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ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Ted Kruger, a longtime executive recruiter for the textile services industry, has announced to friends and colleagues that he’s leaving the industry due to illness, according to the Textile Rental Services Association (TRSA).

Kruger, who lives in California, is receiving round-the-clock medical care, gets regular visits from his two sons and two daughters, and is not in pain, TRSA reported in its association publication.

He told TRSA he was diagnosed in 2011 with cancer. After receiving extensive treatments, he felt well enough to accept job-placement assignments in the San Francisco area. The cancer returned a few weeks ago, and Kruger was given only a short time to live.

The Ted E. Kruger Recruiting website is now closed.

According to TRSA, friends and associates may contact Kruger at 760-731-7243. His address is 4650 Dulin Rd. #1, Fallbrook, CA 92028.

EMI is a formal education program that provides participants with one week of management education per year in successive years. It develops leadership and management skills by delivering a comprehensive understanding of principles and practices relevant to textile services operations.

Each year of the program includes over 30 hours of instruction over a 4-day period. Attendees complete each year of an annual sequence, finishing each EMI phase before advancing to the next. This delivers the maximum networking benefit as they remain with the same classmates year after year and develop strong bonds with them. The staying power of these professional networks attests to the value of EMI not only for the classroom interaction, but the informal exchange of ideas and experiences in the program’s social settings.

Participants gain practical insight specific to the textile services industry and operations that can be immediately applied to motivate and inspire co-workers and employees to streamline production, improve productivity and increase profitability, including:
- Establishing team-building skills and professional network
- Developing effective leadership and communications skills
- Managing innovation and change
- Motivating and inspiring employees and reducing conflict
- Understanding effective management principles and best practices

Register: http://www.trsa.org/calendarevent/executive-management-institute-emi

NEW YORK — The governing body of UNITE HERE recently elected D. Taylor as president. John Wilhelm, who had served as president since 2009, retired at the Nov. 29 meeting of the union’s General Executive Board.

UNITE HERE represents workers throughout the United States and Canada who work in the hotel, gaming, food service, manufacturing, textile, distribution, laundry, and airport industries.

Taylor leads UNITE HERE’s largest affiliate, Local 226 in Las Vegas (also called the Culinary Workers’ Union). Representing 60,000 workers, Local 226 is widely recognized for leading the transformation of hospitality jobs from low-wage, insecure work to stable, middle-class occupations, UNITE HERE says.

Taylor served as Local 226’s staff director from 1990 to 2002 and secretary-treasurer since 2002, and as general vice president of UNITE HERE since 2009.

Upon his election as president, he pledged to develop leadership among young people and people of color, and to expand the success of the union in Las Vegas to hospitality workers elsewhere.

“This is a tremendous honor, and a huge challenge,” Taylor says. “Our job is to fundamentally change the fate of workers in our industries. I’m optimistic that we can do that, but it’s going to require taking some real risks.”

Wilhelm was previously president of UNITE HERE’s Hospitality Division, and before that was president of HERE, one of the two unions that formed UNITE HERE in 2004.

“I am grateful beyond measure for the privilege of serving as this union’s president,” says Wilhelm. “We are blessed with terrific leadership, and it’s time for a new generation to lead us into the future.”

ATLANTA — The Clean Executive Committee (CEC) has unveiled a brand-new mission statement for the Clean Show that it believes reflects and promotes the exchange of new ideas before, during and after the event.

A thorough review of all aspects of the every-other-year show led the group to adopt the following: “The Clean Show provides a global forum for bringing together garment and textile care services professionals for the purpose of sharing ideas, business practices and the latest products, services and innovations as well as raising the level of professionalism in the industry.”

In keeping with the spirit of this statement, the CEC has relaxed certain rules regarding the convening of affiliate groups during trade show hours. In the past, meetings were restricted to hours outside education and exhibit hours (which traditionally run from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.), but now exhibiting companies and industry associations can schedule their sales, distributor or group meetings during educational sessions or between the hours of noon and 2 p.m.

David Cotter, CEO of the Textile Care Allied Trades Association and chairman of the 2013 Clean Show in New Orleans, supports the new direction. “We believe the new rules will support an environment where exhibitors and attendees can conduct business and meet with others more freely.”

The CEC is comprised of representatives from the five sponsoring associations, including the Coin Laundry Association.

The New Orleans Morial Convention Center will host the Clean Show on June 20-22, 2013. More than 400 companies are expected to exhibit.

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. — The Textile Rental Services Association (TRSA) last month hosted the first of six Executive Roundtables planned for 2012, providing members with benchmarking information designed to improve operations, performance, productivity and safety.

TRSA President Joseph Ricci says his association’s members are always looking for opportunities for innovation. “Differentiation with unique goods and services provide a niche for new market entry and the financial premiums associated with those opportunities,” he explains.

This gathering covered issues impacting the restaurant/food-and-beverage and hotel/lodging markets. A representative of Darden Restaurants—the world’s largest full-service restaurant company, including the Red Lobster, Olive Garden and Longhorn Steakhouse brands—took part in the roundtable discussion, promoting the exchange of information from customer to service provider.

Industry consultants from Pertl & Alexander led discussions on linen loss and replacement for hospitality and food-and-beverage (F&B) applications. Attendees were invited to tour three Walt Disney World laundries, each with a special application and purpose.

The Housekeeping Plant processes rooms linen and pool towels for the nearly 30,000 Disney World hotel guestrooms. It produces more clean linen than any other single laundry location in the world—nearly 120 million pounds annually. The 16-year-old facility operates seven tunnel washers (that are targeted for replacement) and an automated open-pocket cell. 

The emphasis on throughput production is clear, but not at the risk of sacrificing quality. Quality control is ongoing, including a station that randomly evaluates linen before shipment.

Bob Corfield, president of Laundry Design Group, appreciated the production and efficiency of the housekeeping plant, but was eager to see how Disney handled its considerable costume and uniform requirements.

After a short bus ride, the group toured the Costume Facility that processes 29,000 costumes and cast member uniforms every day. 

Curt Gray, chief administrative officer for AmeriPride Services in Minnetonka, Minn., says he felt more at home in the uniform plant environment. His goal was to better understand how a world-class organization like Walt Disney World integrates its service culture into the industrial laundry environment.

After going through the plants, Gray commented that the net result of what Disney accomplishes appears to be the sum of doing a lot of little things right.

The Costume Facility tours like a morph between a large drycleaning shop and a production industrial plant (it also processes all walk-off mats used in the theme park). Equipment includes four drycleaning machines, two wetclean washers, and an assortment of washer-extractors.

Terri Amey, Disney’s costume plant manager, attributes the production and quality to the plant’s “cast.” Average term of service among full-time employees there is 19.5 years.

Pablo Lucchesi of Crown Linen, Miami, was particularly interested in touring Disney’s Food and Beverage Plant, as F&B is a growth center for his company.

Disney’s F&B facility provides table linen for the 200 park restaurant outlets servicing 32 different color options.

F&B delivery drivers arrive at work at 2 a.m. Pickups and deliveries are made in the early-morning hours using lowboy trailers. They are equipped with ramps that eliminate lift-gate requirements, reducing delivery times and improving operator safety.

The next TRSA Executive Roundtable is scheduled for May and will involve operational and market issues specific to national textile services companies.

Consulting Services: Ron Evans, RJ Evans and Associates

I am president of RJ Evans and Associates, a consulting firm for the industrial laundry industry. My firm primarily focuses on strengthening customer management programs within textile rental service departments, but has expanded into working with and strengthening full-time sales programs.

My career started more than 35 years ago with a national uniform company in its management-training program. The next 12 years were spent on the operator side of the business in sales, service and general management positions.

An opportunity arose to join an international supplier to the global textile industry as its director of training. This enabled me to visit hundreds of industrial laundries around the world for 15 years and train personnel in product knowledge, sales skills, and service growth. I learned hundreds of techniques and practices that expanded my own knowledge and learning base.

As a result of this exposure to so many companies and their diverse methods in achieving success, I was often asked to participate in textile industry meetings, conventions and workshops as a committee member and speaker.

I became an instructor at the prestigious Executive Management Institute (EMI) for nine years, the executive director of the Independent Textile Rental Association (ITRA), and a training instructor with the Central States Network (CSC) and Universal/UniLink Purchasing Association (UPA). I can say, without doubt, that I have worked with and trained more people in our industry than any other consultant over the past 20 years.

The biggest challenge my team and I have to address is how to successfully assist clients and the textile industry to establish customer management programs that consistently maintain and grow their customer bases. Changing needs require changing customer-service programs that reignite customer satisfaction and loyalty.

2011 was a year of accomplishments. We expanded our training workshop schedule, developed a webinar program to reach a greater number of our clients’ employees, expanded our client list, and improved our database of training information. We also added several new programs to our list of training seminars.

I am looking forward to contributing to this excellent Panel.

Commercial Laundry: Tom Gildred, Emerald Textiles

It is an honor to join the Panel of Experts. I am an entrepreneur and the CEO of Emerald Textiles, headquartered in San Diego County, Calif. Prior to Emerald, I founded FMT Consultants, a business management firm and Microsoft Partner where I am chairman of the board. Prior to founding FMT, I worked for Ernst & Young in its audit and consulting practices for five years. I am also chairman of the board of Gildred Companies and president of the board of the San Diego Museum of Art.

Operational just over a year, Emerald Textiles has quickly become a leading provider of healthcare linen to Southern California and now serves many of the major healthcare systems in the area, including Sharp HealthCare, Scripps Health, UC San Diego Medical System, Eisenhower Medical Center and Kaiser San Diego.

Emerald operates a technologically advanced and environmentally responsible commercial healthcare laundry facility, and saves San Diego County more than 700,000 therms of natural gas and approximately 40 million gallons of water annually.

Its goals include delivering innovative, higher-quality products; increased infection control and energy efficiency; and delivering substantial savings to our customers through new, lighter products and superior linen management.

One of our primary challenges this past year was acquiring sufficient linen supplies to keep pace with our growth. Some of Emerald’s accomplishments in 2011 include extreme energy savings and establishing our position as provider to the major healthcare systems in our area.

I look forward to the opportunity to collaborate with this panel.

Uniforms/Workwear Manufacturing: Steve Kallenbach, American Dawn

I’m a three-decade veteran in the textile rental, garment resale and wholesale textile segments of our industry. Starting as a route driver in the 1970s, I earned promotion into service/sales/production management, general management and finally group general management with two of the industry’s largest uniform and textile rental companies (Todd Uniform, later purchased by ARAMARK Uniform Services).

After 13 years on the laundry side, I moved to vendor with the largest apparel maker in the industry, VF Imagewear. That career spanned 11 years and included selling and managing many nationally licensed image apparel programs – still serving the industry.

I then founded and operated a direct sale company (Image Apparel – Brand Identity Solutions) and a garment manufacturing company (Basic Apparel), and subsequently sold them to my partners.

In 2004, I joined American Dawn Inc. as regional sales manager for California. American Dawn services this segment of the industry with toweling, linens, aprons and specialty garments.

I have been a featured speaker at many industry conventions and national sales meetings, and have consulted to some of the largest companies in the industry as a trainer/teacher in sales and marketing. I now regularly instruct at EMI (TRSA’s Executive Management Institute) and PMI (Production Management Institute), plus make regular appearances at Pepperdine University as a guest lecturer in strategic marketing.

I’m proud to be considered an expert in this segment, including sales, marketing, service, administration, production and procurement; and I’m excited to have been chosen to serve this well-read and important publication in our industry. I love this business!

Tuesday: Introductions to representatives from the textiles, linen supply, and hotel/motel/resort laundry sectors.

Click here for Part 1.

INWOOD, N.Y. — Laundrylux has hired Kim Shady as senior executive vice president for OPL and National Accounts, the company reports.

Shady has more than 23 years of experience in the on-premise laundry sector, and previously worked as North American sales manager for UniMac. He serves on the Textile Care Allied Trades Association board of directors and has been a member for more than 15 years.

“We are delighted to welcome Kim Shady, a highly respected industry leader, to Laundrylux to lead the growth and expansion of our OPL and National Accounts business,” says Laundrylux CEO Neal Milch. “Kim will be working closely with Dan Goldman as they expand our sales force to ensure national coverage for both the Electrolux and Wascomat OPL product lines.”

“Kim has been an OPL sales leader for many years, and we have always respected him as a competitor,” adds Howard Herman, Laundrylux president. “Laundrylux and Electrolux Professional are totally committed to OPL as a pillar of our business, and Kim Shady is the ideal professional to lead the charge.”

Shady called his new post “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

“I never anticipated changing affiliations after so many years, yet I have watched with admiration how the Electrolux brand has steadily succeeded in appliances and professional coin laundry,” Shady says. “I know it has incredible potential in OPL and National Accounts.”

EMI has enhanced the careers of thousands of textile services professionals and earned high praise from participants for nearly 50 years. The program develops the management and leadership skills of participants through team-building, interactive sessions emphasizing information-sharing and problem solving. The EMI program offers 30 hours of interactive classroom training covering topics such as conflict management, strategic planning, delegation, effective communications, coaching, problem solving, interpersonal development, ethics and diversity, financial management, marketing/sales and customer service. EMI is the commercial laundry industry's definitive experience for new industry leaders. Contact Salita Jones, 703-519-0029, ext. 108, sjones@trsa.org.

WILMINGTON, Mass. — Adopting a “hippie look” to go undercover in his company for the CBS series Undercover Boss, UniFirst President and CEO Ronald Croatti often found himself unable to match the speed of the workers training him, as he sought to discover if he could “make the cut” as an employee.

But his week-long journey was as much about seeing the company through his employees’ eyes and learning if the “family culture” he believed to be in place was truly there.

WESTERVILLE, Ohio — The International Executive Housekeepers Association (IEHA) is now accepting nominations for the Unsung Hero Award, presented to frontline workers in the housekeeping and custodial industry who show exemplary initiative in going above and beyond their call of duty.