Concrete is used for flooring and construction all over the world. It’s known for its durability - when properly sealed, concrete is slip-resistant, chemical-resistant, and waterproof. It’s also very affordable.
The problem? Bare concrete is kind of boring. At its worst, it can make the interior or exterior of an otherwise classy-looking building appear downright dingy.
Decorative concrete, achieved through acid-staining, can rejuvenate the look of your business while providing all of the advantages of concrete flooring. Let’s dive a bit deeper to see how it can help your business thrive.
More Than Just Decor
We can group businesses into two broad categories: customer facing (directly facing customers), and non-customer facing (indirectly facing customers). Both types of businesses can use decorative concrete to add value to their buildings.
It’s All About The Experience
The biggest source of competition for brick-and-mortar, customer-facing businesses is the convenience of shopping online. When customers walk into your door, they want a unique experience - they really want to be wowed.
Durability, low maintenance cost, and efficiency add to the resale value of your business when it comes time to sell.
Decorative concrete flooring can look like almost any stone floor you could imagine. Through a combination of concrete scoring and acid-etching (staining), your floors can look like they’re made of marble, flagstone, or other elegant stones.
This makes decorative concrete particularly well-suited to stores that want to offer their customers a high-end boutique (or in-store) experience. Wine cellars, wellness shops, restaurants, and clothing stores can all benefit from the natural stone look of decorative concrete.
Decorative concrete can be imbued with all kinds of different colors (as well). You can take inspiration from popular color trends for flooring - generally, however, we’d advise going with something timeless instead of trendy because your floor will last for a very long time. You can also choose to match your floors to your brand colors - decorative concrete can look very futuristic, if you want it to.
Functional Flooring
Decorative concrete isn’t just aesthetically pleasing - it can also be used to designate different zones in warehouses, factories, and other non-customer facing businesses.
You can color-code different areas to improve the flow of traffic - you can also score the concrete to create paths through the different zones. This, when coupled with proper signage, can increase efficiency and reduce the risk of injuries.
A Long-Term Investment
One of the best reasons to use a decorative concrete floor is that it will last considerably longer than other types of flooring.
It’s important to keep maintenance up on your investment. Easy maintenance and longevity are perks of decorative concrete.
Decorative epoxy flooring only has a lifespan of under 20 years - in high traffic areas, epoxy flooring may actually last less than 10 years. Polished concrete has a longer lifespan, but most installers will only warranty their polished concrete for about 20 years. Wood flooring is almost never used in commercial or industrial applications - it simply doesn’t have the durability you need.
When properly sealed on a yearly basis, stained concrete can last over 100 years. That means that, with proper maintenance, you may never need to replace your flooring again.
Low Maintenance, High Impact
One of the biggest advantages to decorative concrete is how easy it is to maintain. Dust mop weekly, damp mop monthly, and recoat with floor finish once or twice a year, depending on how much traffic you get.
The low level of maintenance required saves you money on both cleaning supplies and labor costs. It’s amazing that floors that look this good take so little effort to keep up!
Sales Appeal
Everything we’ve discussed so far has been about adding value to your business through customer satisfaction, efficiency, lower labor costs, and the like. When it comes time to sell your business, stained concrete can be a huge boon. Think about it like this: would you rather buy a business with unfinished concrete floors, or one with beautiful, decorative concrete floors?
Interested in decorative concrete? Let’s talk. Browse through our gallery of commercial projects to see some of the incredible flooring we’ve done for businesses like yours, then give us a call.
(Jeffrey Schaeffer is a Guest Author, from Polished Concrete 1. )