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OUr lobby carpet has definitley seen better days and now that the new POS is all installed the carpet seems to be our next major project.

We have a few choices:
1) Go with a movie theatre style carpet with designs and stuff to hide the spills,

2) Tile the lobby - I think there are non-slip tiles now that are quite nice and make clean-up easy. We'd still keep the halls carpet but higher trafic areas = more spills in the lobby.

3) What else is there?? Any ideas or suggestions?

Thanks
Blake

From the standpoint of durability and permanence, nothing outlasts terrazzo, which can be made in many colors and countless patterns. This, of course, is rarely an option for an existing building even if it does have heavy concrete floors, primarily due to the stiff costs involved. Tile can be very good looking and durable, but it is about three times the cost of carpet and, like terrazzo, it requires a recessed top to the concrete to allow for its depth, in most cases. Keeping a stock of replacement tiles in storage is only wise, since one will inevitably brake, and it is not too hard to insert a new one you have in storage.

Carpet is now much more durable than in the past with the new nylon fibers having any color and great durability. Static-resistant types are a good idea. And, of course, as you say, carpet can hide the spills. Who has an employee always at the ready with mop and bucket to swab a hard floor as fast as the spills occur? And then there is a slippery, wet area as the floor dries. Any wet floor, even if marked with a sign, is a legal hazard which some unsympathetic patrons may fall upon and then sue you. Is it worth the risk?

I agree with Jim. Carpet is the only way to go, and as you said above, make sure that it is a busy pattern. Never use solid colors or tiny patterns. You will regret it in no time at all.

Yes terrazzo is great, but unaffordable for most, and as beautiful as it can be, it can create a cold atmosphere in many rooms. Many a movie palace grand foyer had terrazzo, only to cover it up rather shortly after opening. The San Francisco Fox is a good example. After the carpet worn out they left the terrazzo uncovered during the last years of it's life.

[This message has been edited by RoxyVaudeville (edited June 03, 2003).]

Yes, terrazzo is definitly out of the budget. Carpet while nice, seems like it has so many added cleaning problems. The new vinyl sheeting (from what I've read recently) is non-slip with water, & able withhold scratching and scuffing. True someone may not be right there with a mop but looking at many other quick service/high trafic areas - Mc Donalds, supermarkets, food courts, etc... None of them have carpet.
I'm still debating.

Someone sway me.

None of the fast food places have carpet because they expect a lot of spills and do have a person on-call for cleanups ("Clean-up in aisle 6") and in supermarkets the use of carts would be impeded as well as the clean-up situation.

It just occured to me that with both carpet and vinyl tile you also have the burning cigarette hazard. True, most people know that they can't legally smoke in a theatre, but there is always the bozo who doesn't care or comes in the door and drops it on the floor inside and slightly stubs it out with his foot -- only it is still going to burn for a while and you can guess what it does for the vinly or carpet, assuming the carpet is the SELF-EXTINGUISHING type of fiber. And if someone gets ticked off at your place, I hate to think of the quick damage a gang of such types could do, all droping their burning butts as they enter the lobby -- or even in the auditorium. Such behaviour was unthinkable just a couple decades ago, but not today!

I am beginning to think that TEXTURED (slip-resistant) quarry tile (ceramic) may be the way to go. It is long lasting and durable, not combustable, of some beauty and character, and if one busts, it is not that difficult to remove it and grout in a replacement. With black or dark grey grout and dark color tile, dirt should not be as noticible, and clean ups are easy. Yes, I would love to go back to the old movie palace carpets of the past, but this is a different day and age where people generally have no respect for property. Best Wishes
Jim Rankin, member: www.HistoricTheatres.org

Casinos, hospitals, cruise ships, theatres, restaurants, etc. all use great carpet by Durkan. If you have not seen the choices available it is amazing.

But the best deal is to see what they have in over-run stock. You never know how many yards or what style but you can get very-very lucky. We designed our entire interior around 1200.00 worth of carpet that would have cost 7000.00. http://durkan.com/pages/printprod.htm

The reason fast food uses tile is because people enter wearing muddy or wet and they turn many times the amount of people that a theatre does.

---

Michael Hurley
Impresario

I have seen tiled theatres and have to admit they do look nice. But I have to agree with most of the comments made here. Carpet is the best bet.

Suddenly feel the need to put my 2 cents in....As a cleaning contractor, I feel I can give many convincing arguments for carpet.

Tile, while beautiful will require a great deal of maintenance. A tile floor needs to be:
1.swept,
2.damp mopped with a mild neutral floor cleaner, and
3.allowed time to dry.
If you are in a winter enviornment, you will also need to use a salt remover so the salt will not chew through the tile or the grout. Winter cleaning also calls for a "flood" mop, and then a damp mop to pick up as much of the salt and dirt as possible, or your beautiful tile will wear. You will also need to deep machine scrub the tile with a floor machine or have it done by a pro at least once a year to remove dirt and salt from the pores of the tile, or your floor will brown and become ugly.
The other option is to purchase a $7-$10K machine called an Autoscrubber to wash and scrub the tile every day. This machine is about the size of a shopping cart, and can easily cause damage to displays and drywall if handled like a dune buggy, which is the usuall way most of your staff will handle it (that's why I don't have one).
One other thing about tile is it has a terrible acoustic value. The theater in my town has tile and causes every noise in the place to bounce off the floor and into my skull, which in fact makes me hurry past the concession stand in hopes of finding sanctuary in the auditorium.

Now for carpet.
Carpet is good! You MUST CARE FOR YOUR CARPET!!! Proper care includes:
1. litter pickup(can be accomplished with broom and dust pan)
2. DAILY vacuum. Use a good quality upright. I use Electrolux uprights. I change the bags when 1/2 to 3/4 full, and use 3layer bags. HEPA is nice, but not really necessary IMO. A vacuum is not a race car and should be worked at a slow walking pace, or an arm's length back and fourth.
3. Stains- the sooner the better. I recommend buying a inexpensive upright hoover steam cleaner with a good quality carpet cleaning fluid to be used daily as needed for simple spot lifting(e.g. coke spill). I use a hand-held spot remover(dirt devil) for the small coffee stains, or spills on chairs, etc. It cost me under $100. My fee to pull out the big machine for a chair or spot is minimum 35 bucks.
4. Regular steam cleaning. DON'T rent a machine to do this. Most machines for rent are light weight and cannot pull up much water - meaning all of the dirt has just had a bath and is now home to many molds etc. Use a professional service, but be careful. The big name people are tempting, but most use a truck mounted system. This means they will need to drag about 300 feet of hoses through your building, bringing with them much of the dirt in the parking lot. There is also the security issue since the front door will need to remain open, so you will need to be present, or pay someon to stay around.
Shop around for the little guy with a portable machine. You will usually get better service, plus, you can lock him in or give him the keys=security. My portable machine can stand up to most of the truck mounts since I only run 25 feet of hose=no loss of suction. I pull 85% of what is put down, so no blowers are needed, and the carpet dries in about 8 hours average.
If you do get your carpets cleaned on a regular basis, say every quarter, the little guy may give you a rate break for the steady work(and mabey some passes) plus you may become his show piece.
If you have read all of this, you deserve a mars bar or something. I hope this gives you somthing to think about

The King

I consider myself lucky that I have a terrazzo lobby floor... It's been there since the theater was built 75 years ago, and still looks almost new... Non-slip wax buffs it up to a nice finish, and is usually a very safe footing, but I am always concerned on those rare instances when we are swamped during heavy snow periods... Wet snow will track in, and when it starts to melt, it can be very slick... Constant mopping, and warnings are a MUST!... Matte finished textured ceramic tile would be my second choice for durability/cost/appearence... There are some really beautiful and durable theater carpets available, but the track in/spill/soil problem still exists, and the really high quality stuff will cost considerably more than ceramic tiles... Local weather conditions and outdoor paving near your location have to be considered before you decide...

Well, we did make a decission and we ended up doing both carpet and tile. We re-did the tile infront of the concession and then extended it up, including the condiment area and upto the usher area. We replaced carpet from the ticket booth up to the concession tile.

It was a nightmare install though. The installer was a complete moron, and I have never seen a worse job EVER. There are gaps between the tile, it is uneven there are cracked tiles....it's bad.

The owner and supervisor came this week to look at it and they decided to RE-DO the entire job! (at there expense).

Except for the mistakes it looks quite good.

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We are looking to replace our carpet. Someone said stay away from small patterns but don;t you want as dense a pattern as possible to hide the dirt and spills?

We have a modest art deco theater from 1926. Anybody have suggestions on designs. I am looking for overuns. Found a place in Richmond, CA with a lot of stuff. What should I expect to pay per square foot?

Know any reliable installers in the San Francisco area?

Also, arethere any problems using different designs between lobby and auditoriums?

The only problem I can think of is aesthetic. Do you want another pattern there? Sometimes patterns are used to define an area, but they should still be thematically consistant with the rest of the decor. No matter how cheap you can get it, if you are putting an art deco pattern between two baroque patterns, you might want to rethink the "bargain." Need expert advice? Ask the art department curator at a nearby museum or library to come to 'advise' on your decor and mention this in advance to your local newspaper which might want to make a little feature about it, and thus you get publicity, and the "expert" gets their name in print as payment for the giving gratis of their civic-minded expertise. Make the occasion a visual one for the sake of the newspaper photographer by laying out ten or twenty large samples of carpet on loan from a dealer to give the idea of what you are doing and to have something for the paper to photograph, even if none of the samples are what you will eventually choose. This way you get guidance and free publicity, the carpet store/dealer gets their name in print as does the 'consultant', and eveyone is happy. You will be surprised at how many people will come to see your new decor (or just the carpeting) once you reopen. Should you have a Grand RE-Opening to salute the new 'decor'? (again, the media are invited, of course!) Promitionalism is part of Showmanship. Jim