SMART RESTROOMS AUTHOR Joe Petrie Bathroom Tech Booms Pick the right tools to build to enhance the overall experience inside your restroom. ADVANCED RESTROOM technology is increasing in demand as airports look to enhance the passenger experience and improve operations. While new innovations are coming onto the market every month, it's difficult for airports to know what will fit their needs. But if you consider trends in the marketplace, customer demands and anticipate the new permanent changes coming to public sanitation due to the COVID-19 pandemic, you can focus on the products to best fit your airport. Kevin Smith, vice president of technology for Corvado, a cloud-based facility maintenance software provider, said smart restrooms doesn't just mean implementing new technology. It also means being very conscious of the manual activity that goes into keeping restrooms clean. "You want to take advantage of all the technology like available datapoints like the expected volume of people on a given day and how do you align that anticipated volume of traffic with the right amount or resources required to clean and sanitize your facilities," he said. Studies by JD Powers and Airports Council International (ACI) show passengers are willing to spend more when restrooms are cleaner. Smith said Corvado found concessionaires near restrooms with higher cleanliness scores have higher sales receipts than by those with lower ratings. Paper indicators for hand towels and toilet paper can be tracked to determine when staff can refill them without leaving customers in the lurch. A n n a Kön ig son Koopm a n s, marketing director at Essity, said digital technology is a key tool in Touchless technology is one of the major features transforming airport restrooms. SLOAN 20 \ AIRPORTBUSINESS / MAY 2020