Photo: The Kreussler and Gaowofan team at the booth: Hao Hu (Gaowofan), Liu Dong (Gaowofan), YuyingBobist (Gaowofan), Thomas Zeck (Kreussler), Dr Manfred Seiter (Kreussler), Jürgen Bobist (Kreussler), Yu Ping Ting (Gaowofan) (from left)
Together with new trading partner Shanghai Gaowofan Merchants Company, Ltd., Kreussler enjoyed the opportunity to present new solutions like OptiCare 50° GREEN, a modular system of products certified with the coveted European Ecolabel, Lanadol AVANT x-treme, a double duty brushing agent with extra strong fat dissolving power, to lots of interested visitors. Kreussler has been busy even before the fair: due to the diligent work of new partner Gaowofan, several contracts with new wholesaling partners, suppliers, industrial laundry owners and managers as well as business partners providing luxury hotels with textile care services were signed ceremoniously at the prestigious Chateau Star River Pudong hotel in Shanghai.
Networking for more Professionalization and Specialization
Thursday April 28th: The Sneak Preview Reception, the evening before the two days show, delivered a promising start. Excellent networking by associations, retail textile service companies, experts and suppliers from within and beyond the South West part of the USA. After Corona it was seen as a good opportunity for personal contacts and exchanging the ideas and practical solutions for issues everybody in the industry is facing. The Program of this two days event included a series of networking events, practical presentations on a wide variety of business topics and advanced demonstrations of suppliers.
These days Elite Drycleaners, based in Edinburgh, received the Scottisch Best Drycleaning Business Award. Elite won the award as a result of a straight forward voting. The award underlines the entrepreneurial skills of the Elite team to provide modern textile services appreciated by a vast and growing clientele. Continue reading “Scottisch Best Drycleaning Business Award for Elite Drycleaners”
The US-based Drycleaning & Laundry Institute (DLI) recently announced its board of directors for the 2021-2022 term. The board is made up of industry professionals who own and/or operate fabricare businesses and are members of the organization.
The 2021-2022 DLI Board of Directors are:
Chair: Jess Culpepper, CGCP®, Culpepper Cleaners, San Antonio, Texas
President: Bobby Patel, Kona Cleaners, Costa Mesa, California
President-Elect Jeff Schwegmann II, CGCP®, Sunshine Cleaners, Cold Spring, Kentucky
Treasurer & District 1 Director: Kathy Benzinger, Benzinger’s Dry Cleaning, Hamburg, New York
District 2 Director: Mark Pollock, Signature Cleaners, Doylestown, Pennsylvania
District 3 Director: Don Holecek, Crown Cleaners, Knoxville, Tennessee
District 4 Director: Ray Kroner, Kroner Dry Cleaners, Cincinnati, Ohio
District 5 Director: Ed Longanecker, Iris City Cleaners, Mount Pleasant, Iowa
District 6 Director: Kyle Nesbit, Tide Cleaners, Spring, Texas
District 7 Director: Hilary Taylor, Continental Cleaners, Salt Lake City, Utah
District 8 Director: Toran Brown, Rytina Fine Cleaners & Launderers, Sacramento, California
Allied Trades Director: Bill Odorizzi,SankoshaUSA, Inc., Elk Grove Village, Illinois
The Drycleaning & Laundry Institute (DLI) has been the international trade association for garment care professionals since 1883. It also represents over ten thousand retail drycleaners in the United States. Through legislative & regulatory policy development, education, professional training, information, garment analysis, and research, the organisation aims at offering solutions to help member businesses remain on the competitive edge. As the new directors are sworn in, their predecessors move on to an executive position or become DLI Senators.
Now it’s the best time to strengthen your team’s knowledge. For Industrial Laundries newcomers, we recommend the E-INDUSTRIAL LAUNDRY STARTERS course. This module is a part of the e-learning courses for the Industrial Textile Services specialists. The basic principles will educate the basics of textile care. The industrial laundry process and the used equipment are explained. The complete washing process with its important factors are explained.
Among the course’s chapters, you can find the following:
Professional laundry technology
Washing
Drying
Finishing
By attending the (online) E-INDUSTRIAL LAUNDRY STARTERS course from the Level C of The World of PTC Business School, you will gain and strengthen the following skills:
1) Get to know the industrial laundry process
Know the processes in industrial laundry operations
Know the importance of the sorting process
Know the drying processes and operation of tumble dryers
know different designs and layouts of dryers, garment finishers and flatwork ironers
2) Have basic knowledge of the washing process
Know the different steps in a washing process
Know different washing processes and have basic knowledge of the important factors influencing the wash quality
know different designs and layouts of washer extractors
Be able to distinguish different designs, loading and unloading possibilities of wash extractors, water flow diagrams and chemical dosing possibilities
Know different designs and layouts of tunnel washers
Understand the differences between standing baths and counterflow washing
know the process of extraction presses and centrifugal extractors
The World of PTC – Business School is a training initiative developed by CINET in cooperation with international suppliers, specifically designed for professional laundry and dry cleaning stakeholders. Through this initiative CINET aims to strengthen and stimulate the development of the PTC (Professional Textile Care) industry.
You will find easy accessible information on Retail Textile Cleaning and Industrial Textile Services on the following levels:
Starters (Level C): Basic level of education and knowledge for people who likes to start in the textile cleaning industry:
Operational Excellence (Level B): Advanced level for operators, employees for detail knowledge and skills of the textile cleaning process
Management (Level A): Excellent level for managers and employees on legislation, improvement methodologies, operational management, business modelling & cost structures and marketing
The product range of The World of PTC – Business School consists of E-learning & (on the job) Training courses, Practical Workshops & Webinars and a vast PTC online library & Book series. Select the courses that match your professional (both individual and company) needs and become a Master in PTC!
More info, on the E-INDUSTRIAL LAUNDRY STARTERS course in The World of PTC – Business School – here!
Milan, October 19th; Prominent innovations in robot technology and automation were shown for the first time for a broad professional audience at ExpoDetergo International 2018. The most spectacular and eye-catching innovation came from the Netherlands. The newly established Laundry Robotics company presented robin; the first industrial laundry robot, for the folding of bath linen. In addition, innovations were presented by Inwatec Denmark aimed at the automatic sorting of corporate clothing and there were in the RFID technology field or automated information processing and process control, the necessary new developments.
robin; A new and revolutionary robot
One of the main innovations was released by Laundry Robotics. The robot named robin picks up towels and provides every terry folding machine (regardless of type and brand) of 720 towels per hour. The robot works 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, offers 100% consistent and reliable output, as well as high quality and productivity. Robin uses Deep learning software developed by Laundry Robotics for the use in industrial laundries.
Laundry Robotics is a start-up of six partners that focuses on the design, development and creation of robot solutions for human challenges in the industrial laundry sector. Accuracy, efficiency and high productivity are central. Finding ways to work faster, smarter and cheaper is essential in order to be able to meet the rapidly changing market demand in the future.
The sale of this new robot is expected to start early next year and will be carried out by dealer Landuwasco in Vlaardingen, The Netherlands.
3-D camera equipped grappling robot from Inwatec
At Inwatec was shown a machine that can sort dirty laundry with a mechanical arm by means of an advanced 3-D camera. The 3D camera software finds the best grip on the garments. This ensures good separation of textiles and high efficiency. There is then a next device that checks the clothes with an X-ray or all bags are empty. It then also has the possibility to sort the textiles into 9 different categories in order to select the correct washing process. This can make a difference in manpower when sorting the laundry on the dirty side.
Servtronic auto-feed system from Kannegiesser
Kannegiesser has also had developments in automation. There were several folding machines with automatic feeders, the servotronic, which alleviated the work for the workers. The workers were able to fasten the corner points of the sheets one at a time in the clamp pin, which were then hung in a spread-out manner to be loaded into the folding machine. For example, during the work a buffer could be made, so that even if an operator was away for a while, for example to get a new cart, the production can still continue. In addition, there was a speed feeder who was already prepared to also be connected to the same kind of auto-feed system should this be necessary.
Metalprogetti’s latest conveyor
Metalprogetti is a leading Italian company in the design and manufacture of automated systems for moving and handling both hanging and folded garments, as well as a wide range of other light items. One of their newest products on the stand was the Batch conveyor belt. It has been developed to automatically manage orders that come from automatic packing systems and organize them in defined groups, for example via routes and drop zones.
The following companies with innovations also at ExpoDetergo International 2018 will be presented more in depth next week in a brochure:
Whatever trends in fashion are running, the shirt never goes! Being a classic example, more and more young people wear shirts and therefor the demand on laundry service is increasing. The wuillingness to wash and iron is decreasing, which levels up expectations of advertising in this service segment.
The concept of ‘Shirt-service‘ has developed and is being picked up by several dry cleaning companies.
The Deutscher Textilreinigungs-Verbund e.V. provides their members with attractive advertising materials during the period of 1st September till 30 November 2018, in order to stimulate and advocate their members’ ad campaigns. The campaign is aimed at customers in order to have them experience why modern households cannot do without a shirt-service and to convince them that it will pay back to bring the shirts to a professional laundry service
Different types of fabrics and fibres have been around since people started to shelter themselves from the elements. It was quickly discovered that wool could protect from heat and cold as well as from wind and rain. The versatility of wool is unique. None have been able to match the fabric, they have had better luck in refining and improving it.
The refining process started from the moment people domesticated sheep. They took the wool in one hand and drew it out, twisting it into a thread with the fingers of the other hand. This resulted in a thick uneven yarn.
This was later refined by the use of a (crude) spindle with a stone or clay ring to the end of a short wooden stick. This ‘flywheel’ enabled the drawn-out yarn to be wound on to the spindle. This method didn’t change for thousands of years.
People eventually tried to imitate the beneficial properties in new manmade fibres. This increase in fibre diversity did create the need for cleaners to properly distinguish between them. For laundry applications, textiles can be split into 4 principle categories
ANIMAL
VEGETABLE
REGENERATED
SYNTHETIC
Wool Silk
Mohair
Cashmere
Cotton Linen
Jute Flax
Bamboo
Viscose
Triacetate (tricel)
Diacetate (dicel)
Polyester (Terylene)
Polyamide (nylon)
A very effective way to deal with the inherent weaknesses of the different fibres, is to blend fibres together who complement each other. A common blend, for instance, is to combine cotton and wool. Cotton is relatively cheap and strong whereas wool is more expensive but more fragile. A cotton warp will give added strength to a fabric with a wool weft which provides the texture and colour. Thus a stronger and cheaper fabric is born.
To identify all these different fibres and blends, several methods are used. There is a difference in the flammability of the 4 groups. So simply burning them will give you a clue what you’re looking at. Animal hair, for instance doesn’t burn easily, whereas the vegetables do. Since the textures of the fibres are so distinct, you can also use a microscope. Hair is more scaly, cotton looks like a ‘flat twisted ribbon’ and polyester looks like a smooth ‘glass rod’.
Before you get to make garments, the fibres need to be spun into yarns first. The friction between the fibres bind the yarn and the twist brings the fibres closer together which increases the friction thereby making the yarn stronger. Wool is scoured or washed before spinning. This is to remove the grease, sweat and dirt. This isn’t necessary for cotton, because the natural wax is a good lubricant.
The different fibres pass through a series of processes. First Carding, to straighten the fibre. Then Combing, to remove short unwanted fibres. Gilling, to make more uniform ropes or slivers of fibres. Spinning, either one-step or multiple, to reduce the slivers to usable spun yarns. And Doubling, twisting the yarns together for strength or colour effect.
To make the fabric, the yarns are woven or knitted. There has not been much refinement in these techniques. It has mainly been mechanised to speed it up. When we think of the cleanability of a textile, we tend to think the way the wool or textile behaves, but much also depends on the construction of the garment. Textiles must be handled in laundering and dry-cleaning according to construction. Knitwear must be handled differently from woven goods and it will be important to remember this in the future.
Based on: Guild of cleaners and launderers, July 2018 Issue TB 58
Milliken & Company’s board of directors announced the appointment of Mr. Halsey M. Cook Jr. as President and CEO. Until now, Mr. Cook was the president and CEO for Sonepar USA, a global distributor of electrical products. His main goal in the new role is to introduce change where the organization can further leverage an emphasis on innovation, manufacturing excellence and customer care.
With a history of over 150 years and having its corporate headquarters located in Spartanburg, North Carolina, Milliken & Company is active across a wide range of disciplines including specialty chemical products used in the professional textile care industry. The company has 35 manufacturing facilities located in the U.S., U.K., Belgium, France, China, India, and Australia, and other sales and service operations throughout the Americas, Europe, and Asia.