You’ve seen the scene. A parent pinning a toddler against a sink with one arm, soap going everywhere, while kid number two bangs on the stall door. You’ve read the Google reviews that mention your bathrooms by name. Not kindly.
You know the restrooms need work. You might even suspect that family-friendly restrooms (think child-accessible sinks, changing tables, lower hooks, clear signage) would help. What you probably don’t have is the data to turn “we should fix this” into a budget line item that actually gets approved. So let’s fix that.
What Companies Say vs. What They Spend
Every retailer talks about customer experience. It shows up in mission statements, shareholder letters, town halls. But restrooms? They get treated as a cost center. Keep them clean enough to dodge complaints. Fix what breaks. Move on.
Bradley Corporation has been running their Healthy Handwashing Survey for 16 years, polling over 1,000 American adults annually on restroom habits and expectations. Their 2025 results are blunt: 84% of Americans say a dirty or poorly stocked restroom damages a business’s image. And 75% will think twice before coming back after a bad restroom experience.
Three out of four customers reconsidering a return visit. Over a room that barely has a budget.
Good Restrooms Actually Make Money
Here’s the number that changes the conversation from defense to offense. Bradley Corporation’s same survey found that 71% of Americans are more likely to return to a business, and spend more, after a positive restroom experience. Over 90% associate a quality restroom with a quality business overall. And 70% have actively chosen one business over another because the bathrooms were better.
That last one is the stat to put in your proposal deck. Seven in ten people have picked where to shop or eat based on the restrooms.
You’re not asking for money to maintain a cost center. You’re funding something that drives repeat visits.
Families Notice Restrooms More Than Anyone
Parents with young children are one of the most valuable customer segments for retailers, restaurants, and venues. They also pay closer attention to restrooms than almost any other group. They don’t have a choice.
Most kids under six can’t reach a standard-height commercial sink. So every restroom trip becomes a production. Parent finishes up, then hoists the child (sometimes a squirming, protesting child) to the faucet. Second kid? Do it again. Bad back, disability, or pregnancy? It goes from annoying to genuinely hard.
And when a restroom doesn’t work for their family, parents remember. They tell other parents. They start going somewhere else.
The Health Argument Gets Budget Approvals Faster
Customer experience is one angle. Public health is another, and in most organizations, health concerns move through approvals quicker.
The CDC reports that handwashing prevents about 30% of diarrhea-related illnesses and roughly 20% of respiratory infections. Among school-age kids, proper handwashing cuts absenteeism from gastrointestinal illness by 29% to 57%.
But those numbers assume the kid can actually wash their hands.
If a child can’t reach the sink, the most common outcome is that they just don’t wash. Maybe the parent squirts on some hand sanitizer. The problem? Hand sanitizer doesn’t work against norovirus. The CDC is explicit: only soap and water will do.
Norovirus causes 19 to 21 million illnesses in the U.S. every year. It leads to 465,000 emergency department visits (mostly young children) and roughly $2 billion in annual costs from lost productivity and healthcare expenses. It spreads most commonly after restroom use or diaper changes.
A child who can’t reach the sink in your facility isn’t just having a bad customer experience. That’s a public health gap your restroom could close.
Family-Friendly Restrooms Don’t Require a Renovation
This is usually where facility managers expect the bad news. Construction timeline. ADA review. Contractor bids.
It’s actually much simpler. Making a restroom accessible for children doesn’t require a remodel. A permanently installed step stool lets kids reach the sink on their own. Step ’n Wash makes one built specifically for commercial restrooms: stainless steel, self-retracting (no tripping hazard when not in use), 15-minute install, no contractor.
There are other pieces to a family-friendly restroom too. Changing tables, lower hooks for bags, clear signage. But sink access solves the most visible daily frustration for parents and plugs the health gap at the same time.
Major national retailers have already made this move. Target, for instance, installed step stools at sinks across all of their U.S. locations after a successful pilot. A company with 1,900+ stores doesn’t scale to every location without internal data backing the decision.
The Risk Framing (For Risk-Averse Leadership)
Some budget conversations work better when you lead with risk instead of opportunity.
Portable step stools in commercial restrooms are a liability. They move around. They create tripping hazards. They get dirty, stolen, or both. Each one is a complaint or an incident waiting to happen.
A permanently installed solution eliminates all of that. Products designed for commercial restrooms have years of real-world use behind them, with documented safety records that portable alternatives can’t match. For leadership teams that think in terms of risk exposure, the difference between a portable stool and a permanent fixture is straightforward.
Putting the Proposal Together
If you’re building the case for family-friendly restrooms, here’s what to put in front of your VP.
Start with the Bradley Corporation loyalty data from earlier in this article. Those numbers (the 75% and 71% figures) belong on your opening slide. Sixteen years of consistent survey results make them hard to argue with.
Back it up with the health angle. Handwashing prevents 30% of diarrhea-related illness (CDC). Hand sanitizer doesn’t touch norovirus. Kids who can’t reach the sink don’t wash. Health-based proposals tend to move through approvals faster than customer experience ones.
Then address cost and complexity upfront. No renovation. No contractor. Fifteen minutes per unit to install. Minimal ongoing maintenance.
How to Get This Started
Here’s a practical path. Pick one or two high-traffic locations for a pilot. Track complaints before and after. Note whether family-related feedback shifts. Then bring that local data back to leadership alongside the national numbers.
Once your team stops thinking of restrooms as a maintenance line and starts seeing them as part of the customer experience, the budget conversation gets a lot easier.
