If you’ve ever been inside of a business and saw an insect flying around or a mouse dart across the floor, your thoughts probably turned to what was going on behind the scenes.
Simply looking at a pest inside of an otherwise clean business makes you feel as though the place is dirty and that you don’t want to spend time there, especially if it was a restaurant or grocery store. You would probably also tell your friends and family to avoid the business at all costs.
This is just one of the ways that a pest infestation can seriously hurt a business. No one wants to eat or buy products from a business that has a pest control problem.
It’s not just their first impressions that will be hurt, though: unwanted guests can cause plenty of trouble on their own, and that trouble is bad for business. Here are three big problems that tiny pests can cause.
1. Damaged Reputation
Reputation takes years to build, but these days can be dismantled with a single tweet — or review, or blog post, or text message. Communication is faster than ever now thanks to technology, and the world could know about a mouse sighting in your building by the end of business hours.
What goes on the internet not only gets spread quickly, but could stay online for a very long time, if not forever. No one will quickly forget about a pest problem that someone talked about online, no matter how long it’s been or whether things have improved.
2. Expensive Building Damage
For such small animals, mice and insects can do a lot of damage to your building itself, your products and materials, and your equipment. Drywall, wood, product containers, ductwork, insulation, and wires can all be chewed through by a determined mouse or rat, which can cause anything from inconvenient holes to building fires.
Insects could get into food containers and contaminate usable products with bacteria and diseases. Keep in mind that, like in most things, procrastination isn’t good: if you wait too long after you notice the first signs of infestation to take action, they could do more damage inside and out.
3. Jeopardized Health and Safety
One of the worst problems about pests is how dangerous they are to humans. Everything from cockroaches to mice runs the risk of carrying dirt and diseases from the outside world into your business.
Contaminants can spread on the pests themselves, through their droppings, in the air around them, or even through bites if they get close enough to someone. Someone with severe allergies could have an asthma attack or go into anaphylactic shock as a result of what pests bring in from the outdoors.
Because you’re responsible for what happens in your business, you’re liable for someone getting hurt or sick inside of, or because of your business: controlling pests is the key to avoiding health code violations, fines, and even closure.
What to Do
The moment that you see signs of a pest infestation in your business — droppings and damage to parts of your building are fairly good signs of insect or rodent activity — call a commercial pest control removal service.
Any pest control company will help you figure out where the problem is coming from, fix it, and give you the tools and education you need to avoid having it happen ever again. The money that you spend on routine appointments will be well worth it when you save yourself money, time, and stress from dealing with a pest problem.
