Printed commercial matting in retail can have many uses ranging from brand reinforcement, creating valuable first impressions through to point of sale, increasing product awareness and subsequent sales. As these products have a visual impact the benefits are easily understood, but what about the more functional aspects of matting within retail?   

Wal-Mart in the USA receive over a million visitors a week into their stores, they get sued almost once every two hours every day and many of these legal cases are slip and fall related (USA Today). In fact the retail industry has the highest number of same level falls compared to other industries, the associated claims add up to 17.1% of all employee related claims (Liberty Mutual Research Centre for Safety and Health).

It is the responsibility of the building owner or estate manager to identify areas of hazard to ensure the safety of both public and work force alike and often once the risk has been identified reduction or cure can be quite simple avoiding injury and associated costs.

Take a coffee machine or water dispenser for example, there is more than a reasonable chance of a spill which could lead to slip so why not invest in a simple containment mat, even brand it or add instruction advice, very simple and cost effective.

9 out of 10 slip and fall related incidents occur on wet floors (Profession retail Floor Maintenance).

Jobs that require prolonged periods of employee standing cause a degree of personnel discomfort which increases over time, in more severe cases physical injury, which is certainly unpleasant for the employee. But did you realise with increasing discomfort there is also an associated drop in productivity and general dissatisfaction with the job.

Employees standing on good quality antifatigue matting experience vastly reduced levels of discomfort and fatigue, studies have shown this is as much as 50% (Mark Redfern, Ergonomist at the Centre of Ergonomics at the University of Michigan). Studies go on to show that a person productivity standing for 8 hours on a concrete factory floor by 33% and conversely a person standing on a quality antifatigue mat increases productivity by up to 50% (OSHA).

Most of this is a matter of common sense of course provide a more comfortable working environment to create better employee motivation, simple right? In fact it is but to get the right return on investment you need to purchase products fit for the intended purpose that deliver on comfort but also last, offering that comfort year after year and this is where you can easily go wrong.

Many antifatigue mats out of the box deliver on comfort however over time they become compacted, loose their spring and ultimately offer a fraction of their as new benefits. This is where true nitrile rubber products win hands down, true they cost more but offer life expectancy measured in years, offering day after day as new experience, so when the price is divided by the longevity the ROI is very easy to see.

Different solutions exist for different requirements if products are to be used less frequently, then save your money and look to antifatigue products made with PVC, as they will be cheaper, however in harsher environments and greater usage spend a little more and invest in genuine rubber you’ll certainly reap the benefits and your teams will thank you for them.