The Summer 2026 issue of Cleanfax arrives with a full slate of content built for cleaning and restoration professionals who are serious about growth, quality, and staying ahead. The 2026 Restoration Benchmarking Survey Report reveals where the industry stands on margins, artificial intelligence (AI) adoption, and more. Technical features address tile installation failures, the science of cleaning sequences, and the evolving world of polyester and triexta carpet. Business-focused articles address pricing strategy, the trust gap in sales, and the coming era of AI employees.

Finally, don’t miss an analysis of IICRC’s push for industry advocacy in Washington, D.C. This issue is packed with ideas that will move you forward.

The Summer 2026 issue includes:

• The Silent Killers of Your Business: Every job leaves a feeling that your clients won’t ignore.
• The 2026 Restoration Benchmarking Survey Report: Margins are under pressure, but optimism holds true.
• Why Higher Prices?: They contribute to a long-lasting legacy. 
• Poor Tile Installation: Is the grout really to blame?
• The Science of Sequence: Your cleaning routine may be spreading soil, not removing it—and the order is why.
• The AI Employee Era: It’s coming faster than you think.
• The Operational Plan: How to use a biotoxin assessment kit for microbials.
• The New Era of Polyester and Triexta: Have the appearance-degradation days finally ended?
• The Trust Factor: Buyers have changed. Are you adapting?
• Policy in Motion: Why the IICRC legislative fly-in should matter to you.
• The Last Word: Four Questions: Dan Luckenbaugh

View the Table of Contents and see all that’s available in this issue

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Do you have article ideas or content to share? Reach out via email to Jeff Cross, media director for Cleanfax.

Four leaders across the cleaning industry came together at the ISSA Altus Summit at ISSA headquarters in Rosemont, Illinois, on June 9 to share their best practices for recruiting, retaining, and leading team members for their businesses.

Channing Johnson, president at KB Building Services, Omaha, Nebraska, led the panel and shared metrics that her business had:

• 92% average employee retention overall.
• 61% of front-line employees with three-plus years of service.
• An average application to start date time of two and a half days.
• 50% reduced human resources team.
• Reduced turnover to 66.8%.

Recruiting

Joe Bushey, director of people operations at City Wide Facility Solutions in Kansas City, Missouri, shared that his business hired a dedicated in-house recruiter about seven years ago. The recruiter’s responsibilities include interviewing, offering, and hiring, and they also understand the experience required of candidates, as they have spent time in the field cleaning.

“We’ve taken the administrative burden of the interview process away from the front-line supervisors, who mostly work at night,” Bushey explained. “…The faster you get to work, the more likely you are to want the job.”

City Wide also relies heavily on employee referrals, with several family members in its janitorial team.

Gerren Sprauve, CEO and president of Clean Slate Janitorial Services, Orlando, shared how his business changed its interview process to not only focus on the new hire’s ability to fill the business’s needs but also on how Clean Slate can help them in their career path. Clean Slate now asks potential hires about their goals and shows how the business can help them achieve these ambitions.

“We’re doing our best to become very sticky and give them a good reason for working here, so that they stay longer,” Sprauve said. This goal-oriented interview process has also led to hires referring their friends to go through the same interview process.

KB Building Services tracks employee metrics at 90 days, 180 days, and two years. Data shows that if a team member stays for two years, they remain with the business for almost six years on average.

“We lean into that with the referral programs,” Johnson said. “So, if our employees are referring someone to us, they’re not referring someone that they don’t trust, right?”

In turn, KB Building Services rewards employees who refer with a bonus at the time of the referral’s hire, along with milestones of the referral’s retention at 90 days, 180 days, and two years. KB Building Services also presents an annual award to its top internal recruiter.

“People get really excited about that because it shows how much money they made this year just by doing that and helping the company,” Johnson said.

Otis Scott, vice president of human resources at Prestige Maintenance USA in Dallas, said the business operates with a recruiting team and has streamlined the interview process to focus on behaviors aligned with the business’s values.

Prestige Maintenance also combines the retention bonus and referral bonus into one. “Right after they get hired on the job, the next question they get is, ‘Do you know anyone like you?’” Otis said. Employees can earn an unlimited number of bonuses for referrals, but the referral must meet a retention requirement.

“The biggest thing is right fit, right role,” Johnson said. But she admitted her company struggled with this for 10 years because instead of focusing on a skill set, it was focusing on generic questions that every company asks.

“We said, at the end of the day, what we can do is we can teach you how to clean,” Johnson explained. “Frankly, I prefer if you don’t have cleaning experience, because then I can teach you the KB standard, and you’re not beaten down by the industry or beaten down by the negativity from a prior job. We ended up developing what we call wanted/not wanted lists of traits.”

In turn, every role in her company has an interview process with a list of wanted and not wanted traits.

Sprauve shared that Clean Slate had its best managers and supervisors take an operational (OP) assessment. This allowed leaders to understand exactly where they scored. When Clean Slate interviews someone, it can have them take an OP assessment, too, since a new hire is a significant investment. If the potential hire does not score 85% to 90% of what the top leader in that role scored, Clean Slate wouldn’t hire them for that role.

Johnson added that one thing that has helped her business achieve 92% retention is having potential new hires attend a culture class within its two-and-a-half-day applying to hiring window, graded by the KB’s employee retention team. The fun class provides a first impression of the company, and KB pays attention to traits, including whether the person shows up on time, smiles, and interacts with others in the class.

“It’s been a game changer because it’s allowed us to weed out people that aren’t really great,” Johnson said.

Retaining

Over the years, Prestige has gone into the field and asked employees why they stay, and the answers were not what was expected. After 50 years in business, Prestige found that it was making a difference in people’s lives and their families. In turn, Prestige wants employees and their families to know the same. On the first day of hire, team members receive six videos from leadership thanking them for joining the team and letting them know they belong with the company.

Johnson shared that 10 years ago, when she entered a building, team members feared her.

“That literally has been my goal for the last 10 years to change the mindset,” Johnson said. “In cleaning, you can find something dirty all day long if you want. It’s completely subjective. What I found was the more present I was, the more it changed the narrative.”

Her executive then decided Johnson needed to talk with employees at the two-year milestone. In turn, at the beginning of the month she receives the list of employees hitting the two-year mark, and she goes into the field to meet them, share their accomplishments, and thank them. Last month, Johnson did 18 of these meetings.

The panel shared how important personal meetings, thank-you notes, calls, and texts from executive leadership are to team members and their families.

“It starts from the top,” Johnson said. “If I weren’t doing this, none of my team would want to do this either. We call them ‘employee extra touches,’ and so every role in my entire office is responsible for a certain number of employee extra touches every single month, and it’s tied to their quarterly pay performance structure, and we meet, and we share stories.”

Johnson also gives day and night shift supervisors cash every month, and they decide how to spend it on their team. In turn, they owe Johnson pictures and an email on how the money was spent. “They are the ones that know what their team wants,” she explained. For example, this winter, one of her supervisors used the money to buy a team member a new coat and winter accessories because part of the team member’s work was outside. Acts like this aid employee and supervisor retention because they make team members feel valued, Johnson added.

Leading

City Wide offers comprehensive career branding for every position in the company from janitor to president.

“We are very transparent, publishing it and showing what they have to do or they have to achieve to be eligible for the next step,” Bushey said. “I’m probably any CEO’s worst nightmare because I spent so much time in the Army. I’m not afraid of people leaving, especially if it benefits them individually in their professional career. So, I encourage people because sometimes the roles just don’t line up if you’re not a large enough company to have the right opportunity at that moment. It’s okay if you love them, set them free. If the opportunity presents itself later, they may come back, and they’ll come back with more experience than when they left.”

Bushey added that he carefully walks people through their career mapping, celebrates their promotions, and communicates that promotions are happening from within the workforce.

Scott encourages supervisors to find team members in their portfolios to shadow the leadership. “I’m investing in them because more times than not, they can’t see themselves outside of where they are,” he explained. “…We’ll make sure they are better than where they are today.”

Sprauve said to ask team members, “Are you doing something worth following?” He said this question really prompts people to think about whether they really want to be a leader.

Johnson also encouraged companies to identify roadblocks to leadership within their organizations. For example, if English is a barrier, offer an English as a second language (ESL) class to team members, or if personal finance is a barrier, offer a finance class.