Is your hotel, motel, or rental property suffering “resident loss” due to the persistent presence of “certain unwanted guests?”
Pests are more than just a nuisance, they are an investment liability. Roaches, bed bugs, ants, rodents, nuisance birds, and other pests can eat away at your profits in multiple ways, and across multiple industries.
How Pests Cost You Money
There are a number of ways that insects and other pests can cost your business money. We have mentioned their ability to drive away tenants, but they can drive away customers from almost any type of business as well.
Termites and carpenter ants can do serious structural damage to your business property. Roaches, moths, and other “culprits” will consume stored food products and potentially spread disease.
And the presence of pests also poses a risk of failing county health inspections, which can be ruinous to a restaurant or food processing business.
Clearly, the risk of not investing in pest prevention and control far outweighs the expense of hiring a professional pest management company.
Pests to Be Concerned About
What are the most common pests that businesses need to be proactive against? A full list could be long indeed, but here are some of the main pests to take action against before extensive damage is already done:
- With nests built in hard-to-reach crevices, ants can be difficult to get rid of. They can damage stored foods, invade professional kitchens, and even chew through electrical wiring.
- Termites, both drywood and subterranean types. Termites do billions of dollars in property damage in the U.S. each year. And with tens of thousands of termites often living in a single colony, you cannot afford to ignore an infestation.
- Bed bugs are a species of insect that feeds almost exclusively on human blood. They hide inside mattresses, furniture, and other locations during the day and feed nocturnally. Beg bugs can leave bloody welts on their victims and spread disease.
- Roaches spread disease, contaminate food, cause allergic reactions in some (especially asthmatics), and leave a distinctively strong and offensive odor.
- Mice often enter buildings in the fall or winter to escape the cold and find water and food. They then damage packaged foods, chew on furniture or wiring, and leave feces and urine trails. And they do all this while carrying as many as 200 different diseases that can affect humans.
- Wildlife, including raccoons, skunks, and opossums, create a major hazard to apartment residents or customers. These large animals are dangerous enough that they must be physically removed or effectively deterred.
In the infographic below (click to enlarge) are listed the top five natural remedies for spring pests.
How to Eliminate Harmful Pests
When you invest in business property, pest management is an indispensable part of maintenance costs. To neglect it is to invite major problems that could ultimately cost you much more dearly.
But how can you effectively eliminate pests or prevent an infestation, to begin with?
Here are some answers from the professionals at epm1.net:
- Seal off all entry points through which pests can access the building. This may mean caulking around windows and doors, filling in any cracks in your concrete foundation, and patching up any holes in the exterior walls or siding.
- Eliminate food and water sources on which pests feast. All foods should be stored in sealed containers, floors and tables must be kept clean, and the garbage should be taken out frequently.
- Rely on a reputable pest management company to identify infestations in the early stages and prevent them with a regular pest prevention plan.
