How do tissues contribute to best hygiene practices in different applications?
Paper has been used for hygiene purposes for centuries, but tissue paper as we know it today was not industrially produced in the Western world until the mid-1940s. Tissue products are “single use” products and therefore they insure that for example, when you have a cold, the germs in your textile handkerchief do not re-contaminate you, if you re-use it again.
But probably one of the most important aspects is hand hygiene: it is well known that hand hygiene is a fundamental component for controlling the spread of infections. There has always been much emphasis on the correct method for hand washing, but less so concerning the options for drying hands. But residual moisture determines the level of touch-contact-associated bacterial transfer following hand washing.
As ETS we have sponsored a number of studies with the most prestigious Universities, comparing the hygiene of hands and of the washroom, depending the type of hand drying system adopted. These studies confirm that single use towels are by far more hygienic than electric air systems. I strongly suggest to visit our website (www.europeantissue.com), where all these studies are illustrated in detail and in some cases can also be downloaded for free.
How can a facility manager calculate the consumption of tissue required for different applications?
There are no magic rules, but for example we know that an average of two to three paper towels are used by each customer when he/she washes hands after visiting the toilets, so, if know how many customers you have every day, it is not so difficult to make reasonable estimations.
My only suggestion is to use high capacity dispensers both for toilet tissue and for paper towels in the public facilities, so that you minimize the risk of out of stock and can also better learn how often they need to be refilled. And of course, if you do not need to refill them very often, because they are high capacity, you also minimize your staff operating cost.
What are the present market trends in the tissue market?
While markets like North America or Western Europe are mature and their growth rates are between one and two per cent, the markets in developing Countries have a growth rate which can reach 10% per year.
At the same time, some obsolete machines, which could only produce low quality products, are being substituted by modern, more efficient, faster, lower energy consumption machines, capable of delivering first class products.
Also embossing the paper (in converting) or obtaining a texture (during Paper making) are quite important, both for aesthetic reasons, but sometimes also to boost the physical properties (for example: absorbency) of the tissue products.
The use of recycled fibres is already quite high for tissue products and this will continue in the future. It is also important to notice that when new fibres are used, the European producers of tissue (members of the European Tissue Symposium) are committed to use only pulp (cellulose) obtained from sustainable forests (either FSC or PESC). This decision is increasingly adopted also by the tissue producers in Asia and this is very good news!
The growth axes are two-fold: in developed markets that already have a very high penetration (for example, toilet paper in Western Europe) the key is in quality improvement and maybe the addition of moist towels. Actually, high quality products yield important extensions of use: just think of rolled towels: as their quality improves, their use is no longer limited to the kitchen to absorb oil when frying, but everywhere in the home for uses where absorbency and strength are necessary. This is the key to growth in the high quality segment.
In emerging markets with still partial penetrations, the key is an increase in penetration and in the quantities used – from kitchen towels to handkerchiefs – all the more so in Eastern European countries.
Just think that, compared to an average Italian per capita consumption of around 14kg, in Russia this figure is 2kg. On a world scale, the forecast on the economic boom of many emerging countries, from China to South America, is so obvious that I will not even bother to talk about it.
An exercise in style: a portrait of the roll of the future. It is true that the roll can never be square, but what could be the main innovations of the next few years?
RB: I would extend a series of best wishes to the field. A wish that the re-utilization techniques for paper become increasingly more refined so as to have fibres that are as soft, strong and absorbent as virgin fibres. Toilet paper is thrown away in the end, it is impossible to recycle it, so it wouldn’t be a bad idea to use recycled fibres to produce it, but these will have to be of extremely high quality, something which today is true only in part.
A wish that nuclear fusion may give humanity unlimited quantities of low-cost energy … low-cost energy would be very useful in producing soft, absorbent papers at contained costs. But until then, we have to instead try our best to limit energy waste, promote renewable sources, reduce the miles travelled by products.
A wish that paper production and converting technology unite top quality with top efficiency, maybe with sufficiently compact machines as to be placed near the final customers.
Now if we try and put these wishes together, the ideal roll emerges: soft, absorbent, resistant, very long, pleasantly de-corated and made with recycled fibres. At a price that is accessible to the large majority of people.
Well, humanity certainly possesses the ingenuity for this; the tissue field is used to working hard and, looking to the future, maybe the ideal roll is not so far away… [1] Every Day Low Prices is not simply a slogan for Walmart but an objective that the American retail chain has been successfully pursuing since 1962; a delivered promise to the consumer, who has made the company the biggest retailer in the world, with a 2005 turnover of 312.4 billion euro and 6,500 sales points in 14 countries.
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