Attention building owners:   It's important to make a great first impression with a clean, welcoming entry at your commercial buildings.   It's worth the time and money you'll spend to present the property well to potential buyers, tenants, and customers.  Here's why and how to...

Entryways Influence Visitors

The entryway and common areas of a commercial property are a representation of the entire building.  If the entryway and common areas are clean, with freshly painted woodwork, bright, operational light fixtures, and updated flooring and decor, it sets the tone for the entire property and how it's maintained.

The entryway is like a billboard advertisement for your property.  If the entryway is unkept and outdated, a visitor to the property may assume that the entire building is maintained in a similar fashion or that other, larger maintenance issues may exist.  

A clean, bright entryway enhances the mood when visitors arrive and creates positive energy.  It creates a cheerful, uplifting environment in which people want to visit, work, and do business. 

The  more care you put into the common spaces, the more likely your tenants are to care for their own office spaces in a similar way.  Also, if you're not on-site, the tenants are also more likely to maintain the asthetic to which you've set the standard of the common areas.

Following are a few tips to update your commerical building's entryway and common areas:

How to Update Your Commercial Building Entryway

Paint:  Paint is the easist and least expensive way to update a space.  If the paint color is clearly from another decade or is dusty and dirty, it's time to refesh the entryway and common areas with a fresh coat of  satin latex paint in a modern color.

Coordinated Furniture:   Place a long, thin console table along the wall of a narrow entrance or a round table in the center of a large, open space.  Be sure the furniture is coordinated and of similar style to make the space feel decorated and cared for and does not negatively distract visitor's attention.  If that means refinishing or painting your current furniture, then do that.  THiS article  explains exactly how mismatched or outdated office furniture can be refinished.

Seating.   Set out some seating.   Setting out a few chairs or a bench in the entryway creates a welcoming feel to the building and lets visitors know they should stay a while to do business here.

(Image Source: Universal Finance Corp)

Lighting:  Be sure all light bulbs are in working order and  light covers are clean and not yellowed from age.  Swap out warm yellow bulbs for brighter, whiter flourescents, LEDs, or daylight bulbs.  

Clean Windows:  Let in more light by keeping glass in the entryway clean.  This may require weekly cleaning or, in very busy buildings, daily cleaning.

Greenery:   Live greenery refreshes the air and allows visitors to breathe easier when they enter the building.  If live greenery is not something you can maintain, then display a few, quality imitation planters - but just a few because too much imitation greenery, will begin to feel dusty and dated.