How Do I Keep Roaches Out of My Restaurant? | American Pest

The Big Takeaways:

• Roaches thrive in restaurants when sanitation slips because drains, trash bins, equipment tubing, and floor-level moisture give them easy places to hide and feed.
• Regular inspections and strong exclusion practices such as sealing openings and placing monitoring boards help stop roaches before they spread.
• Professional commercial pest control provides the most reliable long-term protection by preventing failed audits, protecting your reputation, and supporting a safer environment for staff and customers.

Starting a new restaurant takes a lot of time, effort, and money.

If you’ve researched your location well, staffed your restaurant with people who provide exceptional customer service, and have a menu that keeps your customers coming back again and again, you’ll start to turn a profit after a year or two of hard work.

But what happens if a customer spots a cockroach walking across the table or floor?

News coverage can help or hurt a restaurant, and nothing draws negative attention faster than a report of pests inside an establishment. Even a single sighting of flies, cockroaches, rodents, or pantry pests can quickly become a public story that damages your reputation and impacts customer trust.

All of your hard work can disappear quickly if that customer causes a scene or reviews your restaurant negatively, and before you know it, your reputation could be ruined.

There are three basic steps to preventing a cockroach infestation in your restaurant:

Maintain Proper Sanitation

Avoiding cockroaches and other pests in your restaurant starts with sanitation. Create schedules for the crew for daily cleaning of trash bins, floors, sinks, and kitchen equipment. A very thorough cleaning should be completed when the restaurant closes each night.

Inspection

Inspecting your restaurant regularly will give you an idea of where pests could be harboring and help you decide if you need to use insecticide applications and where to use them.

Look closely at any area that could be a hiding spot for pests. Rodents, cockroaches, and flies will generally leave behind evidence that they’ve been in a certain area – such as feces, egg cases, or skins.

Inspect trash bins, floor drains, sinks, and all kitchen equipment and tubing on appliances where rodents or insects could hide.

If you suspect an infestation of cockroaches or any other pest, place glue boards near the suspected area so you can see what type of pest you have and select the appropriate treatment.

Exclusion

Check that your restaurant has tight weather seals around every window and door. Use caulk to close any openings. Treating the perimeter of the exterior of your restaurant can also help prevent pests from coming indoors. 

Restaurant Cockroach Prevention

While you can take the above steps on your own to reduce your risks for cockroaches and other pest infestations, your restaurant will greatly benefit from relying on professional commercial pest control from American Pest.

When you have ongoing commercial pest control you can expect the following benefits:

• Protection from failed health inspections: If your score goes down it can threaten your ability to keep the doors open, and news agencies are quick to report on low inspection scores.
• Protection for your reputation: Pest control technicians monitor and manage pest threats so there is less chance your customers ever encounter them. With smartphones and instant reviews, even a single sighting can become public quickly.
• Protection for your property: Termites, rodents, and other pests can damage wood, wallpaper, drapes, and furniture. Ongoing pest control helps establish a barrier to keep damaging pests out.
• Increased morale: Pests don’t just affect customers—employees feel the impact too. A professionally maintained pest-free environment can support happier and more productive staff.
• Effective, professional solutions: DIY products can worsen issues or create new risks. Professional pest control delivers solutions designed to safeguard your business while reducing unnecessary chemical exposure.

You’ve put your blood, sweat, and tears into starting and running your restaurant – don’t put it all at risk over a potential cockroach sighting!

Our certified pest control professionals will survey and target treatments to the unique needs of your restaurant and will take corrective action as needed.

While we recommend a preventative program for the best results, we also offer emergency pest control solutions and a 24/7 staffed customer care center to meet the needs of our commercial customers.

Give us a call today to see how we can help you keep your restaurant up and running smoothly without the threat of pests.