February 27, 2018 By Suzanne Robertson

The first impression most people get of your business is in the parking lot. If you have a nice, well-maintained parking lot, it provides a natural transition into good expectations for your business.

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A poorly-maintained parking lot, however, will give your customers a bad impression before they even walk in the door, making it much more difficult to earn their business. Not only that, but a poorly-maintained parking lot can cause safety issues that ultimately lead to higher insurance premiums for you. That’s why it’s so important to keep your business’s parking lot in great shape at all times.

Keep It Smooth

Potholes are a major danger and inconvenience for anyone who uses your parking lot. An un-repaired pothole can result in ruining the alignment of customer vehicles, customers twisting their ankle or tripping and falling on the ground, plus you run the risk of someone driving through a pothole and splashing another customer with water that was in the hole. All that to say, keeping potholes properly repaired is crucial to a well-maintained parking lot. If it’s small enough, you can repair it yourself, however if it has been allowed to grow, it’s best to call in the experts, so they can fill it and then smooth it out to ensure the repair lasts as long as possible.

Keep It Walkable

If your business is in a colder climate, one of the largest challenges you face in the winter is ice forming on your business’s parking lot and sidewalks. Ice in these areas represents a huge liability risk to your business, even if your business is already closed for the day. Anyone using your parking lot or sidewalks at any time could potentially sue for a slip-and-fall on icy ground on your business’s property. So, keep salting early and often.

If weather permits, pre-treat any paved areas on your business’s property, then once the adverse weather moves in, scrape and salt all surfaces as soon as the weather allows. If you have a small parking lot, you can certainly accomplish this task yourself, but any larger than that will require you to hire a third party to scrape and salt your parking lot for you. It’s certainly a worthwhile expense.

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Keep It Legible

If it’s been a while since your parking lot was paved, chances are the yellow or white lines painted between the spaces are probably getting pretty faint. If it’s really been a while, each stone that comes loose from the parking lot could actually be carrying away a small portion of the space marker lines. Either way, if it’s hard to read these lines at all, it’s important to have your parking lot re-striped as soon as possible.

Hard-to-read lines make it more likely that people will park in a way that makes them more likely to be hit, not to mention that it takes up more of your parking lot that can’t then be used by other paying customers. In order to get the most bang for your buck, hiring a professional company like APC Services of New England is the best route to take here. They can get the job done quickly, and ensure that all dirt has been removed before they paint so that the stripes will last for a long time.

Keep It Orderly

Stop signs need to be an important part of your business’s parking lot, especially if the parking lot is larger in size. Most people are fairly coherent about where they should be stopping, but there are always those moments when people are in a hurry or not paying attention. That’s when stop signs, whether painted on the parking lot, or as actual signs, are most important.

For those who heed the “STOP” warning, these reminders protect other drivers as well as pedestrians. Additionally, if several people are trying to leave the parking lot at once, it provides a more orderly and faster flow of traffic to ensure no one gets held up while they wait for traffic to clear.

Eye in the Sky

For those times when even your best preparations aren’t good enough, it’s important to also have several security cameras focused on the parking lot at all times. That way, if an accident does occur, you can go back and see exactly what happened, and show any police officers or insurance companies what happened, as well. That way, you aren’t blamed for something that wasn’t ultimately your fault, and you can also get a better idea of any changes you might need to make to ensure your parking lot is the safest it can be.

 

About the Author

Dixie Somers is a freelance writer and blogger for business, home, and family niches. Dixie lives in Phoenix, Arizona, and is the proud mother of three beautiful girls and wife to a wonderful husband.

 
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