Textile loss & replacement

TRSA conducted Executive Roundtables with representatives of textile service operations to identify opportunities to better meet customers’ needs for clean textile products and related services. It was concluded that the end users must be educated about how the industry measure and maximizes textile life and launderers must enhance information-sharing on best practices to maximize linen life. The following white paper compiled from various TRSA research projects and other industry sources address these factors.

Best practices to manage textile assets

Collecting and managing loss data has become fundamental to textile asset management. The following section details the language of textile inventory management and common practices required.

Laundries keep close tabs on the following statistics as important indicators of merchandise consumption:

1. Pounds – Total Clean Pounds of Laundry Delivered: Proper accounting of the total usable pounds of laundry delivered is critical to determining measurable cost and comparing alternatives.
2. Rewash/Rejects – Percentage of Work Rejected in the Laundry Process: Controlling the amount of product rejected for quality in the laundry process and managing the reclamation of the same is an important element of textile asset management.
3. Ragout – Percentage of Product Removed from Service: When an item is rejected after it is rewashed or otherwise deemed unworthy of remaining in service, it is removed as “ragout.” It may have completed its normal useful life (survived anticipated number of servings). If not, its premature demise is often attributed to misuse by end users, trouble with laundry chemistry, production equipment or textile construction.
4. Replacement Cost – Total Cost Per Pound of Textile Purchases: Tracking the cost of textiles based on consumption (pounds) provides the ability to measure the textile’s life cycle cost most effectively.
5. Par Levels – Textile Inventory in Circulation: Maintaining sufficient in-circulating inventory of textiles for efficient laundry operations and services.

 Techniques

The use of inventory management systems and calibrated scales for the receiving and shipping of laundry is critical to the accurate tracking of pounds of laundry. Textile services operators use these tactics and measures, among others, to accurately account for inventory:

1. Empty cart (tare) weights.When weighing a cart to determine how many pounds of items have been returned by an end user to the laundry, the cart’s weight is subtracted from the total to indicate only the goods’ weight.
2. Cost per pound. Calculated for every textile product served to budget for ongoing replacement.
3. Inventory tracking systems such as radio frequency (RF) ID and barcoding are effective alternatives for many applications including uniforms and linens. Uniquely serializing (tagging with an RF chip) items can provide insight into usage, loss, required par levels, inventory, turnover, hoarding and more. RFID specifically provides for complete counting of tagged inventory with little to no additional labor. Diligence is needed to avoid commingling of chipped and nonchipped items. When both are contained in a bag, for example, which is scanned to determine its contents, the antenna finds only the chipped items, possibly creating the misconception the nonchipped items are missing.
4. Used wash test pieces enable monitoring of tensile strength loss.
5. New textiles are tested to assure reasonable durability for commercial laundering.
6. Ragout is subtracted from the total of all unreturned pieces to determine what is missing.

Adequate and accurate record keeping is the first step toward getting control of linen replacement costs.

Factors that impact textile lifecycle and cost

Incidental Loss, Theft and Abuse

Textiles are at risk of theft while at the laundry, in transportation to the use areas and while in use. In addition to outright theft of product from unsecured areas, it may be removed from service as rags to be illicitly resold or removed as trash and reclaimed downstream as part of an organized theft. In hospitals and other institutions, laundry chutes can cause textile damage in the following ways:

• Chutes with unrepaired metal tears and fatigue cause mechanical damage to textiles.
• Typically, there’s no consideration given to provide access to laundry chutes from inspection and repair, often making repairs to damaged chutes very difficult and in some cases impossible.
• Chutes allowed to accumulate soiled textiles in some cases back up the chute to the highest floors of the building. When this happens, thousands of pounds of pressure are realized at the bottom of the chutes.
• Many floors of soiled textiles in the chute create significant weight at the bottom of the chute. When product is pulled from the chute under such conditions, it typically may result in tearing the textiles.
• Cement floors – “disaster” occurs when wet textiles fall directly on the floor, creating conditions that make it extremely difficult to remove the cement stains.

Chemical Damage in End-User Locations

Many disinfectants, cleaners and medications contain alkalis, acids, bleaches or other chemicals that can damage fabric and cause it to deteriorate. Damage begins when these chemicals come in contact with textile products through improper handling practices, such as:

1. Using soiled textiles to wipe up spilled cleaners and disinfectants.
2. Resting containers of cleaners and disinfectants on textiles.
3. Accidentally spilling cleaning solutions on textiles, or dropping them into cleaning solutions.
4. Placing cleaning rags together with soiled textiles.
5. Storing cleaning and disinfecting materials with textiles.
6. Using as drop cloths.

Hospitals, clinics and doctor’s offices handle many potential harmful substances that can have an adverse effect on fabrics, including corrosives, disinfectants and astringents. These chemicals can damage almost any fabric, regardless of its condition or age. The following table lists several substances that can negatively impact textiles.

To prevent chemical damage to textiles, textile product users must recognize potential for damage from chemical compounds and take these precautions:

1. Label all chemical substances.
2. Store clean textiles in separate containers or areas, away from cleaning compounds.
3. Store chemical substances in tightly closed containers and prevent or minimize the escape of fumes or powders during use.
4. Keep wiping cloths in separate containers, away from textiles. Rags can be dyed a different color to prevent misuse; wipers sent to the laundry should be kept in separate bags.

Observed End-User Inventory Practices

We have seen that reducing par levels to a low level reduces the life cycle of textiles. The resulting unintended consequence of lowering the inventory isn’t usually recognized for what it is, e.g. increased operational hours due to interruptions to cover shortages, increased housekeeping, labor, etc. The “bottom line” is higher operational costs.

Also, linens that are circulated at hospitals with onpremise laundries may still be warm from processing when placed into service. Under these circumstances, cotton fibers are more vulnerable to damage.

Maintaining an adequate inventory of textiles in circulation achieves a lower cost of replacement, in part due to textiles having an opportunity to recover from the laundering process prior to being injected into service.

Source: TRSA