Looking for a cost-effective way to give your office a facelift? Look no further than Facilities Management’s Office Refresh program! An Office Refresh can bring your office from drab to fab in just a week! We sat down with Structural IPE (Inspector Planner Estimator) Sam Fernandez to get all the details about how the Office Refresh program started, what’s included, and how to sign up.

The Office Refresh program has been around for a number of years and was given to Sam to manage when he started as a structural IPE. The main motivation for beginning the program, says Sam, was a desire to provide a more streamlined and efficient way for customers to redo their offices. Before the program started, customer requests for office refreshes became major projects, which have longer timelines and can be more expensive. The Office Refresh program keeps planning and execution simple - customers pay a fixed rate and have their space refreshed within a week! 

Office Refreshes cost a fixed rate of $6,000 and are usually started on a Monday and completed Friday! The refresh includes new carpet, vinyl flooring, paint, rubber floor base, ceiling tiles, LED lighting, and window blinds. There are 6 different palette options available, which customers can see at the FM office or request to have them brought to them. All of the material choices are kept in stock so that no special ordering is needed, which keeps cost and time at a minimum! 

The typical timeline for an office refresh is as follows:

• Painting - approx. 2 days 
• Flooring and wall base - approx. 1 day
• Ceiling tiles - approx. 1 day
• Lighting - approx. 1 day
• Window blinds - approx. a few hours 

Customers are reminded that an office must be under 200 square feet to be eligible for an Office Refresh and that they are responsible for clearing furniture and wall decor from the room. Sam says that the sooner a customer requests an Office Refresh, the better! As of November 2023, they are booked until March 2024. The team can usually complete two refreshes within a week, and they completed 100 refreshes in 2022!  Many happy customers have scheduled refreshes for multiple offices within their building. 

If you weren’t convinced to schedule an Office Refresh refresh already, the program is also sustainable! Since paint color options are kept in stock, leftover paint from one refresh can be used on the next, which prevents material waste. Refreshes also come standard with LED lighting, which uses less energy than traditional incandescent lighting. Sam says the team is also currently working on a recycling program for the carpet they remove from offices! 

As for the future of the program, Sam says he would love to be able to complete more Office Refreshes per week when the team has more staff. Sam says the program is not expected to end anytime soon and that he hopes to continue it for as long as possible!

If you’d like to schedule an Office Refresh, submit a work order to the Customer Experience Center by calling (530) 752-1655, emailing facilities@ucdavis.edu, or clicking here. Color palettes can be viewed online using this link, but we recommend you visit FM to see them in person! 

Pictured above are some before and after photos of an office refresh! Pictures at 1 & 2 are before and after at Social Sciences and Humanities room 2287, which used option 6 (Water Tower Blues) with VCT flooring. Pictures located at the top are before and after at School of Education Building room 124, which also used option 6, but with carpet flooring.

Thank you so much to Sam Fernandez for talking with us about the Office Refresh program and to the whole team for ensuring our campus is in top shape for students and visitors!