Old buildings are the reason the survey stage exists. Around Marietta Square and the Kennesaw Avenue historic district, a single tenant space can sit on terrazzo poured decades ago, quarry tile in the back, and a patch of VCT somebody added in the eighties. The floor stripping process Marietta properties need has to start by separating those, because only one of them belongs on a strip-and-wax cycle. Aggressive chemistry on historic material is a one-way decision. You cannot un-etch terrazzo, and no amount of finish on top makes it look right again afterwards.

Identify the material before choosing the chemistry

Terrazzo is a cementitious or resin matrix with stone chips, and it responds to diamond polishing and sealing rather than a wax cycle. Harsh alkaline products can dull or etch it.

Quarry tile in a kitchen is designed to be degreased and left unfinished. Coating it is how a floor becomes slippery and a safety problem becomes yours.

What the floor stripping process Marietta conversions demand instead

Converted buildings near the Earl Smith Strand Theatre often mix original material with modern patches. The right plan treats each area separately and tests every one of them in a small hidden spot first.

Test patches matter twice as much on old floors, because the material history is unknown and the surprises are permanent. National Park Service preservation briefs explain very clearly why harsh cleaning damages historic material, and the same logic applies to a lobby floor that predates everyone in the building.

Where genuine VCT does exist, the sequence still runs in full

Survey, then test. Contents out, floor protected, signage and barriers up. Apply, dwell, agitate, pick up before it re-dries. Neutralize, rinse and dry. Then coats, drying between them, then cure before traffic returns.

Newer builds near Powers Ferry, Franklin Gateway and the Wellstar Kennestone corridor have plenty of straightforward VCT, and there the process is textbook rather than delicate.

Marietta is our longest drive, roughly forty minutes from Norcross. We run it with a dedicated Cobb crew on a capped load, on purpose. Sending a different team every visit is how a floor program drifts, and a forty-minute drive makes that drift much easier to hide.

Most commercial cleaning gets sold on price per square foot, then quietly handed to whoever was cheapest and free that night. That’s why quality slides after month two — the scope was never real to begin with. We build yours from an actual walkthrough of your actual building, on your actual hours. Then we send the same crew who learned it. Boring? Completely. It’s also the only thing that makes month five look like month one.

DBS Cleaning Services Group

Old tile has a limit, and it is worth knowing where it is

Every strip takes a little off the tile. A VCT floor that has been stripped every year for twenty years may be close to its wear layer, and one more aggressive strip can take it past saving.

On those floors the better answer is often burnishing and recoating for as long as it holds, then planning a replacement on your schedule rather than discovering it on ours.

Frequently asked questions