Before we get into prevention, I want you to understand what’s really at stake. A lot of operators think about pest control the same way they think about paying for insurance — it feels like an expense until the moment they actually need it.
Health inspection violations are no small thing. Pest control violations make up 20% of a restaurant’s health inspection score. That means a single pest-related citation can tank your rating and make it nearly impossible to earn top marks, even if everything else in your kitchen is spotless. In 2023, over 100 food service locations across the United States received citations specifically for rodent health code violations.
One sighting can trigger a shutdown. Health inspectors do not need to see a full infestation. A single live cockroach spotted during an inspection gives them the legal authority to close your doors on the spot. And before you say “that would never happen to me,” — I have seen it happen to operations that I considered to be reasonably clean. Pests are opportunists. They move fast, and they hide well.
The financial damage is multi-layered. When a restaurant gets shut down for pest activity, the costs pile up in ways operators often do not anticipate:
- Lost revenue during closure (sometimes days, sometimes weeks)
- Emergency exterminator costs, which can run from $200 to $2,000+, depending on infestation type and severity
- Disposal of contaminated food inventory
- Potential equipment replacement
- Staff retraining
- Re-inspection fees
- Possible increase in insurance premiums
- Legal liability if a customer becomes ill from pest-contaminated food
And then there is the cost that does not show up on any invoice: your reputation. In today’s world, one photo of a roach on a dining table, posted to social media, can travel faster than any fire inspector. Rebuilding trust after a publicized pest incident takes years. Some businesses never get there.
Why Pests Are Ultimately a Cleaning Problem
Here is where I want to give you a perspective you will not get from the exterminator. Pest control companies do their job — and a good one is absolutely worth having. But if your sanitation habits are poor, no amount of bait stations or chemical treatments will provide lasting protection. Pests follow three things: food, water, and shelter. Your cleaning program is what takes those three things off the table.
After four decades of visiting commercial kitchens, I can walk into a restaurant and know within about ten minutes whether they have a pest problem — not because I can see pests, but because I can see the conditions that invite them. Let me walk you through the areas that matter most.
The 7 Cleaning Habits That Actually Keep Pests Out
1. Clean Your Floor Drains — For Real
Floor drains are one of the most overlooked areas in any commercial kitchen, and they are ground zero for pest activity. Drain flies — those small, moth-like pests you might dismiss as just a nuisance — breed in the organic slime that builds up inside floor drains. Cockroaches use drains as highways through your building. Rodents can access your facility through poorly maintained drain lines.
The issue is that most kitchen staff look at the top of the drain grate and think it is clean. The buildup that attracts pests is deep inside the drain itself — the organic material coating the pipe’s interior walls. You need a drain cleaner with enzymatic or biological action to break down that biofilm, combined with a drain brush to agitate the walls. This should be part of your nightly closing routine, not a weekly afterthought.
I have seen facilities that spent thousands of dollars on fly control without ever solving their drain problem. Once they addressed the drains properly — the right chemical, the right frequency, and the right process — the fly pressure dropped dramatically.
2. Treat Your Grease Traps Like They Matter
A neglected grease trap is like a pest buffet. The accumulated organic matter is not just a plumbing issue — it is a breeding ground for flies and a food source for cockroaches and rodents. Many operators schedule grease trap service on a rigid calendar without ever checking whether the schedule actually matches usage. A busy kitchen during a summer rush may need service twice as often as the same kitchen in January.
Know your grease trap capacity and stay ahead of it. If you smell it before the scheduled service date, it is already too late.
3. Clean Behind and Under Equipment — Every Night
This one sounds obvious, but I promise you it is not being done consistently in most kitchens. The space underneath a six-burner range, behind the fryer, and under the prep tables is where cockroaches establish themselves. It is warm, dark, and loaded with food debris if it is not cleaned regularly. German cockroaches — the number one pest problem in U.S. restaurants — specifically gravitate toward these tight, warm spaces.
The cleaning standard I would set is simple: if food can get there, cleaning chemicals need to get there too. That means moving equipment during weekly deep cleans and scrubbing the floors and walls behind and beneath every piece of equipment. It also means training your staff not just to sweep the visible floor at the end of the night, but also to look underneath and behind as part of their standard routine.
4. Stop Ignoring Your Mop Heads and Cleaning Tools
This one is not talked about enough. A wet mop head that sits in a dirty mop bucket overnight is one of the most attractive egg-laying surfaces for fruit flies. An adult female fruit fly can lay up to 2,000 eggs on a moist, organic surface. Your mop head qualifies.
Every mop head should be laundered or replaced regularly, and mop buckets should be emptied, rinsed, and stored dry every single night. The same applies to cleaning rags, scrub brushes, and any other porous cleaning tool that holds moisture.
5. Get Serious About Your Trash Program
Unmanaged food waste attracts pests more than almost anything else. But the problem is rarely just the trash can — it is the entire chain of how waste is handled. Here is what that program needs to look like:
- All trash cans inside the kitchen should have liners and lids.
- Trash cans should be emptied frequently during service — not just at close.
- The cans themselves need to be washed, not just emptied. A clean liner in a dirty trash can is still a pest attractant.
- Dumpsters outside need to be kept closed, and the surrounding area needs to be kept clean of food debris.
- Food from the dumpster area should not be tracked back into the building on shoes and delivery carts.
I have walked into facilities where the kitchen looked reasonably clean, but the dumpster area was completely unmanaged — overflowing, wet, surrounded by loose debris. Pests established themselves outside and walked right in with the next produce delivery.
6. Inspect Every Delivery Before It Comes In
Speaking of deliveries — this is one of the most common and least discussed entry points for pests. Cockroaches, in particular, hitchhike on corrugated cardboard. They love it because the fluted channels inside the cardboard make perfect harborage. Deliveries from suppliers bring boxes that have been sitting in warehouses, trucks, and loading docks.
Your receiving process should include:
- Unpacking deliveries in a designated area away from food prep
- Inspecting boxes for signs of pests before bringing them inside
- Breaking down and disposing of cardboard boxes immediately, rather than storing them in corners
I have seen restaurant operators wonder where their cockroach problem came from after doing everything else right — only to trace it back to produce boxes stored in the walk-in cooler.
7. Address Moisture Problems Immediately
Pests need water to survive just like we do. A leaking pipe under the prep sink, a condensation issue in the walk-in, a clogged floor drain holding standing water — these things attract and sustain pest populations long after a treatment has knocked them down. Fixing moisture issues is not just a maintenance call; it is pest prevention.
During any sanitation walkthrough, your kitchen manager should look for water accumulation and report it immediately. If the floor around a piece of equipment is always wet, find out why — it is either a plumbing issue or a cleaning process issue. Either way, it needs to be solved.
Your Pest Prevention Cleaning Checklist
Here is a simple checklist you can post in your kitchen or use for your opening and closing procedures:
Daily:
- Clean and treat floor drains with an appropriate enzymatic cleaner
- Wipe down all equipment surfaces, including sides and backs.
- Sweep and mop behind and under the equipment.
- Empty, wash, and reline all trash cans.
- Remove all cardboard from the building.
- Store all dry goods in sealed containers, 6″ off the floor
- Launder mop heads or hang them to dry completely.
- Empty mop buckets and store them dry
Weekly:
- Deep clean behind and beneath all major equipment
- Inspect drain interiors and treat as needed.
- Clean the grease trap area and inspect the fill level.
- Inspect the exterior around dumpsters and address any buildup.
- Check for signs of pest activity: droppings, gnaw marks, rub marks along walls, and greasy smear marks.
Monthly:
- Walk the building with your pest control professional to review conditions.
- Inspect the receiving area and storage for any signs of harborage.
- Review and update your pest management log.
The Connection Between Cleaning Standards and Pest Control Contracts
One more point worth making: a professional pest control program is not a substitute for a clean kitchen — it is a partnership with one. The best pest control professionals I have worked alongside over the years will tell you the same thing. They can treat and monitor, but if the sanitation conditions that invite pests are not addressed, the problem will keep coming back.
When you evaluate a pest control vendor, ask them directly: “What sanitation conditions are we addressing that will make your treatments more effective?” A good provider will have a detailed answer. If they want to spray and leave without a sanitation conversation, find a different provider.
If you are unsure where your sanitation program has gaps — the kind that pest control visits alone cannot solve — that is exactly the kind of assessment I work through with hospitality operators. Forty years of walking kitchens gives you a very different eye for what a pest sees when it enters a commercial space.
Final Thought
The old saying in my business is “pay me now or pay me later” — and there is no cleaner illustration of that principle than pest control. A proper sanitation program costs you time and discipline every day. An infestation costs you everything.
The cleaning habits I described in this post are not complicated. They do not require expensive equipment. They require consistency, training, and a management culture that takes seriously the connection between sanitation and pest prevention seriously.
I started as a dishwasher. I know what it is like to be at the end of a shift, exhausted, with a floor to mop and a drain to clean. But I also know what a kitchen looks like six months after those things stop getting done properly.
Do the work now. Protect what you have built.
Jerry Bauer has spent 40+ years in hospitality cleaning, starting as a dishwasher in the 1970s and working through every corner of the industry. He is the host of the Cleaning Processes with Jerry podcast and founder of Bauer Consulting, helping hospitality operators and cleaning product manufacturers build better programs. If you would like to connect, reach Jerry at Jerry@hospitalitycleaning101.com or visit BauerConsulting.co.
📻 Listen to the Cleaning Processes with Jerry podcast on your favorite app or at HospitalityCleaning101.com/podcast