Scaffolding Safety Strategies When Painting Your Business
Curb appeal matters immensely when you operate a business in the brick and mortar world. You can offer the very best in goods or services at your business. However, if you cannot get people in the door, the selection of products and the types of services you provide become of no avail.
One way to keep your business attractive and appealing is an up to the date paint job on the exterior. In many ways, nothing enhances the curb appeal of a business that does a fresh coat of inviting paint.
When it comes to painting the exterior of a business, a business owner oftentimes has the need to use scaffolding. This is the case whether a business owner uses his or her own team for the project, or retains the services of professional painters. With this in mind, there are some scaffolding safety strategies that you need to bear in mind when it comes to painting the exterior of your business.
Scaffolding Accident Facts
About 50 people are killed in scaffolding accidents at construction sites each year. This does not include the number of people who are killed in scaffolding accidents that involve people undertaking DIY projects at their businesses or homes. Thousands of people, at construction sites and involve in DIY projects, are injured in scaffolding accidents each year.
There are certain scaffolding accidents that happen most often. These are accidents attributed to the planking or support giving way, slipping, or being struck by a falling object. Indeed, 72 percent of all scaffolding accidents involve one or another of these situations.
Properly Assemble a Scaffold
As was noted a moment ago, one of the most common types of scaffolding accidents arises from support or planking giving way. This reality underscores the vital need to ensure that a scaffold is assembled properly in the first instance.
If you are new to using scaffolding, you should give serious consideration to engaging the serious of a professional to assemble a scaffold for your commercial project that necessitates its use. Even when you engage a professional to do this task, you need to still undertake your due diligence to ensure that it has been assembled appropriately.
Training Matters
A shocking number of people never receive any training on the proper use of scaffolding. 25 percent of construction workers who utilize scaffolding on a daily basis receive no training whatsoever on the use of scaffolding. The number of people lacking in training on the use of scaffolding is even higher when it comes to individuals involved in DIY projects at businesses of residences.
Whether you and your own crew or contracted labor, will be undertaking a painting project involving scaffolding at your business, you must make sure that all involved have suitable training. You may balk at the training issue when it comes to a painting contractor. Overlooking the training of people you hire to use scaffolding to paint the exterior of your business is unwise. If you do not have well trained professionals, you actually put your own employees and customers or clients at risk.
Secure Materials
A recurring safety risk associated with scaffolding used for a commercial painting project is the failure to properly secure materials. This includes everything from paint buckets to paint brushes to a variety of other items. A paint bucket that falls from a scaffold and hits an innocent bystander below can cause serious harm. However, you cannot underestimate the damage that can be caused even by a paintbrush that falls from a scaffold.
Protect the Perimeter
When it comes to scaffolding safety strategies when painting your home business, particular attention must be paid to protecting the perimeter. As mentioned previously, one of the major causes of injuries, and even deaths, associated with the use of scaffolding is falling objects.
When you operate a business that is undergoing exterior painting with the use of scaffolding, you will still have to contend with customers or clients going in and out of your building. You have to keep them safe and secure. This includes making sure that they are not exposed to unnecessary risks during the painting process.
Scaffolding Safety Resources for Your Business
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, can provide you with readily accessible, informative resources that can assist you on the proper installation and use of scaffolding. You can access these resources and materials via the website maintained by OSHA. There is no cost to access materials on scaffold safety when you seek out these resources via the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Jessica Kane is a professional blogger who writes for Scaffold Store, the favorite and trusted scaffold supplier of the largest contractors.