The Right Accessories

Key Takeaways:
• Selecting the right floor pad or brush requires evaluating the entire floor care system—not just the flooring material.
• Modern floor care technologies can improve operational efficiency while lowering maintenance costs.
• Customized floor care programs deliver better long-term results than one-size-fits-all approaches.

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Step into any facility, and the first point of contact is the floor. Flooring is the foundation of a building’s impression and can greatly factor into a perception of clean. However, floor care goes beyond aesthetics.

Innovations in flooring technology and maintenance meet the needs of differing surfaces, costs, and occupant expectations. Among these assistive tools are floor pads and brushes. For facility cleaning managers, selecting the right equipment accessory enhances appearance, improves floor longevity, and optimizes operational efficiency.

To address equipment accessories that align with flooring trends, Facility Cleaning Decisions reached out to experts for key industry insights.

Q: Which pad and/or brush is best used for each floor type (VCT, LVT, terrazzo, concrete, epoxy, tile, stone, etc.) and why?

Louis—This is probably the most common question I'm asked, but it's also one of the hardest to answer without additional information. Using the right pad or brush involves more than just knowing the floor type. Factors such as foot traffic, soil load, finish, texture, cleaning equipment, and whether a removable coating is present all play a significant role in determining what will work best. 
Unfortunately, there is no universal pad or brush that performs best on every floor type. Over the last 20 years, I've seen a clear shift toward "low-maintenance" flooring systems and "no-wax" floors. As a result, the industry has increasingly leaned into specialty cleaning technologies such as diamond pad technology, melamine, and microfiber abrasives—all of which can help reduce labor and chemical usage. Traditional white, red, green, and black brushes/pads are effective in many applications. However, they often don't address the labor challenges, appearance expectations, and specialized flooring requirements that many facilities face today.
Cleaning managers should understand that there are often specialty options available the can improve productivity, reduce cleaning time, and deliver better overall results.

Gallagher—For most hard floor surfaces, a rotary grit brush or a bristled floor pad is recommended. These tools are designed with flexible bristles that reach deep into grout lines and uneven surfaces to remove embedded soil more effectively—thus delivering a superior clean and improved floor appearance. 
Beyond better cleaning performance, these solutions also help facility cleaning managers significantly reduce operating costs because they outlast traditional floor pads and are self-cleaning. There are cost savings with the product, as well as the labor, since there’s no stopping to flip, wash out, or replace the pads. Downtime’s reduced, productivity’s improved, and the end result is a more consistent cleaning performance.
For luxury vinyl tile (LVT) floors, a soft white nylon brush is recommended. The soft bristles effectively remove soil without scratching the floor surface or prematurely wearing away the factory-applied protective topcoat, helping extend the life and appearance of the floor.

VanBruggen—I commonly receive this question. The type of floor is a good starting point, but the top drivers in determining the appropriate product to use on the floor are floor texture and what material is actually going to be in contact with the floor pad. When users begin to shift their perspective from floor type to surface characteristics, it helps demystify the selection process.
For flat/untextured floors such as VCT, terrazzo, coated or uncoated concrete, and stone, floor pads generally deliver better soil removal than rotary or cylindrical brushes. For decades, the red pad has been the standard choice for daily cleaning. Today, a new class of daily-use floor pads provides enhanced soil removal and gloss restoration over and above a standard red, blue, or white pad. There are a few of these pads on the market today—in general, they are going to have a double-sided coating with an alternate fiber color sandwiched in between.
Harder surfaces, such as concrete or stone, require an abrasive, like diamond. 
Textured floors, such as luxury vinyl and ceramic tile, may need floor pads for daily use, but many customers will find that soil can become embedded in the texture. There are a few options that can help remove this stubborn soil, like a melamine floor pad. Turf pads, cylindrical brushes, or soft nylon rotary brushes are also good options for textured floors.

Q: How does a cleaning manager choose the correct pad color?

Louis—The cleaning industry has tried to keep color coding pretty straightforward. Generally, the darker the color, the more aggressive the pad/brush. However, this isn’t always true,especially with all the specialty brushes and pad systems on the market. Facility cleaning managers could get anything from a white diamond abrasive that could scratch concrete to a black polishing pad, so double-checking with the manufacturer or distributor partner is always recommended.

VanBruggen—Selecting the correct pad color is a journey. The most effective floor cleaning program is as unique as the individual facility itself. Three questions that will help get facility cleaning managers on the right path are: What are the floor characteristics, goals, and resources at disposal (time, equipment, and personnel)?

Gallagher—The colors relate to the type of cleaning to be done. For rotary grit brushes and bristled floor pads, match the color to the traditional floor pad being used. For finished floors, red is used for daily cleaning, light scrubbing, spray cleaning, and routine maintenance. Blue is selected for moderate scrubbing to remove heavier soil, scuff marks, and buildup. On hard surface floors, green is for heavy-duty scrubbing and aggressive soil removal. Black is applied for stripping or heavily soiled concrete, stripping floor finish, removing coatings, and prepping floors for refinishing.

Q: Which brush bristle type works best for a cleaning manager’s application?

Louis—The ideal brush depends on the floor surface, soil conditions, and cleaning frequency. Nylon- and polypropylene-style brushes are still very popular. More aggressive "NylaGrit" style brushes work well for grout and heavily textured surfaces.
Most of my customers are also evaluating specialty pads as alternatives to brushes because they can provide more consistent floor contact, easier maintenance, and improved productivity in many applications, especially in more resilient flooring.

Q: Can one pad or brush handle multiple cleaning tasks?

Gallagher—Yes, and in many cases, a single-grit brush or bristled floor pad can perform multiple cleaning tasks depending on floor type, soil load, and desired cleaning outcome.
Unlike traditional floor pads, which often require facilities to switch between different pad colors for various cleaning tasks, rotary grit brushes and bristled floor pads provide a wider performance range. The thousands of bristles maintain consistent contact with the floor surface to effectively clean light soil, remove scuff marks, scrub grout lines, and tackle heavier soil buildup without frequent pad changes.
The ideal brush or bristled pad selection depends on the floor type, floor condition, and cleaning objectives. However, many facility managers discover they can simplify their floor care program by using fewer products while achieving better cleaning results and lower overall maintenance costs.

VanBruggen—Yes! I am a big believer that creativity is the “X-factor” behind the best-kept facilities. I learned early on in my floor care journey that embracing atypical uses of floor pads helps solve problems and fosters a collaborative spirit. Stripping pads are sometimes used for heavy-duty cleaning in industrial settings. I’ve seen users burnish with scrubbing pads and scrub with burnishing pads. In fact, even the red buffer pad—today ubiquitous with daily cleaning—was originally designed as...well...a buffing pad. Of the 18 pads in my primary floor pad lineup, 11 have alternate/secondary tasks that come to mind.

Louis—This analogy always gets a good laugh given my lack of hair, but it’s a bit like those 2-in-1 shampoo and conditioner products. They will get the job done, but you won’t get salon-quality results. Similarly, you can find multipurpose pads and brushes that cover a range of tasks, and only some work better than others. With today’s non-waxed approach to floor care—like LVT or polished concrete—specialized tools are key to reducing labor costs and getting great results.

Q: Which pad removes the most soil with the fewest passes?

VanBruggen—Hands down the category of “sandwich” pads, which removes far more soil than a typical red pad in fewer passes. Soil removal is more than just providing an attractive floor for the day—it’s imperative for the long-term health of the floor. Two things chip away at an attractive floor: dirt and scratches. Anything that removes more dirt or corrects scratches is going to help us interrupt the all-too-familiar coat, scrub, strip, and repeat cycle.

Gallagher—The best way to maximize soil removal with the fewest passes is to match the grit size to the application—higher grit for routine maintenance and lower grit for aggressive stripping and restoration. For example, 120-grit (green) provides effective scrubbing performance for routine cleaning and maintenance, while 80-grit (black) or 46-grit (orange) delivers more aggressive cutting action for stripping and heavy soil removal applications.
If the goal is daily scrubbing and maintenance across multiple hard floor surfaces—concrete, vinyl tile, ceramic/quarry tile, raised disc rubber floors, and non-slip epoxy finishes—a green, 120-grit rotary brush or bristled floor pad is recommended. These products are designed for general scrubbing and daily maintenance, removing embedded soil efficiently while minimizing the number of cleaning passes required. 
Lower grit sizes (46 or 80) cut more aggressively and can strip surfaces closer to the base level, making them ideal for restoration and heavy-duty cleaning applications.

Louis—This is a fun question to answer because in years past, we would answer a similar question on floor finish: “How many coats can I remove in one pass?” The answer to this was always the black strip pad/brush. Now, for restorations, maroon pads and water are recommended to clean and remove damaged coats without removing all the floor finish. Frontline teams can also clean with very minimal finish removal using a melamine pad.

next page of this article:
Putting Floor Care Equipment Accessories to Work