National Clothesline

As competition in number of operators, aggressive marketing campaigns and discount pricing grows keener the need for quality workmanship becomes more important than ever before.

To get quality workmanship we must begin with quality control, and quality control must begin with direct management.

Management should set the quality standards and give clear instructions to all the personnel involved in production and handling of the garments and household items. The personnel in the customer service area are especially included since this is where the process begins and ends.

The inspection personnel must have full authority to determine what goes back and what goes forward.

There must be no conflicts between the inspector, the cleaner/spotter and the finisher. If there are conflicts they should be quickly resolved by management.

The basis of all quality workmanship is proper training. Continuous training is vital to the plant’s existence as well as to quality control.

Customer service representatives (CSRs) must be taught how to inspect garments for stains and damages and how to discuss those discrepancies intelligently with the customer.

The CSR must be taught to identify the various fabrics and how to discuss any problems that may occur in drycleaning and/or spotting with the customer. For extraordinary cases, the manager must be knowledgeable enough to handle them.

All stains should be identified, if at all possible, since stain identification is 90 percent of removal. Therefore, it would be a big plus to give training in basic spotting and stain identification and composition to all CSR’s. Attendance at training schools, rather than short spotting seminars, are better for training inexperienced CSR candidates.

After the basic school training, the seminars and videos would be most beneficial.

Cleaners/spotters must be taught the basics of quality drycleaning. This begins with proper garment classification, required pre-spotting, and ends with post-cleaning inspection for spots.

Most plants that I have visited insist that the spotter is too busy to inspect all garments after cleaning. Therefore, the garments are haphazardly eyeballed as they are hung for finishing. Consequently, a lot of garments are sent back for spotting by the inspector after they have been pressed. This results in duplication of effort and penalizes the production process.

The basic chemistry of spotting is most important to quality control since alkalis dissolve certain stains (protein) while acids dissolve certain stains (tannin and beverage). The decision to commit a stain to digester, KOH or bleaching is commensurate with special training for the cleaner/spotter.

Also, knowing when to quit working a stain is important to prevent claims for damage, and knowing how to convey that to the customer is the result of special training for the CSR and manager.

Knowledge by the cleaner/spotter of the dye’s sensitivity to chemical action, especially alkalis on protein fibers (silk, wool and other animal hair). Knowing whether to use certain bleaches on certain fibers or on certain colors or whites all contribute to quality control in the cleaning/spotting area.

Finishers need training to understand the fine points of quality finishing. What areas of the garment are most important to produce a good “first impression” to the customer?

How can the finisher produce a firm press job on a soft finish fabric without packing down the nap? How can a hard finish fabric be finished with a crisp look without feeling stiff? How can we press a coat collar properly so it hugs the wearer’s neck? How can a silk finisher press a rolled hem on a cocktail dress? These, and many other questions, are answered in a viable finishing training program.

Inspectors, most important of all, must be trained in basic spotting and finishing in order to discern between what can be corrected and what cannot be corrected.

An overzealous inspector can create dissension among plant workers through harassment when a stain will not come out safely or a fabric is permanently wrinkled by thermal shock.

To avoid unnecessary “send backs” for spotting, the cleaner/spotter should attach a “sorry tag” to the garment which has been exhaustedly worked on for a permanent stain. This tells the inspector that the stain has been noted and worked on, but with no success.

Most times, the inspector will think that the spotter has overlooked the stain and never attempted its removal. It must be emphasized by management that the “sorry tag” is not a substitute for spot removal.

This statement does not mean that fast service “specials” should be denied. In fact, a proportion of the production capacity should be set aside for the “specials” that are truly needed. In other words, do not deny a “special,” but do not encourage it either. What the statement means is that emphasis on quality work should be priority #1.

Production standards are created for maximum production, but they must not negate the necessity for quality. Since most of the production is measured in terms of finishing, it is critical that the finishers be paid a bonus not only for production but also for quality work.

Each time a garment has to be returned for re-pressing, a penalty against production count earned should be levied, and, conversely, a reward paid if no garments are returned for re-pressing.

Conflicts between production personnel and inspectors should be quickly resolved by the plant manager. This is the reason, as I stated before, for training of the inspector in the production processes as well as informing the spotter and finishers that the inspector is doing what he/she has been instructed to do. Try to create a family-oriented atmosphere between inspectors and production personnel through rewards and recognition.

In order to give the plant enough time to produce a quality garment, the number of “specials” promised for the same day should be held to a minimum. Some plants have a rule that same-day “specials” are given from opening time to 9 a.m. or 10 a.m. Other plants charge extra for same-day “specials.”

The better procedure is to have the CSR say to the customer: “Would Wednesday be all right?” Never say: “When would you like it?” The customer will invariably say: “Give it to me tomorrow.” Even though the customer really doesn’t need the order until Friday.

However, if the customer has several items, and he or she says that this particular garment is for a certain occasion, and he or she would really like it for tonight or tomorrow, then the CSR can say: “You certainly can have it tonight. In fact, I will put it on “special,” and it will be ready at 4 p.m.”

The garment is quickly inspected for stains in front of the customer. In fact, the CSR should “eyeball” every garment deposited for stains, and the CSR should ask the customer identify the stain if possible.

The stains should be “pinpointed” by marking the area and preparing a “stain attention tag” with indelible pen in front of the customer to give the assurance of compliance. My cleaner in Florida does this, and I commend his CSR for her attention to this detail.

All permanent stains should be noted on the invoice and individual garment before bagging and filing in the store. In this way, the CSR can point out to the customer that the stain remaining on the garment was attempted but to no avail. However, if he or she wishes us to continue further we will need permission to do so since permanent damage could result. This is what separates the “clerk” from the customer service representative.

My system is based on the premise that all work received during the day will be processed fully by the end of the next day, and it is bagged and filed away in the store ready for delivery by the morning of the third day. It is ridiculous to say: “It will be ready after 5 p.m. on Wednesday.” A promised order for Wednesday should mean that it is ready that morning, not that evening.

To fully accomplished this, all orders received should be marked-in as soon as they are received since the previous day’s work must be started early the next morning. This will avoid marking-in the work late into the evening of the day received or possibly marking it in the next morning hours.

By having the work marked-in as soon as it is received, the cleaner/spotter can then start cleaning the “new” work after the previous day’s work has been cleaned and spotted and fed to the finishers. This will give him or her an edge on the “new” day’s work and a good head start in front of the finishers who will have work to begin when they arrive in the morning to begin the new cycle.

At the counter: The CSR must inspect for stains, damages, faded areas and fragile trim. After noting all discrepancies with the customer and on the invoice the CSR should prepare a “special attention” tag indicating the deficiencies and attach it carefully to the garment.

I used white tailor’s chalk to box in the stain or damage on the garment (blue chalk on whites). This chalk will come out easily from the cleaning or steaming process.

The marked-in garment should be then placed into a separate receptacle for the cleaner/spotter or taken to the tailor for the damage inspection and possible repairing.

As I mentioned above, inspection at the counter with the customer is vital to the quality process, and it ensures against future claims against “the stain and damage that wasn’t there when I brought it in.”

At the spotting board and cleaning machine: Pre-spot the garments which have been put aside by the CSR’s together with stains noticed while classifying for cleaning. Do not spend valuable time closely inspecting all the soiled garments for stains since this procedure will expend valuable time in the cleaning/spotting operation.

Try to get the load into the cleaning machine as soon as possible. If your cleaning is done with perchloroethylene, Stoddard or hydrocarbon solvents you should be careful to adjust the drying temperature to a maximum of 140°F (drum outlet) to avoid heat-setting and caramelizing certain stains.

After the load has been cleaned and dried properly and cooled-down to avoid basket wrinkles, it should be quickly placed into the basket and wheeled to the spotting/inspection board for post-inspection.

This post-inspection is critically important to ensure that all soil and stains that have not been removed in cleaning will now be attacked at the spotting boards. It also avoids sending a garment back for spotting after it has been pressed which is a duplication of production effort and expends valuable production time.

The best way to do this inspection is to lay each garment down on an inspection board with a four-tube fluorescent, daylight fixture installed about four feet above the board.

Ideally, the inspection board should have a steam/air spotting gun attached in order to spray a fine, dry feather of steam all over the garment to bring out those hidden stains. The idea is to have the spotter find the stains rather than the finisher and inspector. Silk, taffeta, satin, smooth finish polyester, lightweight wool tropical worsted and crepe weaves should be feathered for hidden stains.

The inspection board can be made of wood, metal or plastic and should be tilted slightly. It should be installed parallel to the spotting nose of the steam/air/vacuum spotting board.

If the spotter finds a stain during post-cleaning inspection, he or she merely turns a half-right and works on the stain at the regular spotting board.

Hangers are placed over the boards so the spotter can hang the inspected and spotted garment on the finishers’ unfinished rail in groups according to the finishing units (pants, coats, silks, hot head, etc.). Better yet, if the plant uses a distribution conveyor, the garments are hung on their respective slots to be sent to the finishers.

To avoid circles, streaks and swales, the inlet drying temperature should not be so high that it will set and caramelize certain stains upon contact with the garments. An inlet temperature of 160°F to 165°F is recommended for perchloroethylene, Stoddard and hydrocarbon solvents. Other alternative solvents usually require lower drying temperatures and will not set or caramelize stains.

Those stains that will caramelize on cotton, linen, ramie, rayon and acetate fibers are the three beverages (hard drinks, soft drinks and fruit juices) when the fabric has been subjected to an alkaline condition with temperatures above 140°F.

Fruit juices do not need alkalinity. And silk, wool and nylon fibers can caramelize without being in an alkaline condition if subjected to temperatures above 175°F. Polyester, acrylic and other synthetic fibers not mentioned here do not caramelize at all.

The discussion on inspection will continue next month (Part 2).