International Linen and Uniform Service Day

If you have stayed in a hotel, eaten in a restaurant, been treated in a hospital or worked on a factory floor, you have relied on this industry. It runs quietly in the background of almost every sector of the UK economy.

Where the day came from

The date marks 9 August 1910, when Alva J. Fisher patented "Thor", the first electric-powered washing machine. That patent is where commercial laundering as we know it begins.

The day itself is much newer. It was registered in 2021 by Infinite Laundry, with the support of the Textile Rental Services Association (TRSA) and companies across the industry, as a way to recognise the people who kept hospitals, food producers and essential businesses supplied throughout the pandemic. The hashtag is #ILUD.

What linen and workwear services keep running

A hotel that never runs short of bed linen or towels. A restaurant with pressed table linen, clean chef whites and enough kitchen cloths to get through a Saturday service. A food production site where every operative starts the shift in a garment that meets the standard the auditor will ask about.

Engineering firms, quarries, foundries, and welding shops depend on protective workwear that has been laundered in a way that maintains its protective properties. Garages and logistics hubs depend on uniforms turning up every week without anyone having to chase them.

None of that happens by itself. It happens because someone loaded a van at five in the morning.

The work behind a clean uniform

Most customers see only one part of the service: the driver at the door with fresh stock. Behind that delivery is a full cycle that repeats every week.

Used items are collected and scanned on arrival at the laundry, so every garment and every linen item is accounted for. They are sorted and hygienically washed according to the process the item requires, which differs considerably between a hotel duvet cover, a flame-retardant coverall and a baker's jacket. Everything is then quality checked. Damaged linen is removed from circulation and replaced. Damaged workwear is repaired, keeping garments in service longer and reducing replacement costs for the customer.

The clean items are folded, packed and labelled, then loaded for the next delivery, while used items come back the other way. The cycle keeps turning.

The people who make it work

The technology matters. The people matter more.

Our production teams work the sorting, washing, finishing, and packing lines, checking the quality of each item. Our engineers keep the laundry running, including the dual fuel systems and backup generators, so that a power problem does not become a customer's problem. Our drivers cover routes across England and Wales in all weather and traffic conditions, and they are usually the only people from CLEAN that a customer sees each week.

That last point is worth sitting with. A driver who knows a hotel's linen store notices when a site is running tight and flags it before it becomes a shortage, doing something no system can do on its own.

CLEAN has been doing this work since 1886, when we began as the Maidenhead and District Laundry Company. Every one of those years came down to people turning up and getting it right.

How to mark the day

You do not need to do much to take part.

Thank the driver who delivers to your site. Post a photo of your team in their workwear with #ILUD. Give your linen or uniform provider a shout-out on social media. Support the restaurants, hotels and businesses that use commercial linen and workwear services, which is most of them.

If you work in this industry, in any role, the day is yours.

From all of us at CLEAN

To our production teams, drivers, engineers, service managers and customer service colleagues across every site: thank you. The reason our customers rarely have to think about linen and workwear is that you have already thought about it.

And to our customers, thank you for the trust. It is the reason the work matters.

To find out more about linen, workwear or floor mat rental for your business, call us on 0330 818 7008 or get in touch at cleanservices.co.uk.