Over the past decade, the laundry industry has experienced significant technological progress. However, to adopt new solutions, operators should determine the troublesome issues in their operations, such as labour, energy consumption, and downtime. Although recent developments in laundry technology offer various solutions for launderers, it is essential to identify the options that deliver the fastest return on investment (ROI).

Experts advise to start with small changes. Some essential starting points are connected equipment, intelligent software, and the importance of data. Connected equipment (both physically and through communication) and IoT (Internet of Things) solutions provide valuable performance data, enabling managers to identify areas for improvement. This information can be shared by suppliers and should be known by the laundry management teams. Intelligent software, including dashboards for machine and employee performance, supports real-time labour scheduling and expense reduction. The integration of automation, smart software and skilled teams will create more efficient workflows.
Finally, labour is still the No. 1 laundry expense. Transitioning from manual to automated data collection enables real-time performance monitoring and labour optimization. As labour improves, the PPOH (Pounds Per Operator Hour)increases. When PPOH improves, it decreases our expense percentage and leads to more profit.Technology will provide more data than we have today, but the laundry industry itself should decide how to use all of this data to improve.