I work at a hospital as a housekeeper and use this mop. It is used as a mop and like a sweeper to collect all dirt, no sweeping beforehand necessary unless you're using it on tiles with grout ( dirt and hair gets stuck on grout).After 2 years of using it, I was very impressed with how durable and extremely useful and easy it was for getting floors clean. I decided to buy one for my own house. The only thing is that after many washes, the pads wear out a bit since they attach to the mop by Velcro but that's to be expected.