CHICAGO — The end of the year is a traditional time for businesses to look back at the past year and look ahead to the next.
That’s what American Laundry News did in its most recent Your Views survey, “Best of 2024, Looking to 2025.”
More than 64% of those who took the survey rated their laundry’s 2024 business performance as “good” while 21.4% say it was “great.”
Responses of “average” or “below average” business were only 7.1% each, and none rated their performance as “poor.”
Laundry managers’ outlook for 2025 business? Nearly 43% say “excellent,” and 35.7% indicate “good.”
More than 21% were neutral about their outlook for 2025, but no one saw a “not good” or “poor” year to come.
A lot of planning and preparation goes into having a successful industrial laundry year, and more than 85% of respondents indicate 2024 turned out as they expected with only 14.3% saying the year’s business didn’t turn out as hoped.
Reasons for the success operations achieved included:
- We were hoping for flat, but we had an increase of 15%! Unfortunately, too much of the new revenue was eaten up by our increase in costs.
- Hard work.
- Upgrade equipment.
- The supply chain settled down. We haven't seen a huge client growth, but revenue has been strong.
- Since the pandemic began, we have been cautiously optimistic about our business performance. However, it turns out that we have been growing more every year.
- Learning the measures of a new type of laundry business for us.
- Projections were consistent with actuals.
- As an OPL, our strategy was to stabilize our inventory levels along with a goal to be fully staffed. We accomplished both.
- I believe that pricing was where it should have been and with a busy year and better processes our overall year went well.
Planning for 2025, respondents have varied No. 1 priorities. Topping the list at 21.4% is “increase productivity” followed by “market service to attract more business,” “improve distribution or route management,” “retain/improve staff” and “add or replace equipment” each with a 14.3% response.
Finally, at just over 7% each, were “create greater energy savings,” “improve service quality” and “other.”
One respondent added a priority of “to focus on all departments tied to our OPL maintaining strong fill rates, improving operational redundancies.”
The economy and customer confidence (both 28.6%) were top concerns when it comes to what will affect the industry in 2025. More than 21% indicate the supply chain is still an issue, and only 7.1% thought the election would have a major effect.
Other factors (14.3%) included “consolidation of operators” and “In California, my main concern is the lack of investment in new laundry facilities to replace our aging plants, and the overall capacity of healthcare facilities is falling behind the demand.”
Why were these factors selected to most affect the industry? Answers included:
- If taxes increase, inflation gets bad again. Businesses cut back. We lose.
- Vision.
- People are always looking for cheaper prices!
- Lots of hospitality depends on robust business and personal travel.
- I think customers have been reluctant to make major changes to their business right now, this includes the services they use.
- While supply-chain issues are not as severe as they were during the COVID-19 pandemic, they still persist and have not been fully resolved. These ongoing challenges are likely to be influenced by the outcomes of the elections and the state of the economy.
- We are a healthcare laundry, and we need to insure the service levels to our customers.
- Threat of tariffs.
- The shrinking facility capacity is evidenced based on conversations with industrial laundry owners all pointing to plants being at capacity, which cannot support the forecasted growth in poundage. Plants are now overburdened, 24/7 shifts, lack of equipment maintenance and employee burnout.
- If we have a strong travel year, our laundry department will be busy and will need to adhere to budget. If it is a soft year, we will have better chance to stay on budget.
When respondents were asked about their outlook for the industry in 2025, answers included:
- I think we are in a positive trend. The economy is stable, and our supply chains are reliable.
- Neutral. I believe the continued interest of investor groups will further reduce the quality and performance of laundries across the nation. This will lead to a shift in the balance between self op and outsourced processes. While this shift is overdue, and being driven by underperformance rather than fiscal opportunity, is a huge concern for the already diminished reputation of our industry.
- Overall the Industry points to positive growth, but the challenge is CapEx investments. The government should step in an offer incentives that allows our industry to be more aggressive with CapEx purchases.
- According to feedback from other laundry operators, the outlook for 2025 seems promising.
While the Your Views survey presents a snapshot of readers’ viewpoints at a particular moment, it should not be considered scientific. Due to rounding, percentages may not add up to 100%.
Subscribers to American Laundry News e-mails are invited to take the industry survey anonymously online each quarter. All managers and administrators of institutional/OPL, cooperative, commercial and industrial laundries are encouraged to participate, as a greater number of responses will help to better define operator opinions and identify industry trends.
Have a question or comment? E-mail our editor Matt Poe at [email protected].
