With states raising their minimum wages to $15 an hour and movements like FightFor15 being endorsed by Biden, operating expenses are going up for every business that has minimum wage employees. This is currently pushing businesses to install labor savings devices. So far, most of the labor saving devices have been in installing machines to replace human retail labor, such Walmart emphasizing their cashier-free self-checkout. With a rise in operating costs, this push to automate labor will likely go into sectors like guest services and facilities soon.

One company that is taking advantage of this need to reduce labor costs is Cleana. Cleana has done market research on facilities, and found that 75% of messes on toilet seats have been due to patrons not lifting the seat when they urinate. They have designed a commercial self-lifting toilet seat, which prevents these messes from happening in the first place. For users who want the seat down, they can set it down with its special anti-microbial handle, and when they are done, the automatic toilet seat automatically lifts back up. 

Through many meetings with facilities managers, guest-services specialists, and business owners, they have discovered that a messy-toilet seat puts them into a tough spot. Either they keep staff on hand in case it gets dirty midway through a day, or wait until the next cleaning shift, typically at the end of the day. The first option, keeping staff on hand, is incredibly expensive given that minimum wages are rising across the board. The second option, which is to keep toilet stalls out of commission if they are soiled, saves money but worsens guest experience significantly. This is especially true for businesses with few toilets or only one toilet.

The Cleana self-lifting toilet seat prevents toilet messes, which stops toilet stall downtime from occurring. If a stall is soiled, it could be an entire day of business before it gets restored to a clean state. During this time, customers that need a restroom will be inconvenienced at best, and disgusted at worst. This will ruin your business’s perception and paint a picture of your business as one that cares little about guest experience. The Cleana seat saves expensive and inconsistently utilized cleaning labor and stops brand-ruining soiled restroom stall downtime.