My restaurant is battling fruit flies- how to stop them?!?

Question

I am the GM of a restaurant, and fruit flies are in season. I was wondering if anyone had any tips on keeping them at bay. They are ending up in everyone's food and drinks, and I am stumped as to how to get rid of them! I keep having to comp so much food, and sometimes the customers are still mad. What should I do?

Answer 1

well start off by keeping a cleaner restaurant. there is no reason to have them. i dont care what you excuss is. season is no excuse they can come winter summer spring, oh yeah fall too if YOUR NOT CLEAN ENOUGH. id be pissed if i was one of your coustomers too

Answer 2

Ugggg! Sorry for this problem. They are such a pain. I don't know of any solutions for whenever the restaurant is open except looking into the other response about a food safe spray. After hours and all night long you can try putting out bowels of vinegar to attract them also fly paper works well and can be purchased at a dollar store. Is ther somewhere "hidden" maybe in some hanging plants where you can leave them during business hours? If not maybe just hang them overnight, every night and remove them in the morning. Another solution might be to rinse fruit as soon as it comes off the produce truck in the solution made for removing the pesticides and then storing it after it has been cleaned. Hang some fly paper in your walk in box or wherever you keep your fruit stored.

Good luck!

EDIT: just found this, might be worth the try! Can't hurt!

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?...

Answer 3

Yikes. What a mess!

You could try contacting Ecolab. I think they're nationwide. They do (among other things) pest control for restaurants--maybe they can help with fruit flies. They do an excellent job on everything else--I highly recommend them.

Good luck :-)

Answer 4

We have them at Subway too.

One of my employees also work for Tim Hortons

He said they have a spray that is for restaurants that is food friendly and can be sprayed around the counter.

I am sorry I forget the name of it.

Answer 5

Well, I waitress, and YES, they are EVERYWHERE. Stores, homes, everywhere.

Knock on wood, we haven't had them. But we also have the pest controller Ellich or something like that come in for...cockroaches, sorry boss!, but I think they're spraying for those too.

I had an email one time that detergent like Dawn, if you put it in monkey dishes, around the kitchen and even the soda machine, that will kill them. I've done that at home, and it works.

Also, try and keep fruits and veggies refridgerated and covered. Make sure the soda and juice machines are washed too. Like where the nozzles are. Just take a soapy cloth and wipe them down.

But if they are that bad, I would call a pest control. It's expensive, but definately worth it. It's worth saving customers and food rather than throwing it all away. Good luck.