Clean Show review

Drycleaning moves to the next stage of development

1 September 2011



Once again the move to more eco-friendly solvents dominated the drycleaning stands at the Clean Show but this time machine manufacturers had made a deliberate decision to omit perc models from their exhibits.


Reflecting the mood in the American markets, the choice of alternative drycleaning methods represented at Clean 2011 was wider than at previous shows. SolvonK4, Rynex 3E, GreenEarth, the Ilsa ipura system in both hydrocarbon and GreenEarth variants, Solvair, CO2, Drysolv, DF2000 and wetcleaning were all represented at Las Vegas.

As far as the USA is concerned the drycleaning industry seems to be moving to the next stage of its development. Regulation has hastened the pace of change, forcing businesses to adopt what the authorities see as eco-friendly sustainable solutions. This was reflected right across the stands.

Kreussler was taking advantage of the opportunity to introduce its Solvon K4 system.

Commercial director Thomas Zeck said the Beta project had started in March 2010 with Class lll machines being converted to take K4 and an extensive series of field trials, which assessed not just the machine process but how it affected aspects such as spotting. The Clean Show marked K4’s USA debut and 20 – 25 detailed educational sessions had been held and attended by around 400 cleaners.

Education was important, said Zeck, because K4 comes from an unfamiliar class of solvents and cleaners had to feel comfortable both about using it and its cleaning ability. Since the launch of K4 in Europe last October, the FMB group –Firbimatic, Realstar and Union – has developed suitable machines and says that so far it has sold about 35 K4 machines.

All machine manufacturers were promoting alternative solvent machines.

Maestrelli exports 95% of its sales and is well established in areas such as Western Europe, Russia and India. It was now focussing on the USA and Canada as it had obtained ETL and CSA certification in 2009 and this year’s Clean Show presented the first opportunity to meet distributors in these regions since achieving that goal, said export manager Alessio Montanari.

The company had a hard-mount multi-solvent machine, capable of handling both hydrocarbon and silicon solvents, on show. Montanari said he was pleased with event and had made good contacts.

At Firbimatic, export manager Vincenzo Minarelli said this was the first Clean Show with an “array of solvents” and despite the decline of perc use in the USA, the drycleaning market was growing thanks to the development of multi-solvent machines. Therefore it was an ideal time to introduce the K4 machine.

Its development followed the same route as that for adapting to other new solvents and all the necessary approvals were secured. “We follow the requirements of the end-user,” said Minarelli.

President and CEO Gino Biagi said that the company had a branch office in Chicago to cover sales In the USA and a technical team that worked with a network of local dealers. The feedback from this structure was that drycleaners were beginning to see business recover.

Realstar was introducing its K4 machine and sales manager Roberto Grandi said that this was the first exhibition where the machine was running live to show how the solvent worked. These demonstrations were attracting a great deal of attention. Results with K4 are excellent, similar to that obtained with perc but the solvent is much gentler on fabrics. K4 is also effective on stains. The K4 range covers 15 – 40kg sizes and two- and three-tank versions. Realstar recommends that machines are run with continuous distillation.

In addition Realstar also has multi-solvent machines that can be used with hydrocarbon and GreenEarth. Tom Medlin, national sales manager at Realstar USA, confirmed that perc use was declining – landlords don’t want it. The solvent choice is often down to the independent operator but he said K4 had made a big impact.

Solvent choice was not the only innovation. The Nebula multi-solvent machinesfrom Renzacci use a combi-clean system that allows drycleaners to select from several wash techniques. Its dynamic flow system (DFS) is said to reduce energy use by over 45% without sacrificing productivity. The Nebula produces less sludge, which also contributes to low running costs.

General sales manager Marco Niccolini said that he was now receiving feedback from businesses that were using the Nebula system every day. Drycleaners had found the machine very easy to operate. They appreciated the fast cycles and the ability to do mixed loads.

He felt that drycleaning was entering a new era and the show was demonstrating that this was happening across international markets as well as in the USA. People were beginning to see that the alternatives to traditional perc cleaning offered fresh advantages.

On the Italclean stand, Eugenio Boni said: “There is almost no market for perc machines now in North America although they still sell in other markets.” Asked about the solvent choice, Boni said: ”We don’t make solvents – we make machines”. Italclean machines can be adapted to all solvents.

Talking more generally, he said that the company had been working on improving its production of machines without distillation and had two on show. The soft-mount machine featured a shock-absorber and had noticeably improved extraction. The other was hard-mount and Boni said this type was very efficient and simpler to use thanks to its special drying cycle so the total machine time was now around 50 minutes.

Union was holding live demonstrations both of its K4 machine and of a multi-solvent model running with GreenEarth. Sales director Gabriele Cuppini said the stand had attracted a lot of interest. Union exports to

124 countries and the show had also provided an opportunity to meet potential distributors that could expand its network in the USA, although most of the country was already covered.

Though much of the focus has been on the solvent choice, this is not the only development within alternative cleaning methods. The USA market is also seeing a fresh interest in wetcleaning and in some states regulators are offering incentives to switch to this method.

So the Clean Show was an ideal opportunity to introduce the Electrolux Lagoon wetcleaning system. Antonella Favaro said that it had been very successful in both Europe and Asia where it was being used by hotel laundries as well as by drycleaning shops.

Quality and sustainability were the watchwords for the future and Lagoon met both requirements.

It is the only wetcleaning system with approval from Woolmark and both the washers and tumblers have a special program to deal with delicate fabrics. Favaro believes that Lagoon will handle most garments with “very rare exceptions”.

The system is comprehensive and in addition to the washers and dryers, it includes special detergents and finishing equipment.

Electrolux also provides its customers with two days of on-site training and a full range of marketing material.

Rynex 3E is one of the more recent additions to the range of alternative solvents. The formulation results from the collaboration of Rynex Technologies and Equinox Chemicals, Georgia.

The two companies have also joined forces to bring the development to Europe and Marty Brucato is heading up this division.

Brucato says all the field tests for Europe have been completed as well as the testing of the solvent’s machine compatability. He was at the show finalising the strategic partnerships, distribution agreements and European marketing program.

Rynex had just signed a partnership with Christeyns to bring both companies’s products to a broader market (see LCN July p06).

“The primary objective is to establish that we are a viable alternative that’s here for the long term,” said Brucato.

Drycleaners that also offer a laundry service will be a target market for Xeros, the company that is developing the concept of polymer based cleaning that is virtually waterless. At the time of the show the method was due to be evaluated with trials in two large laundry businesses in the UK. Xeros CEO Bill Westwater told LCNi that these trials would use a hand-built prototype machine.

In 2009 Xeros formed a partnership with GreenEarth Cleaning, which will become the distributor for the USA drycleaning market and the methods are seen as complementary.

GreenEarth itself is well established. President Tim Maxwell said the company now had 1,700 affiliates in 22 countries and hoped to award licences in another four countries. In March the company entered the South African market. GreenEarth was also being gradually rolled out across Procter & Gamble’s Tide Dry Cleaner franchise network.

In the finishing equipment section, Pony export manager Massimo Sanvito saw the show as an opportunity to promote the Angel shirt finishing machine to both the USA and Canada. He felt that the drycleaning market in the USA had been suffering although there had been signs of recovery in the 3 – 4 months before the show. The Canadian market had been doing better.

Sanvito saw shirt finishing as an important trend and he said that both markets needed machines that could produce high volumes. The Angel is a single-buck machine that can be operated automatically and has a short drying cycle. In combination with a collar and cuff press, it can finish around 55 shirts per operator-hour.

At Trevil Corinna Mapelli said that the event seemed to be attracting many visitors but that the drycleaning market in the USA had been slow. Drycleaners were telling her they were now seeing signs of recovery but she was still cautious. One of the reasons for being at the show was to assess what was really happening. Mapelli thought that customers with money to invest may have been waiting for the Clean Show, to start looking seriously at equipment.

At this event Trevil was focussing on the Pantastar the company’s system for finishing trousers. This combines trouser topping and pressing in one machine. The two cycles are separate but after the top of the trousers has been finished the machine automatically positions the trousers correctly for the next stage and switches mode.

There are three standard programs, regular, velvet and cord and a special reduced tension process for handling Spandex.

The Japanese manufacturer Sankosha was focussing on its LP655 collar and cuff press. This had been given a special award from Tailwind Systems, which produces management systems for drycleaners and laundries. The LP655U is a press tensioning type system with a built-in vacuum function on the cuff portion. It can handle ladies’ blouses as well as mens’ shirts. It has good productivity and quality and a small footprint.

Spares are an essential for both laundry and drycleaning businesses. Joachim Schneider specialises in spares and accessories. This was the company’s first time at the Clean Show with its own booth.

For this market it was concentrating on technical spares as it felt this offered great potential. Drycleaners don’t always know how to get hold of the spares they need as spares manufacturers change rapidly, says Schneider. The company offers spares that can be used in any machine irrespective of brand. The spares market has great potential, not just in the USA, but the whole American market.




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