Why Use SMARTCare & Nature-L in your Wetcleaning Process?
A
slight paradigm shift has occurred in the dry-cleaning industry. Not so
many years ago, cleaners dry-cleaned almost all of the clothes that were
processed. Today, more and more casual clothes are brought into the cleaners
by the same customers who years ago wore wool suits. Just as the customer
years ago wanted their suits to be restored to a like new condition, today,
those same customers want their casual clothes to not only be clean, but
to look and feel like they did when the clothes were new.
As you have probably noticed, you are getting in a quantity of casual khaki pants, such as the Dockers brand, along with polo-style shirts. In most instances, these types of clothes will come out cleaner and fresher when washed in water.
However, shortcomings occur when you wash clothes using deficient chemicals and improper processes. These shortcomings can cost you time, money, excessive labor, and inferior quality.
The
Kleerwite products, SMARTCare and Nature-L were designed to solve all
of these shortcomings.
No other company makes a product like SMARTCare. It is an all-in-one detergent, conditioner, and sizing. The unique thing about this chemical is that the conditioner and sizing will remain in the garments after they are rinsed. So when you wash with SMARTCare, the clothes will come out of the dryer soft, with hardly any wrinkles which will make clothes easier to press, and after pressing, the garments will be crisp, and have a new feel.
Nature-L was designed to work in wetcleaning by dispersing on contact with the water and dissolving oil and grease stains in the water. When used together, Nature-L and SMARTCare can remove almost all of the wet-side and dry-side soil in one process.
Below is a discussion of the time, cost savings, excessive labor and inferior quality that should expect to receive, as well as an explanation for how SMARTCare and Nature-L can help your organization.
TIME SAVINGS
When you dryclean clothes, most of the garments come out without spots, and are relatively easy to press. However, khaki pants because they are mostly light colored garments show all the soil, which in many cases contains both dry-side and wet-side soil. Wet-side soil is very difficult to remove in the dry-cleaning process without first prespotting the garments which can take a lot of time.
Wetcleaning on the other hand, is not very effective at removing dry-side soil, so in many instances you may find that your cleaners will dryclean the khakis and polo shirts first to remove the dry-side soil. They will then follow this up with wetcleaning to remove the wet-side soil.
Double processing garments in this manner takes extra time, creates excessive handling, and if the dry-cleaned clothes are not dried properly, could put traces of perc into the sewer system.
SMARTCare and Nature-L are designed to take out both the wet-side soil and the dry-side soil in the wash. Our process will get the clothes clean and eliminate a majority of do-overs. What we have seen in over five years of marketing these chemicals is that whatever stains remain after cleaning is pretty tough, if not impossible to remove. So, SMARTCare and Nature-L will save you the time of double processing the garments.
COST SAVINGS
Determining the exact cost savings can be difficult, however, you can associate saving money by eliminating redundant and unnecessary steps in the processing of khakis, polo shirts and other wetcleanable garments.
Aside from the cost of double processing, SMARTCare and Nature-L are
less expensive to use than the detergents and sizing that you use in the
drycleaning process. You use approximately the same amount of ounces per
ten pounds to wetclean or dryclean. However, SMARTCare and Nature-L cost
significantly less than drycleaning detergents and sizings.
When you wash the casual clothes in the regular shirt laundering cycle,
you may have up to three to four rinses. Compared to wetcleaning using
the SMARTCare process, you only need to have one rinse. The amount of
water saved is staggering. For a 50 pound machine, you probably have five
water fills consisting of one wash, three rinses and one final rinse for
the sour. The amount of water used for this process would total approximately
145 gallons of water. Of this amount, approximately 87 gallons of hot
water would be used.
The SMARTCare process consists of a wash cycle and one rinse, with the total water usage of approximately 60 gallons. In addition, only 15 gallons of hot water would be necessary. So, as you can see, the energy used to heat the water, the total water used, and the sewer costs would be reduced by more than half.
In addition when you dry-clean the khakis and polo shirts first, you are creating some amount of lint and still residue that ends up on a filter if you use it, as well as in the still residue. By wetcleaning, you eliminate these two costs. One other cost associated with drycleaning that would be reduced is the cost of drying. While not having the exact costs, it is significantly lower to tumble dry the khakis and polo shirts in regular dryer, than to dry the clothes in a dry-cleaning machine that utilizes a heat pump, refrigeration and steam.
EXCESSIVE LABOR and QUALITY
Sizing, which you may or may not use in the dry-cleaning process, has shown over time to reduce finishing time and improve the overall quality of the garment. When you dry-clean, your clothes gets sized to restore the new feel and make pressing easier, however when you wash khakis and polo shirts with just a detergent, you use no sizing.
The problems that occur from not using sizing in wetcleaning is that the casual clothes can come out of the dryer harsh and stiff, with heavy wrinkling. These garments require longer finishing times, which reduce production, and increase the labor necessary to finish a garment.
IFI, then NID, reported in a Fellowship study in the mid 1960's that using sizing to process garments reduced finishing time by 12 percent. That alone is a reason to use the sizing in the wetcleaning process. However, the sizing also makes the khakis look smoother and feel better. The sizing helps restore the cotton garments to a crisp feel that is not possible by washing in a shirt laundering process.
SMARTCare as mentioned above contains a conditioner and sizing that will not rinse out of the garment. So when you wash with SMARTCare, the presser will be able to finish the khakis faster and easier. Plus the khakis will be smooth and crisp.
In addition, using SMARTCare helps to reduce the wrinkles associated with handling the garments after they are pressed. When you consider how often clothes get handled after they are pressed, by getting pushed down the line to inspection, the handling that occurs in the assembly area, the bagging, and the delivery, garments can be handled upwards of ten or more times. The conditioner and sizing in SMARTCare help reduce and eliminate wrinkles from occurring so that your customers receive a superior-quality and well-finished garment.
The results you will see is not something subjective. Using SMARTCare and Nature-L for wetcleaning khaki pants and polo shirts as well as any other wetcleanable garment will produce the results described above.
SMARTCare and Nature-L should be an integral part of your wetcleaning process. Try it and see for yourself how easy it is to wetclean using SMARTCare and Nature-L