The last thing your restaurant needs is a health inspector or customer spotting a pest. Pests in your restaurant lead to negative yelp reviews or worse, a devastating shutdown by the health department. Let’s take a look at why your restaurant might be attracting pests, pest hot spots and how to keep pests out.
We have helped many restaurants shut down by health inspectors. We helped them identify the issues and get pest free as soon as possible.
Successful pest control uses maintenance, sanitation and exclusion before even thinking about pesticide application. It's important to restrict pests’ sources of food, water and shelter before applying chemicals. Pesticides are an important piece of integrated pest management (IPM), but not the whole picture.
Why Pests Love Restaurants
Pests love a restaurants food, smells, warm temperatures, and nooks and crannies live in. The odor from the presence of food, water and perfect temperature are what attract pests. It can be hard to reduce these conditions in the midst of a busy mealtime at your restaurant.
How do they get here?
Pests often arrive with your shipments, inside corrugated cardboard boxes. These can come in with produce, paper goods or pretty much anything else. They can also come from outside or neighboring tenants. Especially if you are in a mall or building complex. Cockroaches have an amazing ability to squeeze through tiny openings if they smell food. Your building’s exterior may have cracks or you may have uncapped drains or pipes. These all are an invitation for Cockroaches and other pests into your restaurant.
- Cockroaches – Cockroaches will eat almost anything including eyelashes, dust, glue and garbage. Cockroaches can survive for months without food, but they can only live 10 days without water.
- Stored-Product Pests – Moths and beetles are examples of stored-product pests. They arrive on incoming food shipments and contaminate so many stored food goods. These pests often make restaurant managers throw out a ton of contaminated inventory. These can get nasty and hard to get rid of. It's best to prevent them in the first place.
Pest Hot Spots for Restaurants
It’s important to know where to look for pests. These pests can come in so many different ways. In supplier shipments, squeezing in through cracks and even arriving in produce. Knowing pest hot spots can help you take the right steps to prevent these pests don't come in or stick around.
Receiving
Shipments of food and other supplies are constant. These shipments often have hitchhikers of pests on board. Pests as well can use the open doors during receiving to walk on it.
Keep receiving areas clean and uncluttered. Make sure this area is well lit so you can spot pests.
Make sure all doors form a tight seal when closed.
If you can see any light from the outside with the doors closed you have a problem.
Install door sweeps or insulating strips to close these gaps. Keep in mind, rodents can squeeze through an opening the size of a dime and cockroaches need only a tiny slit to squeeze inside.
Monitor supplies carefully for signs of pests. Stored-product pests may leave fine webbing in packages of dry goods. Look closely in the corners of such packages. Small bite marks could signal rodents. Dead insects on shipments are an immediate giveaway.
Keep useful tools like black lights (which can help spot rodent urine) and flashlights handy.
If you find evidence of infested deliveries, immediately reject the shipment, remove it from the site and notify the vendor.
Storage
Dry goods are often where pests can arrive undetected. They can lay dormant and later blossom into a full blown infestation in stored ingredients. Here are several ways to keep pests out of your inventory:
Be sure all inventory is labeled and dated.
Use all the oldest items first following "First In First Out" (FIFO).
The longer a package is in storage, the more likely it is to become infested.
Don’t put damaged containers into storage. They could have tiny openings that pests could exploit.
Keep all containers closed with airtight lids.
Store all containers at least six inches off the floor and 18 inches away from walls. This decreases the chances of pests getting inside.
Inspect under and behind storage racks for signs of pests regularly.
If you find evidence of pests act quickly. Inspect all stored items, sanitize the storage area and notifiy your pest control provider of the issue.
Kitchens
Pests love food debris, grease and trash when they are not cleaned up immediately.
Follow these tips to keep the kitchen closed to pests:
Water is one of the easiest things that you can solve. Think about ways to cut the amount of available water to pests in your restaurant.
- Don't leave standing water in your sinks.
- Be sure that floors are completely dried after washing.
- Be sure that equipment is not leaking water or condensation. Refrigerators can be notorious for this.
- Floor drains are often a culprit as well, make sure they get consistent cleaning and drain well.
- Be sure you aren't leaving out wet towels or mops. Pests have no problem getting needed moisture from these.
Trash inside your establishment can be a welcome invitation for pests.
Keep trash outside and dispose of it as soon as possible.
While trash is inside, make sure to cover garbage containers keep proper liners in them.
Dumpsters and any other outside trash containers should have tight fitting lids.
Dumpsters also need regular cleaning.
If possible, Keep dumpsters far away from your kitchen and restaurant.
Clean the kitchen between shifts and at the end of each day.
Be sure to sweep or mop under appliances and counters, clean all equipment every day.
Be sure any area that can attract grease build up is daily cleaned.
Consider using an organic cleaner in and around sink drains and on the kitchen floor to eliminate hard to remove grime.
A good cleaner can break down organic debris that attract pests and ensure sanitary equipment.
Food Preparation Areas
The most effective way to prevent pest borne food contamination is to keep food prep areas clean.
Be sure your cleaning procedures are rigorous.
Pests can make a meal of just about anything – from tiny crumbs under the steam table to grease buildup around the fryer.
Watch out for leaky dishwashers, ice machines, sinks or other appliances and repair them immediately.
Pests thrive on even a little excess moisture. Likewise, clean up any spills and be on the lookout for other sources of standing water in the kitchen.
Clean grease traps daily. Consider applying an organic cleaner on a routine basis to break down any grease accumulation in drains. These scraps can be the perfect food source for a drain fly infestation.
Employee Education
Make smart pest management practices a part of your culture. Your standard daily operation should prevent pest infestations. Cleaning up spills, fixing leaky pipes and inspecting your supplies should be part of a regular routine. It’s crucial to involve your employees in this process and education. They are the ears and eyes of your restaurant and can be the key to early detection of pest activity. Ask your pest control company to assess your current pest management program. Use that time to tie your pest prevention plan together with the proper documentation.
As Your pest management professional we are here to help. We can ensure you have proper documentation. We keep service records, findings reports, pesticides used and more. Make sure your pest control company does the same.
Consistency is key in preventing pests. Communication is important as well. Be sure your team is communicating about potential pest issues. Also, it's important to include your pest control provider in this information as well.
Expert Pest Control helps restaurants that have tough pest issues or are shut down by the health inspector. Give us a ring and we can walk you through how to better manage pest control in your restaurant.