The laundry index tracks costs for labour, textiles, energy, diesel and other transport, and also includes a figure to represent other costs.
Cotton prices increased by 60.27% between July 2008 and July 2011. TSA estimates that raw cotton costs account for half the cost of a made-up textile and on this basis, the index shows that textile costs rose by 30.14%.
Diesel prices increased from 111.84p to 139.85p per litre in June this year – an increase of 19.6% at retail, but 17.47% ex-VAT due to VAT changes in the same period.
After weighting, electricity costs fell by 0.95% but gas rose by 9.8% and fuel oil by 4.12%, giving a total rise in energy of 12.9%.
