January ‘06: Thank you for visiting our new web site.

We will use this site to provide you with updates to our products, new product anouncements, helpful hints, articles, and other information to help you increase your profits.

We did not have this feature on our old web site, so we have some catching up to do on the news from Darman.

In 2000 Darman introduced its “Super D” line of Split Microfiber products. We now have one of the most diversified split microfiber product lines available, with hundreds of items. Split microfiber products (also known as microfiber products) are made of a technologically superior fabric that is more absorbent than cotton and lasts many times longer. They are replacing many cotton products in the laundry and retail markets. Click on “Microfiber” at left to learn more.

Other new products introduced and improvements in the past 5 years include: New drive rollers in our cabinets that improve the life of your cloth roll towels, ThreadMarkers (enables your CRTs to get cleaner and to dry faster), Paper Towel Dispensers (hands free models), a unique disposable paper roll towel system that rolls the paper back up into the cabinet - just like a cloth roll towel, a video kit for CRT training (under Training Aids at left), additional literature to help you sell CRT systems, and we have made available Rebuilt Darman CRT cabinets. Click on these items at the left for more information.

We recently added a new 10,000 square foot warehouse, eliminating a rented facility. This will consolidate our Utica warehousing into one location, to better serve you. We also have warehousing outside of Toronto to service our Canadian customers.

In 2005 we discontinued the hood style for the Endure cabinets and will only be offering the more modern Endura II style cabinet hoods (introduced 6 years ago). This only affects the hood. All Endura II hoods are interchangeable with the Endura cabinets. Limited Endura cabinet hoods are still available in black and semi-transparent smoke, until supplies run out.

We plan on continuing to add more products to help our laundry customers in the near future.

A Misunderstood Market, Part I
Identifying the value of the cloth roll towel business

By Danny McCoy

You may not have heard it all when it comes to cloth roll towels. Cloth roll towels (CRTs), single service towels (SSTs), continuous roll towels, cloth roll towel cabinets-call them what you may, but the bottom line is, if you aren't including them in your laundry business, you are probably walking away from profits.

Untapped market

The cloth roll towel business is like any other business, if you only: give it lip service, have poor service, never really go after the business, ignore telling your customer about the benefits of the product/service, use "low ball" pricing methods, and don't gear up for production. If this holds true, then it doesn't usually work. It's like handling uniforms when you price them inexpensively, don't tell anyone you have it, don't repair them when needed, don't clean them well, and are using a wash board (slight over-exaggeration) to clean them.

I'm new to the laundry business, which I feel is an advantage. I come without any preconceived notions, a very curious mind, and a diversified background. To be honest, at first, I didn't think that I would find anything highly interesting or challenging about cloth roll towels and their dispensers. I thought it was a dying-old method of hand drying-but was I ever wrong! What I found out is that it's intriguing, challenging, and has an almost unbelievably huge potential. The country, for the most part, is an untapped sales territory, and it's very puzzling as to why the proven best method is so misunderstood and so poorly promoted.

The cloth roll towel business can be compared to a great old idea that solves many problems. But because it's been around for a long time, everyone thinks it can't be very good. Add to that the past (and present) poor attitude by some of the laundries, and you have a poor image of a great product. Some laundries can't see the potential revenues, the benefits or the need to promote it, and they miss a great revenue stream.

On the "inside"

What follows is some of my early observations, facts collected and statements I've heard. They may help shed some new light on what's going on in the business. It will also answer many of the questions about how cloth roll towels "fit in," or what the other companies are doing to make them profitable.

Observations and facts collected by the "new kid on the block:"

• The number one myth: "you can't make money in cloth roll towels." Yes! Some companies can't make money in the CRT end of their business, just like some can't make money in the mop business, in soaps, uniforms, linens, or other sides of the business.

• Some laundries say they will take every cloth roll towel they can get because they make so much profit on it, and it's so easy to sell.

• The cloth roll towel business is sporadic around the country, in some areas it is very strong and in other areas there are none.

• Cloth roll towels in North America are less than 4% of the total hand-drying marketplace; thus a huge potential market exists.

• One very honorable "sage" of the laundry industry, TRSA senior member, Joe Mayer, estimated that there is a potential of over $1.4 billion dollars in CRT rentals available in the U.S. (Textile Rental magazine April 1998). I feel that's a conservative number.

• My estimate is that in the strongest areas of the U.S. there is currently one cloth roll towel cabinet in use for every 100 or fewer people in the population.

• Major city governments use them in the strong-use areas.

• Fortune 500 companies use CRT services in their plants and offices.

• Cloth roll towels have the five characteristics of an ideal product/service. They are: it works best for the task, it's economical, hygienic, environmentally sound, and people prefer to use it.

• A cliché I've heard fairly often in making comparisons to paper and air dryers: "If paper or air dryers are so much better, then why don't you see people jump out of a shower and use them to dry off?"

• CRT's are listed as an acceptable hand-drying method in the FDA food code and have been for many years. Many laundries do not know this. See the "Hand Drying Provision" in the food code (section 6-301.12, pg. 147, 1999).

• Many codes inspectors are unaware that they are listed as an acceptable option in the FDA food code, nor are they aware of their superior hygiene or other benefits.

• At least one codes inspector I've heard about thought that CRTs are a very short loop of towel that people keep using (they never even saw the inside of a cabinet or saw a full towel).

• When the inspectors get the information, they generally allow CRT use in restrooms and kitchen areas, unless local codes specifically say otherwise.

• Laundries often do not have literature (that have been easily available from the manufacturers of CRT cabinets) to show codes inspectors as an acceptable option.

• Many laundries have been increasing the number of CRT rentals.

• Informed businesses realize the benefits of cloth roll towels and see it as a wise investment to reduce costs, reduce potential absenteeism and because it's environmentally the best choice.

• The general public's biggest myth: air dryers are the most hygienic method of drying hands. Studies have shown them to be the worst method.

• Most U.S. consumers know little or nothing about cloth roll towels, the major benefits they have or about the studies showing how bad air dryers can be.

• Every time I mention the research on CRT to someone, they are surprised and ask, why don't you see more of them? When I say the laundries don't offer them or push them, their comeback is often, "boy are they loosing potential business." They also say that they won't ever use an air dryer again.

• Other parts of the world are increasing their use of cloth roll towels.

• In many hygiene areas, Europe is ahead of the U.S., and the U.S. eventually follows their lead. Europe is increasing their use of cloth hand towels because of hygiene concerns and paper disposal costs.

• Europe feels so strongly about hand hygiene that they have the European Association for Hand Hygiene that can be reached through the European Textile Services Organization at www.etsa-europe.org. They have excellent information on the Web, with many pamphlets about CRT and hand hygiene.

• Cloth roll towels are the predominate method in some countries.

• Some plants in the U.S. process over 3,000 towels per day.

• A foreign-owned laundry company has considerably increased their U.S. sales of CRT in a traditionally weak area. (From what I have heard they also charge top dollar for the roll towel service and easily get it because, in part, they sell the value of CRT).

• Many laundries have a very profitable CRT business and they:
  
  
  • use the same washers, driers, unwinders, winders, CRT cabinets, and route trucks that you probably have;
    
    
  • have the same employment problems you have;
    
    
  • have similar tax problems, environmental problems, etc.;
    
    
  • probably use the same chemicals as you do.
    
    
    
• Laundries that are making the most money on CRT services have geared up for CRT production, as you would in pursuing more uniform business or dust mats. They have also invested, as importantly, in training for their sales force (on how to promote CRT) and for their processing personnel (about producing high-quality clean products).

• Laundries almost always indicate that the route person has very little time to sell their services. Thus, the route person misses selling products that take a little longer, like CRT.

• Companies are adding salespeople to handle the sales, and letting the route people concentrate more on delivery and service.

• A very small laundry (less than 10 people) recently put more than 500 CRT cabinets into one customer's facility.

• Good quality cloth roll towels have been shown to be the most desirable way of drying hands. Tests have shown that people dislike air dryers. And when given a choice between paper, air dryers and cloth, they will pick the cloth.

• Cloth roll towels are a solution to some of the solid waste problems plaguing many areas of the country and Canada. One case of single-folded paper towels turns into one cubic yard of un-compacted solid waste.

• One cloth roll towel washed 75 times, replaces about 30,000 single-fold paper towels. Thirty thousand single fold paper towels turns into approximately 7.5 cu. yards of un-compacted solid waste (and uses over 40 plastic bags).

• Cloth roll towels require less energy to make and process, and cause far less pollution to the environment than making and using paper or air dryers.

• For energy starved in environmentally concerned areas, like California, they could help reduce long-term energy shortages, reduce pollution and reduce solid waste disposal, while being the least costly and most hygienic method.

• The rental prices for CRT ranges from a low of about $1.50 to a high of about $5. Cabinet rentals range from zero to about $0.50 per week.

• Some laundries use "lost leader" sales techniques to help secure business, selling a product or service at or below their cost. Some use CRT, while others use some other service or product.

• Older managers have indicated that they rarely lose a sale when the customer is told the benefits of CRT over paper or air dryers.

• Some laundries seem to be their own worst enemy when it comes to CRT promotion, delivery of quality goods, and service. They readily admit that their CRT service is often the poorest of all their product services, and in the next breath indicate that they are loosing business to paper or air dryers. If they did the same thing in their other segments, they would probably lose all their business.

Given the above, some laundries are extremely up-beat on roll towels. Why? Because they make money with them, directly in CRT rental profits and indirectly in getting other reusable textile rental business as a result of offering them.
The above items don't cover it all, but I'm sure they will generate some additional discussions. I hope it answers some of the questions people have, as well as raise additional comments that I look forward to receiving. TR