A Toms River restaurant owner contacted us last month looking for Professional Grease Cleaning Services in Ocean County after her kitchen started backing up during the dinner rush—right when business was at its busiest. Over months of daily use, grease had slowly accumulated inside the grease trap, and no one noticed the problem until wastewater began overflowing toward the dining area.
This is the type of call Crest Plumbing receives on a frequent basis throughout the entire Ocean County area. There are no symptoms of a grease trap problem. They come at once, or they grow slowly and then suddenly strike everybody, often at the most inopportune moment.
A Grease Trap Fails Quietly, Then All at Once
The job of a grease trap is to remove fats, oils, and grease from the wastewater as it leaves the building. This is the waste found in every commercial kitchen, even in the dining room of Route 9 or on the boardwalk. The grease gets hard over time. Coats pipes and inside of traps. When no one is cleaning it out on a regular basis, the trap becomes full and prevents it from functioning.
After that, the sewage backs up. Sometimes, it’s slow draining. Sometimes it’s a complete clog that causes a kitchen to grind to a halt during the working day. Both are bad for business and both are affordable to overlook.
The client from Toms River was very old on her trap service. That’s not unusual. Many owners consider grease traps to be part of the building’s fabric, and leave them alone. It’s the opposite. The frequency with which traps must be cleaned is dependent upon the amount of grease that the kitchen is running daily, and will need to be cleaned regularly.
What the Job Actually Required
Crest Plumbing’s techs arrived with the necessary tools and vacuum trucks to clear out all the grease and sludge that had built up in the system, without spilling anything up in the Kitchen or in the Parking Lot. This is no task for a bucket and wet vac. The proper tools, procedures, and some experience are needed to remove grease commercially, and someone who has seen enough grease traps up close and personal to know the difference between a healthy trap and one that is infested.
The crew pumped the trap, then scraped down the walls where there was grease, checking lines leading to and from the trap for grease accumulation further down the system. The final bit is the most important. It doesn’t help much if the pipe leading to the clean trap is already coated with dirt. The sooner it is caught the greater the costs of the repair bill will be down the road.
When the team completed their project the kitchen drainage system was resumption to its normal routine. No backup, no smell and no disruption of the service for the rest of the week. The owner said she’d been delaying the call for weeks, concerned that it would entail closing the kitchen for a day. It didn’t. If you’re a restaurant owner around here, most grease trap cleanings are scheduled when your establishment is open and around business hours or early in the morning before the doors open.
Why Grease Traps Get Ignored Until They Can’t Be
Grease trap neglect has nothing to do with careless. A restaurant owner is busy running a business, dealing with staff, suppliers, etc. and it wasn’t until that grease trap under the kitchen floor started causing problems that it became an issue. When it gets called upon to make the call, it is a call for a job to be done and not a scheduled call, and an emergency call will cost more and be a more disruptive call.
Also, there is a compliance angle, but a lot of owners don’t know about it until the question arises. There are regulations in most if not all municipalities throughout New Jersey regarding grease trap maintenance for commercial kitchens, which are based on the type of wastewater introduced to the municipal sewer system. Ongoing maintenance of a trap will ensure that all requirements for a safe trap are met, or at least that it is not likely to cause violation, fines, or even closure in the event of a serious problem. Cleaning is not only to prevent a backed up sink. It’s about being compliant, and not having a mess on your hands when it comes time to put things in order during the busy season.
Building a Maintenance Schedule That Actually Fits the Kitchen
A good schedule is what fits most commercial kitchens and depends on the amount of grease that is produced in the kitchen. If the kitchen frying is always running at a high volume, it may require cleaning services once a month or more often. A small plant of relatively light grease production may get through several months without problems. There isn’t a single number that is right for all businesses. Crest Plumbing collaborates with commercial clients to create a schedule that is more in line with usage rather than a blanket recommendation.
This includes the installation and repair of grease traps. This involves grease trap installation and repair. In some cases the trap is too small for the kitchen it provides service to. Just because it’s old, doesn’t mean another round of emergency clean is the best choice. During a routine inspection, a technician can usually determine whether the trap is working or if the kitchen has grown to be too large for the trap.
Ocean County Kitchens Don’t Slow Down, and Neither Should Maintenance
In fact, there are plenty of restaurants, diners, and food service establishments operating kitchens 7 days a week during the busy season in Barnegat, Toms River, Manahawkin and Stafford Township. This is not a demand that can be faked and Grease is one of the most predictable reasons for commercial plumbing failures! It is also one of the simplest problems to control when a business enters into a routine.
The Toms River restaurant owner has said she’ll be providing quarterly service moving forward, rather than waiting for a problem to crop up again. It is the major change that most customers make after having one bad experience in service with clogged traps. No one wants that to happen again.
Get Ahead of It Before It Becomes an Emergency
Crest Plumbing handles grease trap cleaning, installation, and repair for commercial clients throughout Barnegat and Ocean County, along with the full range of residential and commercial plumbing, sewer and drain service, and 24/7 emergency response. For a business owner who hasn’t had their trap serviced recently, or isn’t sure when the last cleaning happened, it’s worth a call before it becomes an emergency instead of after.
Reach Crest Plumbing at (877) 939-2122, or contact the team through crest247.com to schedule commercial grease trap service in Barnegat, Toms River, Manahawkin, and across Ocean County.
