Food Contact Brush Storage - how do you keep them away from walls?
Hello fellow SQFers,
One of our vendors was recently cited in their GFSI audit for having product contact brushes touching the wall.
We are currently using a typical brush rack for storage of color coded brooms, squeegees and brushes. Some of our brushes do touch the wall. How are you storing your product contact brushes away from walls? Looking for ideas. Thank you!
if you use something like this, with the business end facing up, it shouldn't touch the wall
If you are talking about the brushes used for cleaning ie converyors where there is direct/indirect contact with food, they must not touch anything i.e floor, walls or other materials. They must be placed in their own enclosed box or something similar. They can not touch the wall and then be used to clean a food contact surface.
Same with Scampi.. or you may fabricate our own as personally, I don't like anything directly surfaced on the wall. what we usually is we have metal plate (the dimension depends on the number of brushes you would like to hang, e.g. 3 brushes we will use 2in (H) x 12 in (L) metal plate fixed to the wall by means of rod to have a distance of to the wall and the plate of atleast 5cm.. then a hanger same with Scampi's post.
However even if you have that you must cascade or make visual standards/reference on how it should be hanged. Even if use the link attached, if your bristle is facing the wall, more likely it will still have contact, so the visual must be the bristle should always face opposite the wall..Not necessarily enclosed.
On 2nd point, the food contact and non food should not come in contact with each other :)
how do you use your brush?
food contact - obviously the bristles not touching anything. you can dip this though in a sanitizer or a sanitized pail (cleaned and sanitized after every x hours)
non-food contact - you can place it on a holder attached to a wall or in a cabinet
Thanks everyone. Most of our brushes are okay hanging on the hooks facing out from the wall. We have a few that the brush head is round-shaped and sticks out about 4" on both sides. I haven't found a rack that sticks out quite far enough for these. A storage bin might be our best option.
SQF lady.........like PP mentioned..........have the maintenance department fabricate hooks for you for the large round brushes............if they cannot (or you don't have the right equipment onsite) call local machine shops, and they will be able to make you whatever you need (bonus here.....you could have it made completely of stainless steel!! ) Big $$$$ but so worth it
Check with U-line.
If I remember correctly they offered a nice extension rack that places the brushes about 1 foot out from the attached wall surface mount. Enough space to avoid the issue.
I appreciate all of the great feedback. We have decided to place a bracket at the lower end of the brushes to keep them from touching the walls.
I appreciate all of the great feedback. We have decided to place a bracket at the lower end of the brushes to keep them from touching the walls.
Share a picture if you can so others who find the thread can see the solution you came up with!
Can anyone confirm or not the need for brushes to be in their own enclosed cabinet? Or off the wall in the production room is ok?
Dear Kevin,
According to me, I would recommend an enclosed cleaning cabinet placed in a high risk food production environment. It can help many ways to food become safer. It will help to avoid any misuse of brushes or cleaning chemical by an untrained staffs. Also it is one of a GMP in food production area and will create a good impression to those who are visiting your place (Auditors/Visitors). However we need to think of our department budget to implement this otherwise we can go for a simple solution to keep our cleaning materials as good/safe as possible.
They DO NOT need to be enclosed unless you've proven the environment doesn't keep em clean
However, if they are strictly for sanitation , then i suggest dedicated sanitation space (closet etc) that is locked . Then give supervisor the key if they need in during operations