Meet the GBPAP18’s outstanding PTC showcases: Lavadero Apparel Argentina Industrial (Argentina)

For the coming period, we will present you week by week, the most outstanding PTC showcases that were officially nominated for The Global Best Practices Awards Program 2018. The profiles of these companies are also present in the WOPCOM platform, which you can access here.

Lavadero Apparel Argentina Industrial (Argentina)

Positive attitude towards service, quality, environment, health and safety

Apparel Argentina S.A. is an industrial laundry company situated in Buenos Aires, the capital and most populous city of Argentina. The company provides services for washing and provision of textiles, sterilization of textiles and also cleaning of buildings. It executes these services with diverse and relatively new machine facilities like washer-extractors and centrifuges in several production capacities. It has dryers, calendar machines and several special logistic input techniques available to get the laundry in certain machines more easily and try to minimize uncomfortable manual handling. It also has an Ironing tunnel system.

Taking care of employees and customers

The company has a strong policy with regard to health and safety in accordance with OHSAS 18001 standards. These are promoted through integrated policy training and through personal development. There are systems to prevent accidents and improve working conditions.

Service quality is maintained both through quality control procedures of the realization process and through the application of state-of-the-art technology, From a point of view of process validation, the company develops the most effective and efficient ways of working and makes sure it’s able to show (in a documented way) that the output is consistently and meets set quality standards. Of course continuous employee training is of great importance. The earned ISO 9001: 2008 certificate proves that the quality of the company’s processes is in control.

Proud of having earned the certificates ISO 9001:2008 (quality), ISO 140001:2004 (environment) and OHSAS 18001:2007 (Health and Safety)

Sustainability

Sustainability is maintained through the incorporation of technology that contains among other things recuperative heat, water and steam. There’s an optimized use of soap, hydrogen peroxide and products in general. All used technology is in compliance with the regulations of the European Union.

There’s control of liquid effluents and only products of internationally recognized biodegradable soap companies are used that concentrate on development of high-end cleaning chemicals in medical and industrial care. There is design and validation of textile washing programs in accordance with internationally accepted standards and practices. Among the good practices of internal management applied is the adoption of a contingency plan that includes spills, fire, pollution and explosion.

The organization does not use solvents in the process. Instead chemical products such as biodegradable detergents and hydrogen peroxide are used to reduce the environmental impact of the activities that are being executed. Procedures are used for the final and safe disposal of waste and for textile recycling. It is no doubt that Apparel Argentina S.A. is an environmentally aware company. The certification for ISO 14001 standards proves this.

Hi-tech equipment the company is proud of

Daring equipment investments

The use of state of the art equipment proves the innovation level of the company. There are washing tunnels available of the latest European technology of 2016 and autoclaves from 2013 for the sterilization of textiles. The company has designed and implemented special introducers for the calendars to heighten quality and reduce labour effort. It considers innovation as one of its main strengths, being the first laundry in Argentina to incorporate the tunnelling technology for washing and ironing in entire South America.

Apparel Argentina is one of the leading companies in the local market, with more than 15 years of presence and uninterrupted growth. From the very beginning it promoted quality, environmental care and the security of people through an integrated policy disseminated throughout the entire organization. That’s why its management is extremely proud of having earned the 3 certificates ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 to show it’s constantly working at the improvements of all these business aspects.