Restrooms are an important part of a guest’s visit to your building; they directly influence employee health, brand reputation, and customer perception about your business. A recent poll revealed that 62 per cent of women have an average of four positive connections per month with someone they don’t know in a public restroom. This indicates that women spend some time in the restroom, making it an important consideration for facility and maintenance managers.
When asked, 90 per cent of women expressed that restrooms should mean a safe and secure space, along with providing some basic essentials like free period products (49 per cent), hand sanitizer (40 per cent), wet wipes (32 per cent), and deodorant (19 per cent). Further, 84 per cent of women expect to leave a public restroom feeling more refreshed than before they visited.
How can you make your public restroom more appealing for your female guests?
Making public restrooms more appealing for women in 2026 means rethinking restrooms as spaces that prioritize comfort, safety, and dignity. This includes designing interiors with a more spa-like feel, incorporating advanced touchless technology to improve hygiene and reduce germ concerns, and ensuring greater privacy with floor-to-ceiling stall doors. It also means addressing practical issues, like reducing long wait times by increasing the number of stalls, and supporting “period dignity” by providing free, easily accessible menstrual products.
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Design matters
Functionality is also key. Toilet space is typically divided by floor area, giving men and women roughly equal space, but women’s restrooms rely entirely on cubicles, so even when both sides occupy the same area, men’s facilities can serve more users.
Increasing safety can help improve restroom experience. Ensuring that the area is well-lit, that clear signage exists for wet floors and hazards, and installing emergency buttons or intercoms for when needed. As well, designing entrances without doors can help create an open ambiance, increasing touchless benefits while offering a lit space that is easy to exit, reducing safety risks.
Making life easier for moms can also help improve the experience for women, including larger accessible stalls for families and strollers, as well as installing changing tables as part of the design.
Improving the ambiance in the restroom is an experience upgrade and adding soft lighting, plants, and aromatherapy can make the space feel more inviting. Adding spaces for grooming outside of the busy traffic spots, and touchless sanitary bins inside each cubicle are also thoughtful amenities that appeal to female visitors.
Many women visit public restrooms each day and for facility and maintenance managers, making each visit memorable and safe should be a priority.
