Kwasny Co. has found its niche in creating innovative flooring systems to meet the unique requirements of the food and beverage industries.

Machines operate on it. Employees use it constantly. So when a company is looking at improving food and worker safety, it is important to consider the flooring surface. Kwasny Co. helps its customers ensure that proper hygiene starts at the ground level.

Kwasny has been in business since 1990. The company is headquartered in Farmington Hills, MI, and also has offices in Charlotte, NC, and Springfield, MA. It is a nationwide installer of seamless flooring products, primarily installing its own brand, called SaniCrete.

“Our philosophy in the marketplace is that we provide a single-source solution,” says Keith Kwasny, the company’s president. “We provide the marketplace with what we feel is a better product, better installation, and a lot fewer headaches, and we give customers an easier buying experience.”

There are several different versions of SaniCrete available, which Kwasny says was specifically developed for the food and beverage industry. The newest version, called SaniCrete XT, is a wire strand-reinforced product which can increase the longevity of the floor by as much as 30 percent, Kwasny reports. It is due to be released early this year.

Meat and poultry processors face several challenges when providing their plants with proper flooring, Kwasny says. “The food processor faces increasingly stringent sanitary requirements, whether it’s driven from corporate headquarters or owners, or federal testing and FDA rules,” he explains. “Because of that, our product meets all those requirements and is a seamless, sanitary solution over exposed concrete.

“Concrete by itself supports bacteria, because it is a porous substrate,” Kwasny continues. “Our product is not porous, and it won’t harbor bacteria growth. Also, because inspectors really hate to see puddling water, we can create slopes that weren’t there previously to make sure there’s no standing water.”

The SaniCrete products also have different finishes, so floors can have a very smooth finish. If the flooring is in a location with heavy employee foot traffic, a non-slip finish can improve worker safety.

Floors in meat processing plants also go through heavy stresses. “They typically expose the floors, whether it’s concrete or a coating, to thermal shock [using hot water in a cold room], and they expose it to chemical attack in the sanitation process,” Kwasny says. “Our product is highly chemical resistant and can be thermal shocked, and we can also apply our product to damp concrete.”

Kwasny is also able to deliver its flooring with a quick turnaround time. The SaniCrete product is applied in a one-step operation and is fast-curing, so the amount of time that a company would have to shut down is minimized. “A lot of times, we’ll get a phone call on a Wednesday that they want us to come in on the weekend,” he says. “Because we manufacture and stock our own product, we can react very quickly.” NP