The first president of the newly renamed Drycleaning & Laundry Institute (former International Fabricare Institute) also happens to be the first woman to serve as president of the organization in its 100-year history. Barbara Harvey, owner of Fabricare by Fran in Severna Park, MD, began her one-year term as president during Clean ’07 in Las Vegas.
Harvey previously served the institute as president-elect, treasurer, and District 2 director. In addition to her service on the DLI board, she worked on the institutes ’s Textile Analysis Peer Review Group and, until her election as a board member in 2002, was the District 2 representative on the District Committee advisory group. She also has been an active volunteer leader in several cleaning and laundry associations, serving as president of the MidAtlantic Association of Cleaners and the Coin Laundry Association of Maryland, for example.
Harvey chaired the committee to change the International Fabricare Institute’s name to the Drycleaning & Laundry Institute.
“Basically, most consumers did not understand what IFI means,” she said of the name change. “Inside the industry, we all know what ‘fabricare’ means, but the name IFI did not represent what we do very well to the general public. We wanted to simplify the name. ”
