There is no single best office floor, only the best one for each part of your office. Most Southampton workplaces end up with a mix: carpet tiles where people sit and concentrate, LVT where they walk and gather, and sheet vinyl where things get wet. Here is how the three compare, and what tends to catch people out locally.
Carpet tiles remain the most common choice for open plan offices, and for good reason. They absorb footfall and chair noise, they feel warmer underfoot, and a stained or worn tile can be lifted and replaced in minutes. If your office has raised access floors, as many of the larger buildings around the city centre and the business parks towards Eastleigh and Whiteley do, loose lay tiles also keep the floor boxes and cabling reachable.
As a rough guide, expect something in the region of £25 to £45 per square metre supplied and fitted for a decent commercial tile, with budget ranges below that and design-led or cushion backed ranges above. A good quality tile in a normal office should last 10 to 15 years. The weak spots are spills and castor chairs, so look for a heavy contract rating and solution dyed nylon if the area will be worked hard.
Luxury vinyl tile gives you a timber or stone look with a surface that wipes clean, which is why it suits receptions, breakout spaces, tea points and client facing areas. For office use, choose a commercial product with a wear layer of at least 0.55mm. Thinner domestic grades will scuff and dent quickly under chairs and trolleys.
Fitted costs commonly fall between about £40 and £70 per square metre, and the range is wide because LVT is unforgiving of what lies beneath it. It needs a smooth, dry subfloor, so latex smoothing compound is normally part of the job. It also reflects sound rather than absorbing it. In a large open plan space, wall to wall LVT can make the room noticeably noisier, so it is often paired with carpet tiles, acoustic panels or an acoustic backed product.
Sheet vinyl is laid in wide rolls with heat welded seams, so there are very few joints for water or dirt to get into. That makes it the sensible option for toilets, showers, cleaners' cupboards, kitchens, and any clinical, laboratory or light industrial space attached to an office. In areas likely to get wet, ask for a safety vinyl with a slip resistance rating of 36 or more on the pendulum test.
It typically costs from around £30 to £55 per square metre fitted, with coved skirtings and safety grades at the higher end. It will not win design awards, but properly installed it can last 15 to 20 years.
The subfloor matters more than the product. Southampton has a lot of older stock, from converted buildings around Ocean Village, Town Quay and Bedford Place to 1970s and 1980s blocks in the centre. These often have uneven screeds, old adhesive residue or ground floor slabs with no effective damp proof membrane. A moisture test before any vinyl or LVT goes down is essential. If readings are above 75 per cent relative humidity, a surface damp proof membrane is needed, which can add roughly £10 to £20 per square metre.
Two other local points are worth planning for. Being a wet, coastal city, grit and rainwater get walked in constantly, so two to three metres of proper entrance matting will protect whichever floor you choose. And if you lease your space, check the lease and any licence to alter before you start. Many landlords expect the floor to be returned to carpet tiles at the end of the term, which affects whether glued down LVT is worth it.
Zone the floor plan by how each area is used, then price it as a whole. For most offices, that means the following.
As a broad guide, allow roughly £25 to £45 per square metre for carpet tiles, £40 to £70 for LVT and £30 to £55 for sheet vinyl, supplied and fitted. The final figure depends on the product, the condition of the subfloor, whether old flooring needs lifting and whether the work has to be done out of hours.
Usually, yes. Most installations are phased over evenings or weekends, and carpet tiles can often be laid using a lift system that raises desks rather than clearing them. Glued LVT and vinyl need more time because smoothing compounds and adhesives have to cure.
Carpet tiles are the better choice, as they absorb far more impact and airborne sound than any hard floor. If you want the look of LVT, keep it to walkways and breakout zones, or choose an acoustic backed product and add sound absorption elsewhere in the room.