Hotels launder a large volume of linens daily, rightly prioritising guest experience over energy savings and cost-cutting. However, over time, housekeeping issues coupled with general wear and tear can lead to the degradation of linens, sheets, towels, and other fabrics, risking your otherwise exemplary levels of service while exacerbating problems related to operational overheads.
The question is, can anything be done to extend the life of hotel linens? And, if so, which commercial laundry solutions would we recommend?
Join us as we discuss tried-and-tested ways to maximise the life of your hotel’s linens, potentially saving you time, money and resources in the process.
Typical hotel linens: A longer list than you might expect
There are many more items beyond towels and bedsheets that busy hotels must launder to maintain peak levels of service and cleanliness – presenting a sizeable overhead in terms of procurement, resourcing, and laundering requirements.
Let’s take a closer look at the list of items that a hotelier would typically class as linens:
• Towels
• Bedding, pillowcases and blankets
• Tablecloths
• Staff uniforms, aprons and other attire
How to maintain hotel linens to improve their lifespan
Now that you’re up to speed on the scope of items that fall under the umbrella of hotel linens, it’s easy to see why maintaining all these fabrics and materials to a high standard can prove challenging. There are, however, several things you can do to help maintain hotel linens, ensuring that they remain in a permissible condition for longer.
Here are some key processes and solutions we recommend for caring for linens in a busy hotel.
Purchase good quality commercial linens that stand the test of time
Hotel linens aren’t made equal, so you could save yourself a lot of time, money and effort by investing in high-quality commercial hotel linens from the outset.
Any savings you make purchasing inferior-quality linens will only wind up being diminished by costly maintenance, laundering, and replacement costs – costs you could have avoided by purchasing higher-quality items from the get-go.
All hotel linens will need replacing eventually, but investing in premium products will no doubt save time and money in the longer term.
Reduce instances of lost or stolen items
Often, hotel linens can be lost or misplaced, or sometimes stolen by guests or staff. This puts additional strain on your operational overheads, with the cost of replacing missing items quickly stacking up to a sizeable annual expense.
There are plenty of things you can do to reduce instances of lost or stolen hotel linens, including:
• Ensure housekeeping trolleys are monitored and not left unattended.
• Linen rooms must be locked and access restricted to staff only.
• Impose a procedure wherein all linen is recorded and checked on a daily or weekly basis.
• Guests should not take linen out of the room and should be accounted for when they check out of the hotel.
• Towels in gyms, spas and pool areas should be monitored and controlled when being used by guests.
Train staff to take care better care of hotel linens
Staff training levels can have a big impact on the longevity of hotel linens. When your people know how to care for different fabrics and materials correctly, this can have a significant effect on how long towels, sheets, blankets, and pillowcases ultimately last.
Here are some sensible rules that hoteliers can impose to ensure that staff members approach linen care with the attention it deserves.
• Hotel linen should not be used for the personal use of staff.
• It should be transported around the hotel with care using trolleys or laundry bags by a member of staff.
• Staff should be trained to handle laundry and change bedding with care and attention to detail.
• Laundry shouldn’t be left on the floor even if it is dirty or soiled.
Help guests look after your linens
While it’s difficult to manage guest behaviour in relation to how they treat hotel-owned items, there are some unintrusive ways to encourage good practices and prevent misuse. Including
• Making additional pillows, towels, bathmats or blankets available upon request rather than stocking them in the room.
• Installing notices advising guests where to place towels that require laundering or towels that can be reused.
• Tips and advice provided to customers on how to handle towels and laundry.
Set up an efficient and well-managed laundry room
A lot of the hard work associated with linen care begins and ends in the laundry room. Here, you can enforce practical measures to ensure that linens are properly maintained and cared for, all while ensuring maximum levels of hygiene and cleanliness.
• Invest in high-quality commercial-grade destaining detergents and chemicals to deal with tough stains like oils or lotions.
• Use ozone technology for improved hygiene, infection control and quality levels, including fresher and fluffier towels.
• Create effective linen laundry processes, with clear separation between ‘dirty’ and ‘clean’ zones to prevent contamination and soiling clean garments.
• Ensure that commercial washing machines, tumble dryers and ironers are fully serviced and maintained; this can have a significant impact on the long-term care, quality and appearance of linens.
Accept the realities of day-to-day wear and tear
Often, towels, linen and garments may become excessively worn, bobbled or frayed. While the lifespan of these items can be extended to avoid this as much as possible, it is inevitable that they will eventually require replacement. Hotels should aim for a high percentage of laundry to become worn out as opposed to lost, stolen or damaged.
We hope this guide has offered some actionable insights into efficient linen care in a hotel environment. At JLA, we offer a range of commercial laundry equipment that can help hoteliers tackle their day-to-day laundry requirements. Call us free on 0808 239 2638 to find out more.
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