Winter Prep:
Tackling Ice Melt Residue

Every winter, ice melt residue becomes the nemesis of every cleaning staff.

There are three huge issues here:

• The most obvious—the white powdery residue looks unattractive.
• If left on the floor, it can dull or damage floors.
• Ice melt made of calcium chloride or magnesium chloride can also leave a slippery residue.

There are some steps you can take, however, to help prevent this residue from being deposited on floors in the first place. Consider installing floor mats or runners. They can absorb a lot of moisture and debris from the outside. A scraping mat can also work wonders preventing the outside mess from getting tracked in. Also, consider using a fertilizer spreader to distribute the ice melt more evenly. Using a scoop or pouring from the bag can lead to an excess of ice melt being used.

However, no matter what steps you take, cleaning the floors regularly will be necessary. Cleaning 2-3 times a day may be needed so that the ice melt residue doesn't sit on the floor's surface for too long and cause damage. Unfortunately, ice melt residue is known to be difficult to clean up.

For this, we recommend our Green Certified Neutral Floor Cleaner. It’s been proven to cut through ice melt with ease and replaces your neutralizer and detergent with one product.

Here’s our recommended cleaning procedure using this product:

Equipment Needed: Pump-Up Sprayer and Mop OR Autoscrubber

1. Assess the soil load/residue on the surface.
2. Fill Pump Up Sprayer with Heavy Duty cleaning solution.
3. Pre-Spray area with Heavy Duty cleaning solution. Be sure to saturate the surface thoroughly. Keeping the surface wet is key to residue removal.
4. Let the product sit for 2-3 minutes.
5. Use a mop buck or autoscrubber with clean water to remove the excess liquid. Change your water frequently to make sure you’re not putting salt residue back on the floor.