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Budgets for washroom renovation in universities and colleges can sometimes come in high, but that doesn’t mean the washrooms on your campus have to cost an arm and a leg. With careful planning and streamlined design, you could be left with clean, attractive, and durable washrooms and still come away with change.
Approaching the specification
Simplicity is key when it comes to low cost, but great looking washrooms. Consider exactly how many users you expect to be using the facilities during busy periods such as in between lectures and lunch breaks, this will give you a clear indication of how many toilets and washbasins you really need. Washrooms are often too small to cope with capacity, but similarly, they are often cavernous spaces that needn’t be. The extra square metre when it comes to floor covering and wall cladding alone can add up, so it's important to get the specification right and be accurate.
Figure out what’s important to you too. Is it the colour scheme that needs to tie into the university’s motif, or an extra-long life of fixtures, or maybe rugged durability? Figuring out the pecking order of what's important in your washroom specification makes any changes much easier to make.
Upgrades and light refurbs
It’s not always necessary to rip the whole washroom out and start again. Toilet pans and washbasins can often be left as is, while new cubicles, taps, and dryers are left to deliver the impact. The biggest areas for wear and tear in a washroom are the floor covering and cubicle doors. However, when tackling a new floor, most customers tend to install new floor-mounted fittings such as toilet pans and cubicles.
If you already have wall hung toilets, then this might not be necessary, and for frugal site managers, these are a good choice for making maintenance easier in the washroom. Wall hung toilets also make the floor easier to clean and make the room feel bigger.
Toilet cubicles naturally see a lot of use, if you are concerned about durability, then SGL (solid grade laminate) is the best way to go as the material is completely impervious to water and no ingress will ever occur, which means no swollen panels. This sits at the higher end of cubicle materials, and a good second choice would be HPL (high-pressure laminate) which is moisture resistant and more durable than your standard MFC (melamine faced chipboard).
Unisex washrooms
Shared washrooms have been growing in popularity and offer you the opportunity of installing or refurbishing just one washroom, instead of two. In some cases, we see separate male and female cubicle rooms that share a communal hand wash area. Read more about the unisex washroom movement.
Alternative washroom products
Dyson might have created a benchmark hand dryer in the Airblade V, but that doesn't mean that other options aren’t available. Across a whole campus, you can make significant savings by trading across, not down, to similarly powered models that offer the same functionality.
This also applies to other areas of the washroom such as taps, basins, toilets, and dispensers, which are all easy to compare in our virtual showroom.
Our ‘off the shelf’ washroom ranges
Our virtual showroom demonstrates our most popular off the shelf washroom packages. While our Ultra series is very popular among the further education sector, the City washroom offers a sleek, professional design with durability and modern functionality, but comes in at a much lower price point.
While the Ultra series comes with DVS sensor taps, the City offers Bristan sensor taps. The Ultra also boasts Franke, DVS, or Delabie dispensers, but the dispensers on the City are unbranded satin stainless steel. So you can still get the same functionality, and a modern, clean look, at a lower price.
However, you will find most of the more expensive items are manufactured to a higher standard and often come with longer, more agreeable warranty terms and offer good aftercare and support.
If you would like to talk about our washroom ranges or discuss how you can achieve a certain look and functionality at a different price point, please get in touch.
Saving money in the long run
There are features you could incorporate into your washroom now, that will save you money over the course of time. For instance, you might choose to install waterless urinals in the male washrooms. These units are connected to drainage, but have no main water feed and work with a clever filter cartridge. In a busy university, each waterless urinal installed is estimated to save around £400 per year on the water.
Incorporating PIR light sensors into your washrooms, so that the lights only come on when someone is actually in the room, can also bring you substantial financial savings. PIR light sensors also remove the risk of lights being left on overnight, further bringing down energy usage.
Sensor taps and dryers are seriously worth considering
Yes, these items will cost more than conventional taps, but they deliver two economic benefits. There are fewer moving parts than manually operated taps and with the user never having to physically touch the tap, wear and tear is minimal if present at all. This equals less maintenance and fundamentally fewer replacements. Sensor taps and dryers also only work for a set period of time when activated, meaning the risk of water being left running is removed.
If you have a look in mind but are wondering how to achieve it on a small budget, please get in touch on 01202 650900. We can run through all the available options and help you to get the washroom you desire, without breaking the bank.
