Allocations are coming back!
You have alternatives
Bullen has tried over the last year with the Covid supply chain issue to be as transparent as possible with our inventory and what was coming for orders of disinfectants. We now find that as a result of Texas’s freezing conditions some basic chemical manufacturing plants were shut down, and their facilities were damaged. We are seeing drastic cutbacks in the availability of key ingredients in conventional polymer floor finishes and floor finish strippers. The supply issue with strippers is related to certain solvents that are also used in other products. That opens the possibility of a broader list of products that could be impacted.
What are we doing to produce as much product as we can? We are actively working on locating additional sources and using our previous purchase history to obtain as much raw material as possible. We should be able to handle most of the business we have supplied our customers in the past. What we do not need is panic buying or hoarding. Unlike what we went through with quats and disinfectants, there are alternatives to stripping and recoating.
Do I need to strip my floor every 6 months or each year? No, you do not need to strip previous coats of polymer floor finish if it has been maintained property. Most important is keeping the surfaces clean. Most finishes if dust mopped, good use of floor mats, and general cleaning will allow you to restore the floor surface without the expensive stripping process.
It is not unusual to be able to go 3-5 years without the need for a complete strip out of the floor.
Keep the surface clean– A good aggressive neutral cleaner (9 pH) will clean the embedded dirt in the coating and keep it from discoloring and a loss of gloss. We would suggest the One Up Megaclean for this step.
Restore the gloss– Use a burning compound or gel product like Dri-Buff or One Up Rehab to restore the gloss to the existing floor coating.
If the gloss won’t come back after using the above steps try a product like One Up Restorer. This great product will leave a thin coating of polymer that bonds with the existing finish without having to strip it all the way down to the tile or substrate.
Green Seal Approved Products- Another alternative while still being hit a little by the allocations are the E-Clean Finish and E-Clean HD Stripper. These two products use a different set of raw materials than conventional floor care products and their availability may not be as affected by the disrupted supply chain.
LVT- (Luxury Vinyl Tile)- This very popular “new” floor type has been installed worldwide. The expectation is that little if any maintenance is required for longevity. This is not true, LVT requires special products and procedures to protect its wear layer and yield the lowest cost to maintain it. The Extends products will provide a better looking, longer-lasting floor at the lowest cost of maintenance.
Click the link to download the product literature.
Deep scrub solution- (1up) Mega-CLEAN (spec)
Bounce back the gloss by burnishing- (1up) rehab (spec) or Dri buff (spec sheet)
Restore gloss if there is not much finish left- (1up) RESTORER (spec)
For LVT (luxury vinyl tile)- One Up Extends Program LVT-BROCHURE
Here is our Jancast episode #91 where we talk about the allocations and alternatives to strip and recoating-