Rented textiles or your own: which option makes sense

One of the most common questions we meet is a simple one: why would a company rent its textiles when it could buy them outright? The question is entirely fair, since textile rental is not a familiar model to many. In this article we set out what a textile rental service actually involves and why more and more hotels and restaurants choose it over buying their own.

When the decision is being made, the purchase price usually draws the eye first. In reality, buying a textile is only the beginning. Over its working life a textile needs washing, maintenance, storage, logistics and eventually replacement.

That is why the decision is worth looking at across the whole life cycle of the textile.

Few people stop to think that a hotel cannot run on a single set of textiles. Some textiles are in use at any moment, some are in the wash, in transport or in storage. In practice a hotel needs several sets of the same products to keep running during busy seasons as well.

When textiles are bought outright, the company ties up a considerable amount of capital in them before the first customer arrives.

In a 100-room hotel, for example, at least four sets of textiles are typically needed. In practice this means that if every room has one duvet cover, one sheet, two pillowcases and bath and hand towels, the total rises quickly into several thousand textiles. Buying them alone ties up a significant amount of capital before a single guest walks in.

The company is also left with the following, among other things:

• buying the textiles

• managing the stock

• replacing damaged items

• monitoring quality

• arranging the washing

• making sure there are enough textiles

The larger the volume of textiles, the more time and resources their management takes.

In a textile rental service, the customer pays for using the textiles rather than for owning them.

The service provider looks after the full life cycle of the textiles: buying, washing, quality control, repairs and replacement. The customer does not have to keep an eye on when the towels are starting to wear or how many sheet sets are left in the store.

The aim is a simple one: the right textiles are in the right place exactly when they are needed.

They are designed to stand constant use and hundreds of industrial wash and finishing cycles. The materials, fibre structures and stitching have been developed for professional use, where textiles are in daily circulation.

When a textile is designed for the exact use it is put to, its working life is longer and its quality stays even for considerably longer.

Not every textile designed for professional use is available through consumer or retail channels either. Some manufacturers supply their products only to laundries and textile rental providers, because the products have been developed specifically for industrial use and professional care.

Even a good textile will not last long if it is maintained badly.

When the laundry knows the textiles it handles from the start, it also knows where each product is in its life cycle. The wash process can then be adjusted to the condition of the textile where needed, so the result is as good as possible at every wash. Worn textiles can also be spotted in time and taken out of circulation before they affect the customer experience.

A guest may not know who owns the hotel textiles.

What the guest does notice is whether the sheets are fresh, the towels soft and the textiles tidy.

An even textile stock is part of the customer experience in exactly the same way as cleaning, good service or a good breakfast. When worn items are taken out of circulation in time and replaced with new ones, the hotel keeps its look day after day.

Sustainability in textiles is about more than the choice of material.

It matters just as much that the textile lasts as long as possible. A professional textile that is washed and maintained correctly stays in use years longer than one that is handled badly.

When new products are needed less often, the environmental impact of manufacturing, transport and disposal falls as well.

Many hotels know how many textiles they have in use, but fewer have worked out how much capital is tied up in them.

If your hotel has 100 rooms and runs a four-set textile rotation, the textiles can easily tie up 30,000 to 60,000 euros of capital, often more depending on their quality and volume.

In a textile rental service that capital can be freed up for developing the business, while responsibility for managing the textiles moves to a professional.

In the end the decision is about more than sheets or towels.

The real question is whether a company wants to spend its time buying, managing and maintaining textiles, or spend it on what it does best: serving its customers.

A textile service that works brings freedom from worry above all. The right textiles are available at the right time, their quality stays even and the customer always gets the experience they expect.

Before your next textile purchase, it is worth stopping to consider:

Do you know how much capital is tied up in your textiles?

Have the working hours spent managing textiles been counted into the total cost?

Do you know how long your current textiles last on average?

Would your staff time be more productive spent serving customers than managing textiles?