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Nandkishore Gawade, Deputy Housekeeping Manager, Novotel Mumbai Juhu Beach reveals some ways through which revenue management can be achieved by the Laundry.
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Laundry and housekeeping are two of the most important functions in hotels, but often they are services put to the bottom of the priority list. Ironically, it’s the unsung heroes in housekeeping that your guests will remember; the little touches when they return to their room after a day spent sight-seeing or in a long business meeting. Especially the laundry quality leaves a lasting impression on the guests.
• There is almost no limit to the special promotions you could offer potentially in laundry. E.g.: Promotions that offer a special discount to your elite club members of the Hotel chain.
• Offering special discounts on weekends will help in attracting FIT and leisure guests to get clothes laundered in bulk and boost revenue on weekends.
• Introducing ‘Outsource Laundry’ and making contracts with the hotels nearby which are looking for outsource will in turn help in usage of machinery, HLP and chemical resources to maximum capacity, thus increasing revenue.
• Pioneering dry cleaning services to corporate companies and MNC’s at a special discounted rate and delivering the clothes with attractive packing will add upon the future business and fame to hotel.
• Offering 50% discount on laundry and 35% on dry cleaning to the staff working in the hotel not only makes staff loyal to organization but also adds up on revenue.
• By adhering to the global norms for conservation, preservation, solid waste management, energy efficiency, etc., hotels will be able to perform the corporate responsibility and sustainability. These green practices will optimize operations.
• By applying ‘Reduce, Recycle and Reuse’, the hotel will be able to bring down the HLP costs and increase revenue.
All the techniques for creating revenue are in vain if one doesn’t have an effective control on the costs and processes followed in laundry.
• A laundry opt-out program can cover two different types of hotel linen – bed and bath linen and serve two different purposes: reducing laundry costs and a property’s carbon footprint. Linen opt-outs are one of the most popular eco-friendly steps taken by hotels and resorts.
For Bed Linen: Leave a card in guest rooms saying that unless the guests ask for daily service, housekeeping staff will only launder their sheets every two or three days. The card should elucidate that it is a part of our eco-friendly efforts to save natural resources such as water and electricity, allowing guests to feel virtuous for helping the environment.
For Bath Linen: Offer guests the opportunity to opt out of having their towels washed every day, too. Place a sign or a card in the bathroom indicating that towels left on the floor will be removed and laundered whereas the towels hung up will be left to be used another day.
Cheap linens will be rendered as unusable more often, which will drive up costs as they need to be replaced.
• Use a scale to make sure your washers and dryers are working at full capacity. Your machine will work better, and your linen will deteriorate less.
• Don’t rush to discard linens. Always try the best possible way to spot our stains before confirming to discard linen.
• Dirty linens should come in one way and continue to move down the line – to the folding and ironing stations which will allow the staff to complete several tasks at once.
