Why are we waiting to replace our restaurants cooler door hardware? Broken walkin and reachin refrigerated hardware is HAZARDOUS! I get it... No one wants to dole out cash for something that is not going to bring in any revenue. But here's the thing. It's dangerous.
When I was in college I worked in a restaurant. It was an extremely busy and profitable restaurant (I might ad). There was always maintenance that needed to be done on the commercial refrigeration units especially. Cooler and freezer door gaskets would always need to be replaced, reach-in bar door latches would consistently break, thermostats not temping right and on and on and on. One day it happened. The walk-in door hinge completely collapsed. The cooler door was being opened by an employee and it fell on her (thankfully no one was injured).
The one thing that I will never understand (to this day) is why do we get lax on changing the refrigeration door hinges? I will throw warmers into the mix as well (just for good measure). It is dangerous. Plain and simple. That day that the walk-in cooler door fell on my co-worker should have been an "ah-hah" moment for this particular foodservice establishment. They should have went and tested all of their (not only) commercial refrigeration hardware but every other piece of foodservice equipment in the restaurant.
They dodged a bullet and did not get into trouble for damaged cooler door hinges. With that said, the health inspector should have caught that damaged hinge a while ago and wrote them up for it (maybe they did, who knows). The moral of the story is that just like everything else in life, you need to take care of your restaurant. Maintain. Maintain. Maintain.
Happy Cooking!