First impressions do tend to count in so many different scenarios, from meeting someone for the first time to viewing a property and forming an instant opinion.
If you are regularly welcoming customers to your business premises, it makes sense to try and ensure that you make a lasting first impression about how you will treat them, and you can do this by treating your parking lot like a welcome mat for your business.
Easily forgotten by you but not by your visitors
If you stop to ask yourself exactly when you last took a close look at your business car parking area, many of us might just struggle to remember when that was.
You arrive every day and lock the car and maybe don’t take a second glance before heading inside, but if you stop for a moment at take a look around at your parking lot as though you were seeing it for the first time, would you be happy with what you see?
When you take a more detailed look, you might just notice that there are more than a few potholes that you had long since forgotten about and another common issue is drainage problems, which are all too apparent when you look around.
Safe and attractive
If you want to avoid making the wrong lasting impression on your visitors, it is important that you aim to make your parking lot as safe and attractive as possible.
Take a look at a site like hydraway.net and you soon get an idea of the sort of drainage issues that can occur and how to put them right. If you have water that is sitting on the surface of your parking lot after rainfall and you find that anyone using the car park has to regularly skip across puddles to negotiate their way to your premises, it is time to take action.
Safety is just as much an issue as how your parking lot looks when it comes to drainage problems.
Sometimes you can experience problems with identifying pavements due to standing water and this can be potentially dangerous if someone falls due to a hidden hazard. It could cause damage to vehicles who hit a curb because they were unable to see it due to water on the surface of you parking lot.
Worn line markings
Another clear indication of a general lack of maintenance, which could reflect poorly on your business, is when the car parking lines have become badly worn and faded.
There are several problems associated with poorly maintained parking zone lines.
Pedestrians might struggle to negotiate a safe passage across the parking lot if they can’t see where they should and shouldn’t be walking.
You will also be potentially losing out on parking efficiency if the line markings are not clearly defined, meaning some people might not be able to find a space when they could have done with adequate spaces marked out.
The founder of Asphalt Industrial states, “Maintaining your parking lot is crucial for creating a positive first impression for your business. Faded or worn line markings can lead to safety issues for pedestrians and reduce parking efficiency. Investing in quality asphalt maintenance equipment ensures your parking lot is well-marked and welcoming for all visitors.”
Sweep your parking lot
You might not consider sweeping your parking lot as a necessity, but regular maintenance will not only make it look smarter, you will also be helping to keep a lid on long term repair costs.
The asphalt surface will gather a fair amount of debris in the form of glass, small stones and various other materials and these will gradually grind their way onto the surface if they are not swept away on a regular basis.
Regular lot sweeping will greatly help to prolong the life of your surface and as well as making your parking lot look clean and tidy for visitors to your business premises, you will probably be able to achieve some savings on repair costs.
Weather-related damage
There is little doubt that surface water is the biggest contributor towards weather-related harm to your asphalt and once this water is allowed to seep through the asphalt, it will then start to cause problems with your pavement base too.
Water penetrating through the pavement surface will then go on to create some major potholes as well as creating substantial damage to the base layer over time. You won’t need to guess that allowing this structural damage to occur through lack of drainage is an expensive mistake.
Make sure you make the right impression about your business by taking care of your parking lot and you should even be able to enjoy some savings on your long-term repair costs if you are proactive with your maintenance schedule.