National Clothesline
Gown specialists add
five new members
five new members
Five new members have joined the Association of Wedding Gown Specialists (AWGS)
in 2009, and the Canadian-based not-for-profit trade association is now
represented in more than 500 cities around the world.
“Our award-winning website is far and away the gown preservation service with the
most traffic on the internet,” said AWGS presidnet Kermit Engh. “Currently 72 percent of the brides who visit our website click through to our
members’ sites, and the more members we have, the better our service to brides who are
looking for one of our Certified Wedding Gown SpecialistsT.”
Engh noted that association members benefit from trademarked logos as well as
promotions such as care labels in more than 70 designer gowns including couture
designers Romona Keveza, Augusta Jones, Ines di Santo, Adele Wechsler, and
Rivini. The association also partners with wedding media such as The Wedding Podcast
Network, Brides.com, WeddingWire.com (affiliated with MarthaStewart.com),
PreOwnedWeddingDresses.com, and Get Married, the weekday television feature on
Lifetime Television.
These programs attracted the attention of new member Ed Longanecker of Iris City
Cleaners in Mount Pleasant, IA, at Clean ’09 in New Orleans. DLI’s Fabricare magazine reported that the association was one of Longanecker’s favorite things at the show: “Their marketing and promotional materials will go a long way toward helping him
bring in more gowns at Iris City Cleaners,” Fabricare wrote.
New members meet with Ken Grippi, the association’s national training director, and Sally Conant, executive director, for a
two-day orientation at Dependable Cleaners in Boston, MA. New members attending
the September session in addition to Longanecker were Bob Fogelsanger, Samantha
Lee, and Linda Bowman of Balfurd, Inc. in State College, PA, and Bob Clarke and
Eduardo Gutierrez of The Clothes Doctor in Foothill Ranch, CA.
New members from Latin America can train with the Spanish-speaking staff at
Conant’s company, Orange Restoration Labs in Orange, CT. Recently new members Adriana
Garza Rojas of Royalty Limpieza, Preservacion, y Restauracion de Textiles in
Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, and Omar Garrido Cuevas of Tintorerias y Lavanderias de
Tamaulipa in Ciudad Victoria, Nuevo Leon, traveled from Mexico to spend several
days in Connecticut.
For more information, call the association office, (800) 501-5005 or e-mail
info@WeddingGownSpecialists.com.
