Energy levels of food truck owners and their staff members are low by the time you make it back to your overnight parking location. This will often cause routine truck cleaning tasks (including the food truck floor) to be performed with less enthusiasm than they should. That’s why it’s important that mobile food operators to periodically check to ensure that employees pay attention and adhere to best practices when performing these tasks.
The primary reason for this is that food trucks must be hygienically maintained to protect the health of the truck’s customers as well as to meet health codes and regulations. It’s a high standard in a tough environment.
6 Tips For Cleaning Your Food Truck Floor
Use these floor cleaning tips to help meet this high standard:
- Open Drains. Make sure floor drains (if installed) are unobstructed and working properly, before cleaning your food truck floors.
- Seal Floors. Food truck floor surfaces, which are typically metal panels, vinyl or ceramic tile, should be sealed with a low- or anti-slip coating to foster proper sanitation and reduce the possibility of a slip-and-fall accident.
- Avoid Cross Contamination. Perform all floor cleaning work before food handling/processing equipment is cleaned. This helps prevent floor soil and debris from becoming airborne and landing on workstations or equipment.
- Clean Tools. If using mops and buckets, they should be cleaned/changed daily. Soiled mops and buckets can spread contaminants across the floor, increasing contamination concerns.
- Use A Squeegee. Use a squeegee to move moisture into floor drains or out of the truck for quicker drying.
- Store Equipment Properly. If stored in the truck, mops, buckets, squeegees, chemicals and all floor care equipment should be stored off the ground on shelves or racks. This will help keep the equipment clean and deters pests.
Additional Tip: Pay attention to how staff members handle your kitchen mats. Since many food trucks use anti-fatigue mats to help prevent slip-and-fall accidents and worker fatigue it’s very important that mats be cleaned and sanitized as well as the floors they cover.
RELATED: Don’t Miss These Spots When Food Truck Cleaning
The Bottom Line
Grease and food particles can make their way onto the floor of your food truck over time. Clean your floor daily. Use these tips to make your food truck floor spotless.
How do you clean your food truck floor? Do you have any tips we missed? We’d love to hear them. Share your thoughts on this topic in the comment section, our food truck forum or social media. Facebook | Twitter
