Case Study: An O Riordan Street Warehouse in Alexandria 2015
A 1,450 square metre third-party logistics unit off O Riordan Street, Alexandria NSW 2015, failed its landlord inspection on three housekeeping findings after roughly two years without a real cleaning program. This is the recovery project, the ongoing scope that replaced it, and what both cost. Client details are withheld at the operator request; the site, scope and figures are otherwise as recorded.
The site and the findings
Sealed concrete slab, six-metre selective racking down both sides, a single dock with a leveller, a 180 square metre mezzanine office over the front, a crib room and shared amenities. Two pick shifts a day, five days a week, with a cleaner attending twice weekly for bins and bathrooms and nothing else. The inspection raised:
- Heavy rubber transfer and embedded grit through the main travel aisles, with line marking barely legible in two runs
- A visible dust load on upper rack beams, sprinkler pipework and high-bay light fittings, which the landlord flagged as both a housekeeping and a fire-services concern
- A dock leveller pit holding pooled water, shrink wrap and pallet debris
The recovery project
We quoted a fixed $4,850 across two weeknights and a Saturday. Night one and two: a ride-on machine scrub of the full slab, worked in overlapping passes with a red pad and neutral detergent, with the operator relocating stock aisle by aisle so nothing was scrubbed around. Line marking was mapped first and no stripper went near it. Saturday: a scissor-lift high-level pass over rack beams, pipework and light fittings, top-down, followed by a second floor pass to pick up everything that had come down, then the dock and leveller pit cleaned out, degreased and left dry. Every stage was photographed before and after for the landlord file.
The ongoing program that replaced the old contract
- Nightly, after the second shift: amenities, crib room, mezzanine office, dock approach and bin bay
- Weekly: machine floor pass across travel aisles and the dock apron
- Monthly: full-slab machine pass, roller-door tracks and leveller pit
- Quarterly: high-level dusting of beams, pipework and light fittings with a dated photo set
- Ongoing: LDPE pallet wrap and strapping separated from cardboard and fed to the baler rather than bypassed
- Crews inducted to the site traffic-management plan, in high-visibility PPE, working behind cones where operations overlapped
The program settled at approximately $2,700 a month, inside our Alexandria warehouse band of $45 to $60 per hour with machine floor work quoted per square metre.
The result, and the lesson
The re-inspection six weeks later closed all three findings. Eighteen months on the slab has held, the quarterly photo sets satisfy both the landlord and the operator own WHS audit, and there has been no repeat project spend. The uncomfortable arithmetic is that the recovery cost about two months of ongoing service to undo damage that accrued purely because nothing above head height was ever scheduled. Periodic work inside a fixed monthly figure is always cheaper than periodic work bought after an inspection.
Related reading
Method detail is on our warehouse cleaning in Alexandria page, and production sites are covered under industrial cleaning. The mezzanine office scope follows our Alexandria office cleaning standard. Our other documented project is the Bourke Road studio case study, pricing context is on the rates page, and terms are on the FAQ.
Case study FAQs
What was the site?
A 1,450 square metre third-party logistics unit off O Riordan Street, Alexandria 2015 — sealed concrete slab, six-metre selective racking, a single dock with a leveller, a 180 square metre mezzanine office, a crib room and a shared amenities block. Two pick shifts a day, five days a week.
Why did the landlord inspection fail?
Three findings. Rubber transfer and embedded grit across the main travel aisles, a visible dust load on upper rack beams and sprinkler pipework, and a dock leveller pit holding pooled water and debris. None of it was structural — all of it was housekeeping that had been deferred for about two years.
What did the recovery involve?
A one-off project clean first: a two-night machine scrub of the full slab with the racking partially cleared, a scissor-lift high-level pass over beams, pipework and light fittings, and a full dock and leveller-pit clean-out. Then an ongoing program to stop it recurring.
What did the project and the ongoing program cost?
The recovery project was quoted at a fixed $4,850 across two nights and a weekend day. The ongoing program settled at roughly $2,700 a month — nightly amenities and mezzanine, a weekly machine floor pass, and a quarterly high-level cycle — within our Alexandria warehouse band of $45 to $60 per hour plus per-square-metre machine work.
What was the outcome?
The re-inspection six weeks later closed all three findings. Eighteen months on, the slab has held its condition, the quarterly high-level photo sets have satisfied both the landlord and the client own WHS audit, and there has been no repeat project spend.
Could the project clean have been avoided?
Yes, and that is the real lesson. The recovery cost roughly two months of ongoing service to fix damage that accrued because nobody was scheduled to touch anything above head height. Periodic work built into a monthly figure is materially cheaper than periodic work bought in a panic.
Servicing Alexandria 2015 and surrounds — book a warehouse walkthrough
Request a Free Quote