ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

A seminar dedicated to hotel cleaning is taking place in Italy, writes Anna Garbagna for ECJ.

In Italy over 34,000 hotels, in all regions, accommodate almost 250 million people every year: business people, tourists, Italian and foreign citizens, who require more and more specialised facilities, especially cleaning services and sanitation of rooms.

In this field, Italy has many producers of machines, equipment and cleaning products; together with a comprehensive network of distributors able to supply the most qualified services for consultancy, support services and training.

The distributors associated with industry body AfidampCOM provide consultancy, support services and training to the hotel cleaning sector as well as those companies that provide services.

In this  partnership, AfidampCOM has identified a key aspect – never discussed before – but of great importance. Cleaning operators face different kinds of problems on a daily basis and these issues are accentuated when the environments where cleaning takes place are planned and built mainly with aesthetics in mind - sometimes without consideration of practicality.

In fact closer inspection of the realities of maintenance and cleaning, in particular, often reveals great difficulties due to the fact that environments, materials, furniture and facilities are not planned to be cleaned. It's almost as if beauty is enough in itself, without the chance to be contaminated by any kind of dirt.

Not only 'big work of art' buildings have these flaws: almost no buildings are planned to be cleaning friendly. In some cases this even applies to hotels, which normally make hygiene one of their selling points.

AfidampCOM has therefore asked if it is at all possible to include in the planning of buildings - especially hotels - prediction, evaluation and monitoring of the feasibility of cleaning operations. While taking into consideration the need for working in short periods of time, optimising performance, minimising resources and investment.

To answer these questions a forum will take place in Rimini later this month entitled: 'Planning of cleaning - how the architect can facilitate hotels' cleaning and maintenance operations'. AfidampCOM has called upon experts Massimo Iosa Ghini and Luca Scacchetti, internationally renowned architects with great experience in planning for the hotel sector, to discuss the possibility of establishing a synergy between the two worlds: the world of architectural planning and the world of professional cleaning.

The issue has never been raised before although it has been around for a while in the DNA of associations which are part of Afidamp that set up the AFED federation - it took part in the drafting of a UNI norm on 'Cleaning services of building estates oriented towards maintenance', by which standards for cleaning operations are also recognised to have a key role in the preservation of buildings.

This preservation would be more timely if, as happens for security, energy saving, etc, it were planned in the first stage of the construction of buildings - becoming a reference point for architects, planners, suppliers of building materials and other workers involved in the building. Rimini therefore heralds the start of a constructive debate which can bring great possibilities.