The floor is the first physical contact anyone will have with a space. Flooring is critical to the interior design of a residential and commercial facility. It reflects your personality and can make or break the overall aura of your property.
Hence, ensuring you choose the right element for this building foundation only makes sense. When you decide on flooring for your property, you’ll find various options, including epoxy floors, paint, and polished concrete.
If you’re unsure which flooring option is right for you, take the word of experienced epoxy flooring contractors in Utah. We’ve outlined this guide to compare epoxy floors and polished concrete for you.
But First: The Purpose of Flooring
Before we delve into which flooring option is right for you, let’s understand how flooring can make or break your property’s aesthetics.
- Affects design: say you own a showroom, but it has a plain concrete floor. When a potential buyer walks in, their first impression of your showroom won’t be great. What if it’s glossy, and the light bounces on the floor and brightens up the whole space? That’ll leave a mark! This is how flooring can affect the design and subconscious of guests and potential buyers.
- Hamper or Improve Functionality: A delicate and well-installed floor can improve the functionality of your property. It can also enhance or undermine acoustics in the shop or home. A floor should be functional and can take the beating of day-to-day traffic.
- Impacts Health:flooring can easily affect health. Any toxic material can worsen allergies. Good flooring material can improve the quality of air and can be eco-friendly as well.
- Influence Maintenance Budget:Maintenance and expenses depend on the type of flooring you pick. If you have a sleek and delicate floor, it won’t require a lot of cleaning or upkeep. Contrary to that, a subpar floor will add maintenance costs and can be laborious.
Back To Basics: Understanding Polished Concrete
Concrete is the commonly used substrate in industrial, commercial, and some residential flooring. It consists of aggregate (gravel, rock, or sand), cement, and water.
Builders value this element due to its innate durability and toughness. When polished, it becomes more resistant and stronger to prevent damage. Many builders also use polishing compounds to create a more dirt-resistant and shiny floor.
Understanding Epoxy Flooring
The popularity of epoxy floors has recently risen. This element is used as an additional layer to protect the flooring. Builders combine a hardener with an epoxy resin to produce a chemical reaction that creates a hardened plastic material.
Epoxy floor coating is a highly resistant and durable coating material. It bonds well with any substrate. Manufacturers have to use high-tech machines, grind down the surface until it is shiny and smooth and reapply sealers to densify and harden the concrete to create polished concrete. Contrarily, epoxy floor coating is easily manufactured with a chemical reaction.
You can visit our floor gallery to explore the type of epoxy and steel epoxy flooring options we offer.
Epoxy Floor vs. Polished Concrete: The Ultimate War
More builders, commercial, industrial, and residential property owners are switching to epoxy floor coating because of its advantages. However, polished concrete remains one of the top choices for many.
The decision comes down to budget, space utilization, durability, aesthetics, and maintenance costs of each floor type.
Durability and Strength
Durability is the first factor you should consider. Industrial and commercial floors need to be tougher and stronger to withstand heavy traffic and daily wear and tear. Your garage, shop floor, and showroom need a durable and sturdier floor option.
Luckily, both epoxy floor coating and polished concrete make great flooring choices if durability is your concern. Polished concrete has innate strength, whereas epoxy is tough and serves as a protective coat for your flooring material.
Budget and Cost
Both epoxy and polished concrete are affordable options. You’ll find polished concrete at most stores. Likewise, the epoxy floor won’t burn your wallet. Epoxy floor coating can last you a decade or two and sometimes even a lifetime, depending on the quality of the material you choose. This makes the epoxy floor a better choice because it’s a long-term investment, and you won’t need to redo your floor frequently.
Installation Process and Time
Between both materials, epoxy takes much less time. An epoxy flooring contractor will take around two to three days to finish the whole job. The process involves surface preparation, primer application, and epoxy and polyurethane top coat application for the finishing. You won’t have to tiptoe around for days before you can walk on the floor.
Compared to that, it takes a week to finish the installation if you want a quality polished concrete floor. The contractor will first pour the mixture and let it sit for two to three days before they finally polish the floor, reapply and dry the sealer. The curing time can extend to 28 days. The whole process can steal important days of your business and life.
Upkeep and Cleaning
Cleaning a polished concrete floor is like dusting a surface with a mop, but epoxy floor maintenance isn’t complicated either. You can use simple water or a squeegee to clean the floor. The shiny floor lets the water spillage sit atop so you can easily wipe it away without a hassle.
Aesthetic Appeal
An epoxy floor coating can add a spacious and chic look to your space. Something that polished concrete won’t offer. The epoxy coating improves the reflectivity of your surface by 300%, so we have a clear winner: Epoxy floor enhances the overall appeal of the space and improves reflectivity so that your business facility or home looks larger than it is.
If you want better returns on investment and don’t want to compromise on aesthetics, epoxy floor coating is right for you. We at Steel Coated Epoxy Floors offer floor coating services to industrial and residential clients in Draper, Layton, Prescott, and Las Vegas. Explore our flake options and reach out to us to request a free quote today.
