Is Your Kitchen Exhaust Hoods System Costing Your Restaurant Money?

Restaurant hood systems are meant to aid restaurant operations so that you can focus on customer satisfaction and make more money. But if something goes wrong with your restaurant’s vent hood installation, it may tell badly on the overall productivity of your restaurant business and how much money you make eventually.

In this article, we’ll show you how incorrectly installed kitchen exhaust hoods can hinder how much profit you make from your restaurant business. Also, we’ll give you tips to correct the problems quickly.

Why You Need Properly Restaurant Hood Systems

Running a restaurant without a kitchen hood is a poor decision considering the age we are currently in. You may make fewer profits, deliver lesser quality, or lose the loyalty of your customers to other restaurant businesses that are taking advantage.

Below are some of the most common perks of not properly installing a vent hood in your restaurant kitchen.

1. Drop in Employee Productivity

Typically, the odorous air and heat in a kitchen tends to cause inconvenience for its workers, particularly when it’s a quite busy one. That being the case, kitchen workers may become less motivated to give their best, which ultimately affects their productivity.

A properly ventilated kitchen may help to naturally motivate and boost employees’ productivity. That’s why your vent hood system has to be correctly installed to trap grease and heat that cause much discomfort for your kitchen workers.

2. Customer Discomfort

Many restaurant operators ignore the kitchen exhaust system in the commercial kitchens operations because they think their customers aren’t affected, but that’s not the case.

Odorous air from your kitchen can sneak into the main restaurant area and cause inconvenience for your visitors. If this happens, you may lose your customers and make fewer profits from your business.

That said, it will help if you install the right kitchen exhaust system with the correct baffle filters in your commercial kitchen space you will completely control the kitchen air quality, leaving you restaurant commercial kitchen space with a fresh smell just like the indoor air quality of your home.

3. Utility Bills

Your utility bills keep mounting if the installed exhaust hood systems are not serving the intended purpose. So, what’s the point of not ensuring it’s correctly installed since you’ll still incur the usual utility bills?

In some cases, the vent hood may be properly fixed in your kitchen, but it may need some cleaning or maintenance. Create time out of your busy schedule and fix the issue at once. When you’ve settled that, you’ll feel better that you’re paying bills for what serves you well.

Quick Tips for Saving More Money from Your Vent Hood System

The tips below will help you maximize the energy your vent hood system consumes, and, consequently, reduce the cost you incur in business.

1. Ventilation System Balancing

Excessive smoke accumulating in your kitchen is a likely indication that your restaurant’s vent hood system is unbalanced or your ductless hood suck. We recommend that you consult a trained and experienced technician to help balance the kitchen exhaust hood system, making your restaurant safe for employees and customers.

2. Suction Maximization

Though it is relatively inexpensive to run an efficient ventilation system in your commercial kitchens, there are simple hacks that can help maximize extractor hood efficiency.

The heart of any commercial kitchen is the cooking equipment so make sure it is placed directly under the “lungs” of the commercial kitchen exhaust hood to better position it to remove heat, grease, and smoke quickly and effectively. You may also adjust the side panels to increase the efficiency of your hood installation. Proper placement will ensure your fire suppression system, whether it’s an ANSUL-6.0 Ansul or Halifax SCHP1448 Type, meets National Fire Protection Association standards.

3. Ventilation Control

A demand control helps to identify the volume of activities in your kitchen and then regulates the exhaust hood system. Experts have shown that demand controls can reduce the amount of energy your kitchen vent hood uses by 30-50%. That said, you should install a demand/ventilation control to cut costs and enjoy a more effective exhaust hood system. This is especially useful on integrated restaurant exhaust hood systems and double island hoods.

4. Extend Your Vent Hood System

To avoid extra costs, some restaurant operators don’t upgrade their kitchen equipment even when it’s apparently necessary.  When space permits the fastest least expensive hood expansion is from a single commercial exhaust hoods to a double island hoods. You could also consider low proximity hood options. These exhaust hood systems have baffle filters at the cooking surface and exhaust the grease laden vapors to the rear and back any type of stove.

You should check if your vent hood system is large enough to cater to the volume of activities in your type of commercial kitchen space. If you need to extend it, ignore the extra cost for now and upgrade the system immediately. If not, it may cost you more than you bargained for in the long run.

4. Place Cooking Equipment Strategically

It’s very helpful to separate the heavy cooking equipment from the minor ones. What’s more, it’s better to place the heavy equipment directly under the hood. For the other equipment, find a perfect position where the kitchen hood can still easily trap steam and cooking vapors.

5. Clean the Hood Filter Regularly

The hood filters in exhaust hood systems help capture grease from heavy cooking activities in the kitchen. Over time, the substances will build up and can result in your kitchen exhaust fan working harder that it should if you don’t clean the filters regularly. We recommend hiring a reliable kitchen hood cleaning service to help if you can’t do it yourself.

Conclusion

Your goal as a restaurant owner is to make more money and provide maximum satisfaction for your customers. Ensuring that your restaurant hood systems kitchen exhaust fan is correctly installed and working efficiently is a smart way to achieve your goals. But, more importantly, the purpose of any restaurant kitchen ventilation system is the safety and health of your staff and patrons. Maintaining your commercial kitchen space with quality kitchen ventilation components meets all of your goals.