Guide to Commercial Entry Doors

Wood doors, metal doors, glass doors - your front doors speak volumes about your business and can make a lasting impression on customers and clients. However, commercial doors can do more than bring in business. Exterior doors and interior doors serve a variety of vital functions: They aid in deliveries, provide security, divide offices and provide climate-controlled environments.

Before installing commercial doors in your business:
1. Make sure your exterior doors and interior doors are in ADA (American Disabilities Act) compliance.
2. Figure out what types of commercial doors work best for the primary use of the doorway.
3. Study the traffic flow of each doorway to find the appropriate commercial doors for your business.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Interior doors and exterior doors

Exterior doors can play an important role in that all-important first impression. Whether you want a standard model or a custom creation that will set your business apart, you can find numerous options for exterior doors, including wood doors, metal doors and glass doors.

I recommend: Cross Aluminum has a large selection of aluminum framed custom and stock doors. Steiner Doors offers custom exterior doors for storefronts, including glass doors and metal doors, that fit the tone and ambience of your business. Forms + Surfaces provides custom glass doors and metal doors to fit any type of contemporary architecture. Woodport Interior Doors specializes in wood doors and has a large gallery of raised panel, flat panel, French and bifold doors that fit any office setting. Interior Modular Systems specializes in glass and metal interior doors.

Automatic doors are user friendly

Automatic doors are a must in situations where customers are required to push a cart or carry items through the exterior doors of your business. They provide a hands-free motion sensor that automatically opens when someone nears the door. Exterior doors that are not automated can be retrofitted with openers for persons with disabilities.

I recommend: Horton Automatics specializes in sliding automatic doors for commercial, industrial and clean room uses. Dorma offers a variety of door options with stiles (vertical panes) that include narrow stile, medium stile and fine frame, non-breakout, fixed sidelite and full breakout. Planet Mobility provides a selection of door openers that can be retrofitted to any exterior doors, making them ADA compliant.

Impact doors (aka traffic doors) provide easy access to high traffic areas

Restaurants cannot do without traffic doors, also known as impact doors. These traffic doors can swing in, out or both ways, allowing people to come and go easily through high traffic areas such as a kitchen and dividing private areas from public view.

I recommend: Chase Doors is a manufacturer of double acting traffic doors and offers a variety of restaurant swinging impact doors in single or double door configurations in retro and contemporary styles.

Revolving doors allow high traffic while keeping the elements out

Using revolving doors for your exterior doors offer several benefits over traditional front entry doors. They provide an airlock to keep your lobby or business climate-controlled. Revolving doors can also provide extra security in that some are equipped with bulletproof glass for use in high security applications such as banks. Revolving doors also control traffic by limiting the number of people who can enter the building at one time, which is useful in areas where people have to go through security checkpoints before entering.

I recommend: Crane Revolving Doors offers a variety of revolving doors, including manual doors, automatic doors, all glass doors, security doors and large diameter doors. International Revolving Doors has Saturn design four-wing revolving doors in stock for quick turnaround.  Eastern Door Service offers ControlFlow revolving doors that require security cards for entrance.

Overhead doors provide high security in large doorways

If you have a loading dock where you receive or send deliveries, you'll need to invest in overhead doors. Many retailers also use overhead doors and gates to provide extra security after hours.

I recommend: Overhead Door provides overhead metal doors for many solutions including rolling service doors, fire doors, side folding doors and sectional doors. City Gates USA specializes in rollup security doors. Bondor Manufacturing Company makes strip doors that allow traffic to come and go in areas such as loading docks.

Specialty commercial doors offer unique solutions

There are many other types of specialty commercial doors that your business may need, depending on your company's needs.

I recommend: Jamison Door offers cold storage sliding doors to keep refrigerated rooms and walk-in coolers sealed. Specialty Doors offers a variety of options for unique partitions and commercial doors including acoustic doors, accordion doors, movable partitions, bookcase doors and folding doors.

Tips & Tactics
Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• Before installing any commercial doors, consult with your architect or local building-permitting department to make sure the doors are in compliance with the American Disabilities Act.
• If you do install any type of automatic doors, make sure you have signs that notify users "Caution Automatic Door."
• Traffic doors provide hands-free passage between kitchen, prep areas, dining rooms and stockrooms and are more sanitary than traditional doors because workers do not have to grab doorknobs to open them.
• Revolving doors may be more expensive than traditional exterior doors up front, but the amount of money they save each year in energy can pay for itself in just one year of use.

The official source of Commercial Entry Doors is the Doors page at Business.com