A trolley incorporating everything a cleaner might need for a typical day would be cumbersome, heavy to push, hard to manoeuvre and difficult to steer through corridors. Manufacturers are therefore increasingly offering modular systems allowing customers to pick and choose only those elements required for the job in question. Ann Laffeaty asks them how it is done.

Related story: new products, trolleys

Manual cleaning is a messy business. It requires various tools ranging from mops and sponges to buckets and cloths in order to carry out the task effectively. These items have to be teamed with assorted detergents and chemicals and there is invariably some mess - such as soiled cloths and dirty cleaning water - to  dispose of afterwards.

Trolleys are the simple yet ingenious facility that makes the whole task possible. They allow the cleaner to transport a variety of tools, detergents, sprays and sponges with them wherever they go. The trolley also provides storage for the waste solutions and soiled cloths.

But cleaning requirements vary from one facility to another so there is no one trolley that fits all. This means that the trolley manufacturer needs to be able to provide flexible solutions that can be adapted to suit a wide range of different environments.

Modular trolleys allow cleaning companies to cherry-pick the elements they require and piece them together in a bespoke trolley for their specific needs. Crisp Clean has been offering modular trolleys for more than 10 years. “We have always based our trolley systems on modular requirements,” said international sales manager Judy Grundy. “We sell to a range of environments from smaller offices to the largest of hospitals. Many years ago customers were happy to settle for what companies could offer but now they are becoming more insistent on what they require.”

A larger trolley from Crisp Clean would typically offer storage space, waste collection, a bucket for holding cloths and a wringing facility as well as clips for holding brooms. Smaller models would include some of these elements depending on the customer’s needs.

Customised options

“We don’t dictate to our customers what they need – they are the experts in their own fields,” said Grundy. “About 85 per cent of our trolleys are customised.”

Among the latest product lines from Crisp Clean is the Solo range which comes in seven versions from the compact ST 100 that includes six trays, a 120 litre sack holder, three six-litre buckets, broom holder and handle clip, to the largest ST 440 model which also incorporates a solo doser and an extra sack holder.

Grundy claims that Crisp Clean offered modular systems ahead of many of its competitors. “Many of them have now realised that having one fixed trolley does not always work,” she said.

Another company that has been offering modular trolleys since its inception is IPC Ready Systems. Modular systems are becoming more important than ever in today’s financially-challenged climate according to president Michele Redi. “These days customers need to get as much as possible in terms of effective solutions while spending as little as possible,” he said.

IPC Ready Systems trolleys range from compact base models for use in tight corridors to trolleys designed for larger areas where several cleaning tasks need to be carried out at once. “Here we would suggest a trolley with a large and stable base supported by two fixed wheels and two spinning wheels, since this set-up is better when handling a heavier trolley,” he said.

Among IPC Ready Systems’s latest models is the Wow compact multi-purpose trolley that can incorporate either a waste bag or a tray plus 25 litre waste bin. It is designed to be sufficiently compact for use in narrow corridors and can also be easily stored.

Storage is often a tricky issue according to Kärcher scrubber dryer category manager Gilles Troff. He said the company’s trolleys are sufficiently compact to pass through any doorway or corridor, but added: “Storing them in the broom cupboard after work can prove more difficult. Broom cupboards are often too small.”

Kärcher offers various modular trolleys including the Eco-Firstliner and Eco-Cleanliner models which can be equipped with a long-handled brush or electric broom, mop holder, waste sacks, cloths, mop and detergent depending on the environment.

One of the most difficult elements to incorporate into a modular trolley is a mop-wringing solution, said Troff. “These require a lot of space which is why we offer a compact system with preconditioned mops. The benefits are obvious: no spills on the floor, exact dosage and no cross-contamination because fresh mops are always used.”

There is a growing demand for trolleys to be able to accommodate cleaning machines such as electric brooms and vacuum cleaners, he said. “There is also a trend toward enclosed trolleys and preconditioned mops.”

More important than ever

According to Troff modular trolleys are becoming more important than ever in today’s cleaning market. “Contract cleaners are being given ever shorter periods of time to clean a building,” he said. “When they move to a new building they must be able to adjust their trolley for performing new tasks. This is where modularity is a clear advantage.”

Vermop Salmon product manager Claudia Berthel agrees with this view. “If a short-term contract ends or a customer loses a contract, the trolley needs to be modular and flexible so that it can be adapted to a new site with new requirements."

The company’s modular trolleys include the Equipe system that can be configured according to the customer's needs with the help of the Equipe Configurator PC tool. The Equipe trolley can be assembled on base plates of varying sizes depending on the size and accessibility of the area to be cleaned. “Areas where several cleaning tasks have to be carried out at once or where the tasks change daily are a challenge,“ she said.

The company is constantly having to adapt to meet new demands according to Berthel. “As we build new cleaning equipment or develop new cleaning systems, we integrate them into the Equipe system,“ she said. “It is also becoming very popular to customise the trolley with the company’s own logo or design."

Among Vermop’s latest products is the  Equipe multiwall which has 17 insertion positions to allow the positioning of the various elements to be changed whenever needed without the use of tools. “We also support our clients with special solutions,“ said Berthel. “For example our Equipemove trolley allows the operator to step on and drive it instead of pushing. This is a good solution where large distances are involved such as at airports."

One of Vileda Professional’s latest modular trolleys is the Origo, which is claimed to be so flexible that it can be configured in more than 1.2 million ways according to business development manager Enrique Canela. An Origo Creator tool on the company’s website allows the customer to configure their own model on line.

Minimum investment

An example of a trolley in this range is the Origo 300FX which can incorporate the UltraSpeed mopping system for wet mopping with a lever press. “But with a minimum investment in different accessories it can be adapted to different mopping solutions such as Swep, where the pre-preparation of the damp mopping system is more basic,” said Canela.

The key to a good modular system is factoring all the elements into the equation at the design stage, he said. “Everything is easy to incorporate if it has been included in the original design. If something new needs to be added later, that is when over-engineering leads to an illogical solution that never quite fits.”

He said the trolley market, like the cleaning market as a whole, was fairly slow to change. “The major change we are seeing is that people are now seeing the trolley as a complete cleaning system than the sum of isolated tools,” said Canela.