Walmart’s Hometown Distribution Center Enhances Its Concrete Floor Appearance

The floors of the Bentonville, Arkansas, Walmart Distribution Center are now as shiny as a retail store's floor. Here's how.

Problem
As the nation’s leading big box retailer, Walmart operates thousands of stores across the U.S. featuring a wide variety of products. To keep up with consumer demand and ensure its shelves are always stocked, Walmart operates numerous distribution centers across the U.S. to streamline the delivery of products to its stores. These distribution centers can be enormous with millions of square feet of floors to maintain. One flagship distribution center in Walmart’s hometown of Bentonville, Arkansas wanted to enhance the appearance of its distribution center’s concrete floors. It was maintaining approximately 1.3 million square feet of concrete floors using sweeper scrubbers with nylon brushes and traditional sweeping and mopping. “Our distribution center is a 22-year-old building, and the floors are bare concrete that isn’t polished or shiny,” said John Mergendahl, Maintenance Operations Manager, Walmart. “Our previous system removed dirt, or moved it around, but didn’t actually polish the concrete and make it any shinier.

Solution
To elevate the appearance of the distribution center’s floors, Mergendahl implemented Ameripolish’s daily SmartFloor™ Maintenance System, which includes the SmartFloor Daily Maintenance Pad. The pad features an innovative composite resin abrasive technology that when combined with an automatic scrubber improves the distinctiveness of image (DOI), or shine, by gently refining the surface while cleaning. “We’ve got all of our scrubber driers using the pads,” Mergendahl said. “The transition was extremely easy. The pads stay firmly on our equipment and work very well.” Mergendahl is particularly pleased with the appearance of his floors. He says he started seeing results after about only four months. “We started seeing results fairly quickly with some areas showing a big improvement,” Mergendahl said. Mergendahl’s teams are cleaning approximately 27 acres of floors, running equipment in the facility every day.The distribution center has teams running in four shifts for approximately 146 hours per week. Since implementing the system, Mergendahl has been pleased with the durability of the pads. “The pads wear out evenly and are very durable,” Mergendahl said. “Rather than deteriorating when the pads go over anchor bolts on our floors, they are actually shining the tops of bolts just like the floors.”

Results
Walmart has seen a multitude of benefits since deploying Ameripolish products, including: High-Shine Flooring: The floors are much shinier than anticipated, resulting in a brighter and more inviting facility for workers and visitors. Ease of Deployment: The pads fit easily onto existing equipment, making the transition seamless for Walmart. Lower Equipment Costs: Ameripolish’s pads last up to four times longer than competitive pads, allowing Walmart to cover more square feet per pad. Next-Level Service: Ameripolish prides itself on being available to its clients, working closely with Walmart to ensure its products are at peak performance. “Being a Walmart distribution center in Bentonville, we are held to a higher standard,” Mergendahl said. “Our floors should look the best and they do. Our general managers are very happy with the floors and want the machines running all the time.”

To learn more about the SmartFloor System click here.