Laundering Uniforms/Coats
Hello,
Does anybody here launder your own uniforms/lab coats? We wear white lab coats and have them laundered. I am considering buying a washer and dryer and our own coats. Any thoughts???
You can do so but you have to have measures in place where you can prove that your washing process is able to comply with the microbiological requirements; much like you validate your food production processes.
As EthelT said in the above post, your biggest challenge will be to prove that your washing process is able to comply with the microbiological requirements and contamination issues.
It can be done, however, based on the benefits Vs Cost + Documentation, it is much wiser to just have a third party/service provider do it for you as there are multiple economical options available (just my 2 cents).
Hello,
Does anybody here launder your own uniforms/lab coats? We wear white lab coats and have them laundered. I am considering buying a washer and dryer and our own coats. Any thoughts???
it's very feasible but you will have to ensure that your process is validated by peer reviewed methodology for sanitary controls (assuming high risk). Contracted service providers will most likely be more financially viable because of volume, however you may think about scaling and turn-around for your operation.
this is similar to pest management.....can you do it in house? yes, are the potential headaches,non compliance,etc. worth saving the money? in my opinion they are not. leave it to the professionals.
You have enough on your plate.
The reason we are considering it is due to the fact that the company we have doing it now are very unreliable. The coats come back with more stains than they had when we sent them. They lose coats. They do not even smell good. They have come back wet. They have delivered them laying on top of dirty rugs and I had to send them all back. It has not been a good experience at all. I am ready to just get the washer and dryer and do it ourselves because from what I see we can do much better than them.
Thank you for all of your responses.
The reason we are considering it is due to the fact that the company we have doing it now are very unreliable. The coats come back with more stains than they had when we sent them. They lose coats. They do not even smell good. They have come back wet. They have delivered them laying on top of dirty rugs and I had to send them all back. It has not been a good experience at all. I am ready to just get the washer and dryer and do it ourselves because from what I see we can do much better than them.
Thank you for all of your responses.
I agree this can be frustrating, as you are not getting the service that you are paying for....
IMO: look for an alternative service provider, if not feasible/available and you are planning to do it internally, you need to consider the (microbial) contamination part of it, separation of storage of dirty vs clean laundry, control and count of the coats, control of the washing chemicals/utensils and other related factors.
Hope this helps.
Cintas has serve that is second to none and the prices are very competitive when looking at apples to apples
As FSQA mentioned, there is a lot involved to do this in house......your #1 best bet is to switch providers
We use to do laundry in-house and it was a PITA. We switched to Canadian Linen and they are great. I am sure you have spoken with your laundry provider already but I suggest sitting down and "training" your laundry provider. Explain to them what is acceptable, the handling and care of the garments and what condition they should be kept in. If you don't feel this would help I suggest switching providers and ensure they can provide what you are expecting from them before moving forward with business.
We wash our work clothes in house. It's a PITA but, the promblem is not the facility or the written routines we have. It's the staffs handling of the clothes.
Clothes aren't changed as often as they should. Newly washed clothes can be stacked in massive piles in the storage, sometimes they're not properly dried, The FIFO rule should be applied but it's not so a "batch" can be left for months after wash before being used and should in reality be washed again. I can go on.
So in our case it wouldn't help changing to an external service supplier. It's our own fault....
And the clothes could in worse case scenario spread unwanted micro-organisms in the production environment.
We only have low-risk production and I think that's where the staff is stuck in their mindset. They've always done it like this and it's hard to teach old dogs to sit...