start in your kitchen but the most common culprit is a grease fire. Sadly, water sprinkler systems aren’t very effective in suppressing grease fire. 

For added safety, you need to install commercial fire doors in your restaurant to ensure that you effectively contain a fire. Once installed, you need to carry out routine fire door repair and maintenance for optimal door performance. 

Additionally, look into installing other fire suppression systems that can help cut off the fuel source if the gas line is tripped or cut. 

Consider installing nozzles that can help spray fire suppressant and help with doing some damage control if required. 

2. Proper Attire

Staff uniforms in commercial kitchens are designed both according to rank and to keep chefs and sous chefs comfortable and clean as they prepare and plate meals for patrons. Usually, the choice of footwear is overlooked and that shouldn’t be the case. The wrong shoes can be responsible for a number of serious injuries in the kitchen and you obviously want to avoid that. 

For proper safety of your staff, ensure that everyone wears closed-toed-footwear when working. Wearing closed-toe shoes will help prevent cuts from falling knives and other utensils, burns and scalds from hot oil and water, chemical burns from cleaning products and more. 

The material of your staff footwear should be robust, waterproof and heavy-duty and the soles should be non-slip to prevent anyone from falling and incurring an injury. 

3. Proper Ventilation

If your commercial kitchen lacks proper ventilation, the room can become hot, smokey and all in all unbearable for its inhabitants in a short time. This can quickly become an unsafe work environment for the staff in the kitchen who remain in the space for prolonged periods of time when cooking. Exposure to constant heat can put them at risk from any heat-related illnesses, not to mention respiratory issues too. 

With proper ventilation in place, you can upgrade the safety and comfort of your staff to create a safe kitchen environment. Moreover, having a proper and functional ventilation system is a legal requirement that you need to comply with. If you fail to meet with this requirement, you could face consequences where you may even have to close shop. 

To create a safe kitchen environment for your staff, ensure that you install the proper ventilation system and maintain it properly to ensure peak efficiency. 

4. Adequate Health and Safety Training

While all industries have occupational health and safety training of some sort in place, there are certain workplace hazards that are specific to the hospitality industry. You need to ensure that you stay on top of these to create a safe kitchen environment for your employees. It would be a good idea to start with a dedicated occupational health and safety training day. 

With COVID-19 to think about as well, a proper training seminar can help address a number of issues including social distancing, hygiene, proper food handling and storage techniques amongst other things. 

Call Doorway Services to Install Fire Doors

Commercial kitchens are perhaps one of the most dangerous environments to work in which makes kitchen safety a top priority. As your staff works in close proximity to flames and fuel, a fire breaking out is always a concern. 

Call the expert door installers at Doorway Services to take kitchen safety up a notch. Additionally, incorporate the tips mentioned above to protect your employees and your business from any potential harm while ensuring that you maintain your productivity!

Give us a call to find out more about business doors!

image of office buildings representing how to maintain your commercial building
By Paul Shewry Automatic Doors • Do It Yourself • Fire Doors • General Information • Maintenance • Renovation • Security • • 0 Comments

6 Tips To Maintain Your Commercial Building Effectively

As a business owner, one of your top priorities is to effectively maintain your commercial building. It’s a job that all too often falls by the wayside, but it’s important for you to retain your property’s value.

As is the case with nearly every property, wear and tear of a commercial building is bound to happen over time. As a business, your workplace is where you make money so carrying out routine maintenance for its upkeep is essential. 

The repairs that crop up in a business building are very routine in nature. Proper maintenance is key to avoid expensive renovations in the future. 

Maintain Your Commercial Building

Here are 6 tips to ensure that you maintain your commercial building well without any compromises in its upkeep!

1. Upkeep of Fixtures and Fittings 

This might not seem important on the surface but it is one of those little things that matters a lot. If damaged and broken fittings and fixtures are ignored for a long time, they can harm your employees and cause further damage to your property. 

Broken lights, cracked windows, damaged doors and handles are a few examples of damaged fixtures that will make your commercial space look shabby. This is why being on top of getting broken things fixed is integral. These small issues should be taken care of as soon as they come to light. It will help improve overall productivity in your office. 

2. Install Fire Doors

Fire breakouts can happen any time given how unpredictable they are. So legally, every office building must have fire doors installed for maximum safety and security of its occupants. Additionally, ensure that you eliminate all the fire hazards across the property. Make it a point to diligently check all the smoke detectors installed at least once a month. You will need to replace its batteries every year as well to keep it running. 

Ensure that fire exit doors are fully functional and passageways are kept clear. Each floor of your business building must have fire extinguishers in case of an emergency.

3. Maintain and Repair Your Business Doors

The entrance of your business building must perform at peak efficiency at all times.  Your commercial doors are quite literally the starting point of your business. Moreover, you have to keep in mind that your clients and customers will frequent the premises. So it is essential to conduct routine maintenance checks and timely automatic door repairs. These robust doors will elevate the entire aesthetic of your commercial property not to mention they add to the overall security as well.

Another benefit is that automatic doors help you be more energy-efficient. 

4. Conduct a Safety Audit on a Monthly Basis

To effectively maintain your commercial building, the safety mechanisms and fixtures you’ve installed should top of your list of concerns. As far as the well-being of the building’s occupants is concerned, these safety fixtures must be in proper working condition to keep potential accidents and lawsuits at bay. Some safety fixtures that you should keep a constant eye on are:

You should conduct a monthly audit of these installations to ensure that they are working as they are supposed to.

5. Prioritise Renovation Projects

Renovating your commercial building will go a long way in maintaining it well. As a general rule of thumb, treat your business building like you would treat your home. If you notice that certain section needs a bit of work, get on top of it and get it fixed.

Paint your wall’s exterior once every year to get rid of peels on walls and ceilings. As far as maintaining your commercial building is concerned, this is the absolute basic that you can do, to keep it in good condition.

6. Maintenance of Utilities and Facilities

The facilities of your commercial building should be fully functional at all times so there’s little to no disruption. This means you need to ensure that the escalators, elevators, business doors and public bathrooms are well-maintained at all times. Additionally, if your HVAC units breakdown, get them fixed right away.

It’s important to inspect your commercial building once every month to make sure that everything is up and running. This will help you ensure that your business operates without any hitches while maintaining high work standards at all times. 

Commercial Door Repair

If you need business door servicing in Northamptonshire and the surrounding areas, give the professionals at Doorway Services a call. 

You can also install new doors that are bespoke to your business.

image of a stacked warehouse representing the choosing of the right door for your warehouse
By Paul Shewry Automatic Doors • Design • Fire Doors • Maintenance • Tips and Tricks • • 0 Comments

How To Choose The Right Door For Your Warehouse

Choosing the right door for your warehouse will depend on a number of different aspects. It will depend on what you store inside, how people gain access within your facility, the kind of foot traffic you receive and much more. 

In this piece, we will discuss how these factors come together to influence how you choose the right door for your warehouse. 

Storage Aspects

In most cases, what you store within your warehouse won’t affect the type of business door you’ll need. However, in some cases, you might require a very specific type of door depending on the characteristics of the products stored within. 

For instance, if you store liquids or organic food products in your warehouse, then there’s a chance that the goods might either freeze or spoil. This is why maintaining a certain level of temperature to avoid the freezing of liquids and the spoiling of perishable items is essential. Here, automatic doors and steel doors would be the perfect option. 

Similarly, if you store highly flammable products in your warehouse, having fire doors installed is ideal. 

Weather and Location

If your warehouse is located in a residential area, a lot of noise emanating from your surroundings can be disturbing. This is why having insulated doors are perfect to keep the noise pollution at bay. 

Every time that your door opens and closes, you lose heat from within the facility. This can then result in more energy consumption to restore the temperature back to normal. If temperature is of great importance in your facility, consider installing high-speed automatic doors that’ll take less time to open and close, preventing loss of heat in the warehouse. 

With high-speed swing and slide doors, the products you store in the warehouse will be protected. Moreover, in the colder months, these doors can help maintain comfortable temperatures for working staff who rely on boilers and heaters to stay warm.

Ease of Accessibility

We have seen how high-speed automatic doors are great for preventing heat loss. At the same time, these industrial doors are ideal in warehouses where frequent regular access is required. For fast-paced businesses involving several deliveries and collection on a daily basis, time that’s spent waiting for doors to open and close can accumulate and waste hours over the course of the day. So having doors that provide speedy accessibility is of utmost importance for fast-moving businesses. 

If you house goods and products of high value, it will be worth installing high-security Dane shutters to avoid unwanted access. Additionally, you can have a separate pedestrian access.

Adopt a Bespoke Approach

With business doors, you can’t adopt a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Depending on the specifications of your facility, every warehouse door will be constructed in a manner that’s unique to the premises. At Doorway Services, we design and provide a range of options that are bespoke to your business needs that results in the perfect fit!

Our experienced team is hands-on in providing you with the best business door advice and service. We also provide business door repair and maintenance service to ensure that it performs well always!

So get in touch with us today and choose the right door for your warehouse!

image of checklist representing fire door maintenance
By Paul Shewry Fire Doors • Maintenance • Management • Renovation • Security • Tips and Tricks • 0 Comments

The Ultimate Fire Door Maintenance List For All Round Safety

Fire door maintenance is pretty straightforward. But when it comes to checking them over, its best to have a plan in place. This way, you can ensure that your fire-resistant doors will extend the maximum protection possible whenever the need arises.

To make this easier for you, we’ve compiled a list that’ll not only keep you up to date with the maintenance work of your fire doors but also ensure all-round safety round the clock!

Let’s take a look.

Legal Requirement for Fire Door Maintenance

In accordance with Article 17 of the Fire Safety Order, all fire doors must be properly installed and maintained. Failing to abide by this will be considered as a breach of the order. This could lead to your property being shut down while the necessary safety changes are made. In order to ensure that you’re in full compliance with the regulations, it is best to sign up for regular ‘Fire Door Inspection’ with Doorway Services.

Schedule Routine Maintenance Checks

Ideally, fire door checks should be carried out at least twice a year. But if the building is newly constructed, the safety checks conducted should be more frequent – preferably at least once every three months. Additionally, you need to keep an eye on the foot traffic that your building receives. Areas that experience the largest flow of people should have fire doors that are in top-notch condition and not damaged in any way. 

Here, fire door checks must be made as often as once every week.

Fire Door and Frame Set Checks

At the time of fire door inspection, be as thorough as possible and pay attention to the smallest details. To ensure that you comply with the regulations, you have to check the door frame and set. 

This includes:

  • Checking that appropriate gap between the door frame and the door is maintained.
  • The seals are intact and in place with no damage whatsoever.
  • Correct signage is being used.
  • There’s no blockage in the transfer grille.

You can refer to the fire door checklist readily available online as it highlights all the aspects that are to be inspected. Moreover, it is best to work through the maintenance checks systematically so as to not miss out on anything. 

Create and Maintain a Fire Door Register

If your building (s) has more than one fire door installed with varying inspection schedules, it’ll be best to create and maintain a fire door register to be on track with the inspections and their due dates. 

Your register will be the central source that’ll contain information regarding:

  • Door specifications
  • Different door components required
  • Maintenance work undertaken
  • Various checks required
  • Fire certificate numbers
  • Date of fire door installation (s).

In essence, your fire door register will have a firsthand record of all repair/maintenance-related aspects. Additionally, it’ll protect you in case of any legal actions and/or investigations.

Fire Door Repairs

If the maintenance checks bring to light any repair work that needs to be done, then you should get on top of it. Ensure that any components you replace are compatible with your fire door. Moreover, make sure that you have the right equipment and tools to carry out the repair work. 

If you’re not sure about the components to be used, then it is best to refer to the fire certificate datasheet to find out about their compatibility with your door model. While you can preside over these checks, it’s recommended that you call in door repair experts at Doorway Services for a professional and safe maintenance check. 

Our experienced door technicians are just a call away in case you need any advice on fire door maintenance. Our impressive track record with successful installations over the years speaks volumes about the quality we bring to the table. 

So, be it fire door installation or repair, give us a call today.