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Shopping malls and supermarkets are spaces that both sell goods and receive visitors continuously: lobbies and shared walkways take thousands of footsteps every day, shopping carts roll back and forth, water and food spill in food courts and fresh-food areas, while the logistics warehouse behind has pallet jacks and goods moving in and out. The floor here must at the same time be beautiful, clean, safe and able to withstand almost non-stop operation. Epoxy floor coating is often considered for these areas thanks to its seamless surface and ease of cleaning, but choosing and installing it for a shopping mall is quite different from a factory: aesthetics and the ability to operate continuously matter no less than mechanical durability.
Divide into zones before choosing a floor
Lobbies, corridors and shared walkways are the face of the mall, needing a flat, bright floor that reflects light well and keeps its appearance after daily cleaning. Shops and display areas need colours and gloss levels that suit the identity of each tenant brand, while food courts and fresh-food areas need to prioritise slip resistance when wet and the ability to withstand cleaning with water and detergents. The logistics warehouse, delivery areas and car park of the mall are technical areas, needing to prioritise wear resistance and painted lane markings. A single coating system for the whole mall is usually not optimal; each area should have its own requirements, written down clearly before installation.
Aesthetics together with wayfinding and safety
- Colour and gloss: light colours and a suitable gloss level help a space look larger and brighter, and support visitor wayfinding. However, a high gloss on a wet floor can feel slippery, so entrance areas in the rainy season and food courts need a balance between aesthetics and slip resistance.
- Line marking and traffic flow: floor markings help separate pedestrian flows, shopping carts and delivery vehicles, mark escape routes and restricted areas. Markings need to last under machine cleaning and cart traffic, otherwise they fade quickly and lose their wayfinding function. See also: Line Marking and Zone Painting for Factory Floors
- Slip resistance when wet: entrances from outdoors, areas near doors, food courts and fresh-food areas are places where floors are wet frequently. The slip-resistance solution for these locations needs to be worked out separately, not by applying one roughness level across the whole mall. See also: Anti-Slip Epoxy Floors: Quartz Sand or Aluminium Oxide Grit?
Shopping carts, stains and daily cleaning
Shopping carts and pallet jacks create concentrated wear along their travel paths, especially at warehouse entrances, checkout counters and main corridors. A seamless epoxy surface makes cleaning food stains, water and dirt faster than a floor with many joints, but grease stains in food courts and long-standing dirt still need a cleaning routine suited to the coating, without using strong detergents at random, as they can dull or damage the topcoat. The mall car park has its own requirements for load bearing, waterproofing and line marking, presented at: Epoxy for Basements and Parking: Load, Waterproofing, Line Marking.
Installation and maintenance while still open
Shopping malls and supermarkets rarely close entirely for floor works. The approach often considered is phased installation by shift and by area, outside peak hours, combined with screening, ventilation and waiting time before use according to the technical documentation of the coating system chosen. After the floor is put into use, fast-wearing locations such as main walkways and checkout counters should be inspected regularly and repaired locally early, rather than waiting until the whole floor has to be redone. See also: Localized Epoxy Floor Repair: Patching and Recoating Individual Areas and Epoxy Floor Maintenance and Cleaning Done Right.
Suggested coating systems by area
As a general principle, ordinary walkways and shop areas can be considered for a roller-applied system, while large lobbies and corridors needing an even, highly aesthetic surface can be considered for a self-levelling system. The coating systems from Kadier include the RollCoat system and the LevelFlow system; which system suits each specific area must be checked against the official technical data sheet (TDS) of that system, not inferred from its name or from this article.
Scope note: the content above describes the general characteristics of epoxy materials and floor systems, with TCVN 9014:2011 and TCVN 12574-2018 as the reference framework where relevant. This article does not publish technical specifications, wear-resistance levels, drying times or test results specific to any particular Kadier coating system; those figures only apply when there is an official technical data sheet (TDS) for the product and the specific project.
Featured image: Flint Huynh on Pexels.
