Q. What are some of the complaints and suggestions you have received from executive housekeepers?
Nassiera: Amongst some isolated complaints that are constantly asked, the one that comes to mind immediately is the oil smell on spa towels. Another common complaint is misuse of linen within the laundry itself where employees will either step on the linen which creates stains which are not removable at all — such as shoe polish, damaging the linen while dragging it on the floor and so on. Our task then involves educating the staff and performing training at the laundry premises on what are good practices.
John: One of the main concerns of housekeepers is the efficiency of their machines. They want maximum performance, and the best ease of use. It’s also important for housekeepers to know that they can count on reliable support when needed. We don’t have quality issues; there’s a reason why Alliance Laundry Systems is the number one laundry manufacturer in the world.
Jorge: Common complaints from executive housekeepers across the laundry industry are missing items, stains and wear-and-tear. Available technologies such as radio-frequency identification (RFID) minimises the impact of human error when counting. Having the right stock par of linen makes life easier for both sides as well by reducing the wear-and-tear by resting linen at least 36 hours between washes.
Jean-Michel: Our laundry technology addresses key issues the UAE market is currently facing. We have come across sites where we have reduced our clients’ re-wash percentage – stain issues. Due to the nature of the laundry department, it’s vital to provide urgent service/breakdown calls during operation. With innovative smart phone reports we are able to send completion reports to clients as soon as we leave the site.
Q. How important an agenda is sustainability with regards to chemicals and other cleaning and laundry products?
Nassiera: In Sealed Air Diversey Care, we understand the cleaning and hygiene challenges our customers face every day. We take great care to make safe and hygienic facilities that deal in food and health care apart from our other sectors such as laundry, building care, product care, odour control and personal care. We also care for safer solutions that are kinder to people and the environment. We make greater use of natural ingredients while delivering efficient and effective results. That’s why we launched the Sure range, a comprehensive line-up of plant-based daily cleaning products for kitchens, buildings and personal care, with significant investment and years of research & development into combining more natural cleaning formulas with trusted, excellent performance. These formulations have been especially developed to meet the market’s strictest demands for performance efficiency, respect for the environment and safety to human health.
John: Sustainability is a big concern for Alliance Laundry Systems. When developing new machines and new programmes, we always take that into account to reduce the water and chemicals use as much as possible. Reducing water usage and energy savings are a big concern worldwide, but even more in the Middle East. But also the machines themselves are sustainable: in our Science Technology And Research Centre in the Czech Republic we test up to 150 machines simultaneously on mechanical functioning, software and controls to long-term durability and reliability.
Jorge: Chemicals in the laundry industry, alongside the water quality plays the most important role in safeguarding our environment and the wash quality. The UAE government aims to reduce its energy requirements by 30% and generate at least 25% of power from renewable sources, Laundries will play an important role in this. Bubbles is built around sustainability and awareness of environmental concerns — by recycling water to the extent of 80% and using the most environmentally-friendly chemicals possible.
Jean-Michel: Our products are free of hazardous compounds. They are concentrated and operate at low temperature. It’s important to save water and energy to increase sustainability.
Q. How do you maintain balance between price and quality?
Nassiera: Diversey Care is the only total cleaning solutions provider with a complete line-up of professional, cost-effective cleaning products, tools, machines, services and consulting for facilities of any size. We are launching innovations every year to provide our customers the latest innovative solutions available in the market. We intend to offer the best value for money to our customers and confirm reductions in total operating costs providing a win-win situation.
John: Quality is the number one priority for all product ranges of all the Alliance brands. Our machines are rock solid, which makes them sustainable and guarantees a long-term use. We have been in the Middle-East market for 40 years and have built a strong reputation. Alliance Laundry Services and UniMac machines are strong brands with strong products. That is a reputation we don’t mess around with. Therefore there’s a strong focus on innovation and research to further improve our equipment to the highest standards.
Jorge: Advanced technology and high quality procedures help create a balance in competitive markets, such as the one we are faced with in this region.
Jean-Michel: We achieve that by optimising the synergy of each formulations. We are proposing additional operational savings – for example, on some sites water and energy costs are higher than chemical costs.
Q. Do you look at providing any training towards your hotel client’s housekeeping staff?
Nassiera: Our biggest strength is our commitment to service and train the housekeeping and the end-user teams. Our applications are simple and easy to use, and we make sure that all users of our products and systems are well trained from a usage perspective as well as safety, which is of paramount importance to us.
John: The after-sales service of our brands is provided by a team of service managers and technicians of our distributors, who get full training at our brand new customer service centre in Dubai. If necessary, distributors can bring their own customers for training on the features and operating procedures on our products. In addition, distributors and consultants can visit the customer service centre for product and marketing presentations.
Jean-Michel: Laundry and housekeeping staff play key roles in an efficient and safe work environment. In addition to chemical usage and safety training, we design training modules to increase productivity and improve synergy between laundry attendants and room attendants.
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Jun 23, 2016 , Turkey
The laundry systems has to be evolved and use more Ozone instead of chemicals. With this any laundry have the benefit non-heated washers and detergent cost plus saving storage area. Depending on the type of operation, in house laundry has two benefits of control. One is cost other is the quality...