Wash your hands quote on liquid soap bottle, bathroom poster. Handwritten brush lettering print. Virus prevention tip, personal hygiene. Cartoon drawing of soap dispenser with slogan

While cold and flu season may be ending, keeping up with proper hand hygiene is important to not only protect ourselves, but those around us. To help commercial facilities prioritize hand hygiene, Sofidel shares four recommendations ahead of World Hand Hygiene Day, celebrated on May 5. 

“World Hand Hygiene Day’s theme of ‘Unite for safety: clean your hands’ highlights the responsibility each and every one of us has to practice proper hand hygiene,” says Fabio Vitali, vice president of Marketing, Sofidel. “Hand hygiene is vital for infection prevention, and we continue to enhance our restroom products to meet the handwashing needs of businesses throughout the U.S.”   

Sofidel offers the following hand hygiene tips:  

1. Encourage frequent handwashing. Consider sharing digital signage around your facility’s restrooms highlighting key handwashing tips, like washing for a minimum of 20 seconds or the equivalent of singing the “Happy Birthday” song twice. The CDC offers several fact sheets that can be shared to get employees, visitors, students or anyone else who frequents your facility’s restrooms on board with proper handwashing.

2. Keep supplies stocked. A recent Harris Poll uncovered that 68 percent of Americans would view a business poorly if its restroom had empty hand soap and paper towel dispensers, among other restroom products. The ability to properly wash hands when using a facility’s restroom is highly important to consumers, so be sure to stock restrooms regularly.

3. Incorporate automatic dispensers. Just last year, a survey found that the use of automatic or no-touch dispensers in a restroom enhances over half of Americans perceptions of that facility’s cleanliness. Adding automatic paper towel and hand sanitizer dispensers can help improve the public’s perception of a business to keep customers returning.

4. Provide paper towels by restroom exits. Consider adding paper towel or door tissue dispensers near your facility’s restroom exits. After handwashing at a facility’s restroom, 44 percent of consumers shared they like having door tissue dispensers near the exit as it increases their positive perceptions of the business.

Later this year is the similarly-themed Global Handwashing Day. For additional hand hygiene tips centered on overall hand hygiene, click here.