Floor care is the part of a cleaning contract most likely to be bought as an emergency and least likely to be planned, which is exactly backwards. A hard floor that is scrubbed and recoated on a schedule needs full stripping rarely; a floor that is left until it looks bad needs stripping often, and stripping is the most expensive thing that happens to a floor. The money in floor care is almost entirely in that choice, and it is made in the specification rather than at the point the floor fails.
The ladder: buff, scrub and recoat, strip and refinish
Buffing restores gloss on a finish that is intact. A scrub and recoat removes the top layers and puts new ones on. A strip takes everything back to the tile and rebuilds the finish from nothing. They are three prices and three intervals, and the whole discipline of floor care is keeping a floor high on that ladder so it never has to visit the bottom of it.
What is actually published
Two companies in this record put a floor care figure in writing: ISSA publishes a strip and refinish rate per square foot, and Commercial Cleaning Corp publishes a floor waxing and polishing rate, also per square foot. Both are quoted on their own pages and dated in this record. Everything else you will be offered is a walkthrough price, which is not evasion so much as an admission that the variables are real.
The variables that move a floor price
Floor type, how many coats of finish are already on it, how much furniture has to move, the number of coats going back, and above all when the building can be closed. Overnight and weekend access is the single biggest multiplier and it is almost never in an advertised rate.
Why the programme is cheaper than the emergency
A scheduled scrub and recoat on a sensible interval costs a fraction of a strip, and it also avoids the closure that a strip requires. The reason floors end up stripped is rarely that the schedule was wrong; it is that there was no schedule and the floor was reviewed when it started to look tired.
Questions people ask about commercial floor care
What does commercial floor care cost per square foot?
The two published figures in this record are ISSA's strip and refinish rate and Commercial Cleaning Corp's floor waxing and polishing rate, both per square foot and both quoted from their own pages. They are the whole of what this market puts in writing.
Is floor care inside the nightly rate?
Sweeping and mopping are. Buffing, scrubbing, recoating and stripping are periodic project work and should be their own lines with their own intervals, because folded into a monthly figure they become invisible and then optional.
How do I know whether a quote is for a strip or a recoat?
Ask how many coats come off and how many go back. A proposal that cannot answer that in one sentence is quoting a scrub while describing a strip, which is the most common pricing confusion in this category.
Does the floor type change the method?
Substantially. Vinyl composition tile, sealed concrete, terrazzo, wood and luxury vinyl plank take different chemistry and different pads, and a contractor who does not ask what the floor is has not yet priced your floor.
Can this be done while the building is occupied?
Buffing often; stripping essentially never. The floor has to stay out of use while it dries, which is why the access window is the variable that most moves the price.