Predictive maintenance used to be reserved for factories, data centers, and giant industrial plants. But as the cost of these systems goes down, and energy and labor costs go up, that's no longer the case.

Restaurants, multifamily buildings, schools, and small commercial facilities are ideal candidates for sensor-based maintenance. Connected thermostats, refrigeration monitors, leak sensors, submeters, vibration monitoring, and cloud dashboards are getting cheaper and easier to deploy. And budgets don’t have room for surprise failures.

As a result, contractors and service businesses need to prepare as predictive maintenance moves off the factory floor and onto Main Street.

The need to control building expenses. 

Buildings are expensive to operate, and many of those costs come from equipment that is run harder, longer, or less intelligently than it should be.

The Department of Energy (DOE) states that buildings account for 74% of U.S. electricity use and about $370 billion in annual energy costs. DOE’s building-sector analysis also emphasizes that data, controls, and technology targeting can help owners identify where the biggest savings can be. 

If a rooftop unit fails on a Friday night, a freezer drifts out of range, a leak suddenly pops up, or a boiler issue becomes a tenant complaint, those costs can mount up in a hurry.

Predictive maintenance, on the other hand, can anticipate equipment problems before they become expensive failures that need emergency service. In buildings where operating budgets are already tight—schools, restaurants and smaller businesses—those savings can make a huge difference. 

A new third option.

Many smaller facilities use one of two maintenance strategies.

The first is reactive; waiting until something breaks. That’s the most expensive option, giving building managers and tenants no control over costs or timing.

The second is calendar-based preventive maintenance, usually a service contract. It generally involves inspecting the equipment; possibly changing or cleaning parts whether needed or not. It’s a better choice, but still doesn’t rule out the chance that something will go wrong between inspections.

Predictive maintenance adds a third option. It monitors real-time operating conditions to help decide when attention is actually needed. That can be a huge advantage for smaller commercial properties. Predictive maintenance can reduce the guesswork between “too late” and “too early.”

Restaurants are a natural fit.

Restaurants are a prime candidate for predictive maintenance. They rely on refrigeration, kitchen ventilation, HVAC, hot water, and electrical systems that have to stay up even in difficult operating conditions.

A failed cooler or freezer can lead to spoilage, downtime, safety issues, and lost revenue.

Sensor-based monitoring can detect temperature drift, compressor behavior, door issues, and power disruptions; symptoms that often arise before a total failure. A contractor or facility manager who gets an early warning has a better shot at solving the problem before the business takes a major hit.

Multifamily buildings have a similar opportunity.

There are numerous places where multifamily buildings can benefit from predictive maintenance. 

Aging water heaters, pumps, HVAC systems, lighting controls, exhaust fans, and leak risks can all result in expensive surprises, not to mention angry tenants. 

The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) ENERGY STAR program notes that for multifamily buildings:

1. owners can’t manage what they don’t measure, and 

2. having performance benchmarks provides a better foundation for operational decisions

The advantages are obvious. A property team that can track performance signals, leaks, run times, or unusual energy use can act sooner, and at less expense, than a team that waits until tenants flood their phones with angry calls on a Saturday night. 

Predictive maintenance also creates new opportunities for plumbing and HVAC contractors. The relationship shifts away from emergency response and more toward helping the property owner stay up and running, with fewer surprises.

Schools are an overlooked market.

Schools are prime candidates because they often combine aging facilities, stretched maintenance staff, and environments where comfort and indoor air quality are crucial.

EPA states that many costly issues in schools could be prevented with thoughtful, regular maintenance plans, to the benefit of students and staff alike—and that every dollar spent on preventive maintenance yields four dollars in savings.

Here, sensor-based preventive maintenance could be extremely valuable. It can identify issues sooner, keep close track of HVAC functions and indoor air quality, and enable school districts to use their limited maintenance funds more efficiently.

Less expensive controls and sensors make predictive maintenance easier.

Controls and sensors are less expensive and more sophisticated than they used to be.

DOE cites wireless sensing, control algorithms, submetering, and better control platforms as part of the future of building operations. And its sensors-and-controls program notes that buildings are shifting from simple, reactive controls toward optimized, whole-building controls.

So while not every strip mall and school district will become a smart-building showcase, the ingredients for predictive maintenance are now more accessible and more relevant.

The opportunity for contractors.

There’s a chance for contractors to escape the role of “bringer of bad news” when a system fails. Instead, with predictive maintenance, the contractor can be an advisor who alerts the customer to potential problems, sets priorities for needed services, and helps the customer avoid the steep costs of emergencies. 

That answers the needs of many small commercial customers. They don’t want (or need) a massive building-automation project. But they’ll be happy to have fewer expensive surprises, and better visibility into how well their equipment is working.

Predictive maintenance is coming to Main Street because the economics finally make sense. The buildings are old enough, the systems are connected enough, and the cost of waiting for failure is high enough.