Alternative Pest Control With Air Curtains
Challenge
When you restore an historically important venue that once played host to luminaries like Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, and Duke Ellington, you install premium products to ensure you deliver a setting that pays due homage to its storied past.Set in Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood, the club finds itself in a tropical monsoon climate with warm winters and long, hot, and humid summers where temperatures will rise to an average high of over 90.9°F in July. Such a convergence of climatic factors result in what experts suggest is mosquito season year–round. It’s also a haven for an abundance of other insects -- reportedly numbering around 373.
For the site's new owners Bill Fuller and Zack and Ben Bush, installation of a dozen of Mars Air Systems air curtains was their only choice when they were told by trusted allies, “gotta go with Mars”.
The Solution
Renovations at the club included the installation of an expanse of bi-fold doors that now give patrons access to the garden area.A second, larger 50-foot stretch of accordion doors was installed to invite foot traffic and passersby on 8th Street and minimize the separation between indoors and out. Such welcoming openings augment the ambiance, but also invite in hot, humid air and serve as a welcome mat for flying pests that can bring contaminants and annoyance.
Savvy specifiers secured the openings with a blockade of protection using the Mars Standard series unheated models. Widely-known as a commercial and industrial hybrid, the Standard units feature a ½ hp motor and provide superior protection in heights up to 10 ft. Now secured is a lively indoor scene with music on two stages and Cuban tapas dishes served to crowds of locals and the city’s thousands of annual tourists. Guests remain pest-free while the owners have confidence that their utility spend is controlled and the number of disease-bearing flying insects is dramatically diminished.
“TRUSTED ALLIES INSISTED...GOTTA GO WITH MARS” -BILL FULLER, BALL & CHAIN CLUB
KEEPING WIDE OPENINGS FROM ATTRACTING THE WRONG CROWD
When a popular sports bar in downtown Overland Park, Kansas added a track-guided garage door and a series of fold-out windows along the second-floor dining area to open the space and bring the outdoors in, Johnson County health code regulations threatened to halt the experience enhancing plans.Prohibitions against open exposure to flying pests in food prep and food serving areas were circumvented when Mars Air Systems formed the backbone of a solution to meet regulatory requirements, enhance guest comfort, and cut utility bills. A cleverly-designed exterior mount solution worked double duty as an architectural mullion as well as a supportive ledge to cradle the hardworking air curtain units. A painted protective covering was then custom-made and placed around the units to shield them from the often harsh Midwestern elements, all while blending in with the building and appearing to be part of an intentional facade. Now the threat of flies and mosquitoes has been halted as the air curtains provide the proven invisible protective shield the health code demands. Able to operate continuously whenever the garage door or windows are open and still provide trusted defense, patron experiences are also protected as any drifting cigar or cigarette smoke from the patio is prevented from reaching inside diners.
BALLS KEEP FLYING, PESTS GET GROUNDED
Camelback Ranch Stadium — home turf to two Arizona League teams and spring break host to the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago White Sox — sits amid 141 acres populated by 5,000 plants and trees that invite flying pests of every kind.Add to that a fully-stocked lake (to attract pests that breed in standing water) and frequent dust storms, and its clear why the powerful Mars air curtain units were on in demand in every concession stand. With the installation of a host of Mars units, including those at the main kitchen receiving doors and the large opening at the White Sox training kitchen, the result is an effective embargo on flying pests, unconditioned air, and dust in the food at this important facility that fosters baseball love. Now 118,000+ sq ft of clubhouse space, 13 full baseball fields, three half-fields, and up to 13,000 daily guests enjoy a shield of protection from unpredictable Arizona desert haboob dust storms and uninvited pests.
ONLY EXCEPTIONAL PERFORMERS INVITED
When you bring in the world’s top entertainment venue designers to build an iconic sports facility valued at $1.1B, filling the 1.75M sq ft structure with premium equipment that performs with the latest technology is the name of the game.U.S. Bank Stadium – home to the Minnesota Vikings football franchise – is big, bold, and best-in-breed. With entry doors that serve as the gateway for tens of thousands daily, they needed the most technologically–advanced way to thwart flying pests and keep climatized air inside and harsh winds outside. Now with 25 sizable Mars air curtains, fans experience a halo of heated air during Minnesota winters and an invisible protective barrier from dust and pests year–round. Down below, the dock doors that service the facility's over 430 food points of sale, have their own protection with a cluster of Mars industrial air curtains, designed for environments that need heavy-duty brawn.
TOP CHAINS ORDER UP PEAK PERFORMERS
While a Health Department code may prescribe air curtains to create cleaner, pest-free food prep areas, the real mandate comes from patrons.Creating a pest-free space with evenly–distributed conditioned air does more than give guests the impression of cleanliness, it’s actually a building block to designing a truly hygienic venue. Food poisoning is directly linked to flies who carry pathogenic organisms that cause E. coli, salmonella, and shingles, and introduce other bacteria. Working hand-in-hand with the sanitation protocols you already have, Mars Air Systems’ air curtains above entry doors, pass through windows, and back receiving doors become silent sentries that seize control to keep out the uninvited. We’ve been doing that for over 50 years for iconic hospitality brands such as Panda Express, In-N-Out Burger, Taco Bell, Subway, and Olive Garden as well as growing up-and-comers like Smashburger and Five Guys Burgers. Whether you need a recessed unit that blends seamlessly with a well-defined décor, or defense against brutal weather conditions (hot or cold), or vigorous defense for food storage areas, Mars products have been the solution of choice for the most demanding operators world-wide.