Clean India Journal spoke to a few laundry managers from India’s most luxurious hotels and resorts, to find out how they kept the linens and towels at their hotel rooms and F&B areas, sparkling white through the year. Excerpts from the interview:
Vasudev, Laundry Manager
Club Mahindra Lake View,Munnar
“The first thing what our laundry personnel do every day is to segregate the room linen into three categories viz., heavily soiled, medium soiled and unsoiled. Heavily soiled linens are taken up for washing in two stages. First they are washed in hot water mixed with cleaning detergents (Diversey). And then they are given steam treatment of up to 800C to ensure the smallest of the stain gets removed. The medium soiled and unsoiled linens are given only hot water wash. Over and above, we bleach the room linens once a week, which ensures the longevity of its whiteness. There is no percentage method applied for discarding the linen because mandatorily, after 134 washing cycles the linen is discarded, irrespective of what is the whiteness quotient. As far as F&B linens are concerned, they are washed in hot water mixed with laundry chemicals. Unlike room linens, these linens are not bleached.”
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
“Heavily soiled linens are taken up for washing in two stages. First they are washed in hot water mixed with cleaning detergents (Diversey). And then they are given steam treatment of up to 800C to ensure the smallest of the stain gets removed.” – Vasudev
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Narendra Reddy,Laundry Manager,
Hotel Novotel, Hyderabad
“At Novotel, Hyderabad, we use chemicals (Diversey) to keep the linens bright white. Diversey conducts weekly checks of the whiteness percentage of both the room and the F&B linens. Of late, we have been using Diversey’s Clax Suspend Extra exclusively for the room linen. The company uses reflectometer to measure and keep a track of the whiteness of all linens. When the whiteness reading of the room linen falls below 90%, the linen is discarded. The water which we use for washing room linen is purely plain water with iron percentage between 50 to 55ppm since beyond that the linen is at risk of turning yellow. The F&B linens are washed in a different manner, though. They are washed using the Clax range of laundry chemicals like Clax Rinse and Clax 200S. The discarding percentage of F&B linen is kept at 70 to 80%.”
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
“The water which we use for washing room linen is purely plain water with iron percentage between 50 to 55ppm since beyond that the linen is at risk of turning yellow.”– Narendra Reddy
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Satheesh Abraham, Laundry Manager,
Zuri Kumarakom Kerala Resort &Spa
“The question of whiteness does not arise for our F&B linens because we do not use white linen but coloured linen. Talking about the room linen, when the linen is new, we get whiteness of anywhere between 110 to 120%. As for the linens, which are more than a month old, the whiteness percentage we get is 93.
The room linen is discarded when the whiteness falls below 80%. People from Diversey keep a check on the whiteness of the linens and inform us about the percentage. It is they who decide whether or not to discard the linen or when to discard the linen by checking it using a reflectometer. We use the Clax range of chemicals to wash all linens.”
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
“The room linen is discarded when the whiteness falls below 80%. People from Diversey keep a check on the whiteness of the linens and inform us about the percentage.” – Satheesh Abraham
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Yogesh B, Laundry Manager,
Golden Palms Hotel & Spa, Bangalore
“Whiteness of linen begins with what kind of water you are using to wash the linens. It is important to check the hardness and softness of water. Water below 60ppm gives a good wash, above that it will mean compromising with the whiteness.
If the ppm is found satisfactory, only then the linens are put to wash. For heavily soiled linens we use bleach, whereas for not-so-soiled linens we do opt for hydrogen peroxide.
Bleaching removes stubborn stains and also gives good whiteness, whereas hydrogen peroxide only gives whiteness. The washing process is divided into four phases viz., mechanical action, steam, time and temperature, which we have to maintain properly. While bleaching, you need to maintain temperature of around 60 to 65 degrees. When we use hydrogen peroxide, we maintain the temperature between 65 to 70 degrees. We do not discard the linen quickly.
We wash the linen 90 times before deciding whether to discard or not. In case of new linen, we wash them in cold water. We do spotting for two to three months.
Only if we find that the stains are indelible and the linen is losing its whiteness that we give it a hot water wash and use bleach or hydrogen peroxide. We depend on our judgment to decide whether the linen is worth discarding or continuing.”
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
“Bleaching removes stubborn stains and also gives good whiteness, whereas hydrogen peroxide only gives whiteness. The washing process is divided into four phases viz., mechanical action, steam, time and temperature, which we have to maintain properly.” – Yogesh B
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Ashesh P
