Customers will know the difference.

Before ever sitting down to eat, let alone being served, diners take in their surroundings when they walk into a restaurant. It could be their first visit or their hundredth, they could be aiming for a nice family dinner or quick, satisfying bite while traveling; regardless, beyond the décor, these guests will notice something far more important: the cleanliness.

Cleanliness can make or break the reputation of the restaurant, and yet typically little time goes into training restaurant employees on proper cleaning methods, and few establishments hire commercial cleaning companies because they don't realize the benefit they can bring.

Hired as servers, cooks, hosts and hostesses, the employees are expected to know how to clean. Cleaning becomes something employers pass off as general knowledge, something everyone should know how to do because everyone has had experience cleaning, to some degree.

But what if it were someone's job to clean, and they were trained specifically to clean thoroughly, to know how to inspect their areas, and to do the best job that could be done? Imagine that person was trained to know the difference between various cleaning products, which ones to use, which ones work best, and how to properly use them to get their full benefits?

Not things the chef, or even the kitchen staff need worry about. Let's face it, what chef wants to go from sautéing a dish of vegetables to dabbling through bottles of cleaner? What hostess, excelling at being friendly to customers and making them feel at home, wants to finish off work each night scrubbing the floors, a solitary, repetitive job that doesn't fit their personality?

The guests, if it were up to them, probably wouldn't want it that way, and yet most restaurant owners and managers assume that's the way it should be. Some have wised up to realize they can hire outside commercial cleaning services to take the burden off their own employees. Not to mention, hired commercial cleaners are guaranteed to do a better job.

Commercial cleaning employees make it their job to clean thoroughly (after all, that's what they're there to do -- not serve food or drinks), but, and sometimes more importantly, they also know how to clean items that your everyday person has no idea how to attempt, like scary food stains and oils.

And let's not forget the food critics.

Points get knocked immediately if your restaurant isn't up to par, and that always includes cleanliness.

We're taught from a young age that it's OK to ask for help, and then we have to re-learn it later in life. It's typical to expect a lot from an employee, even at minimum wage -- and high turnover rates are typical, too, in the restaurant business especially -- which, of course, leads to more money spent on hiring and training new employees. Restaurant managers can hand them the mop, but every time that will mean biting off more than they can chew.