National Clothesline

What a long, strange trip it’s been this past year for the industry’s most popular cleaning solvent. Perc faced particularly tough legislative battles in Chicago and Los Angeles. The efforts of the South Coast Air Quality Management District have ensured that perc will be regulated out of existence in southern California drycleaning plants as of 2020 — unless the law is reversed later on. For now, it is evident that environmentalists will resume their quest to outright abolish the use of the solvent.

Their overall perception of the drycleaning industry seems to be that it is self-serving and cannot be trusted to do what is right for the environment. Supposedly, the drycleaning industry just doesn’t know any better.

Of course, those same people who think that way fail to see that the industry has already done more to reduce the consumption of perc than a bushel basket of bureaucrats. According to TCATA’s recently released perc demand study, drycleaning plants consumed 47 million pounds of perc in 2002. That’s a plethora of perc, to be sure, but it’s 5 million pounds less than the previous year. In fact, since 1985, the industry has managed to reduce its perc consumption by a staggering 82%. In less than 20 years, cleaners have gone from using 260 million pounds to 47 million pounds. Extraordinary.

How did that happen? Well, a large number of cleaners have continued to invest their hard-earned money into better, more efficient equipment. In some cases, regulations on perc have sped up the process for those reluctant to change, yet a large number of cleaners have made the changes voluntarily. They have become environmentally-friendly perc users — something many environmentalists don’t even think is possible, but perc cleaners know they can be “green” businesses by simply practicing safe and responsible policies which, by the way, lead to greener profits in the long run. Nobody in the industry needs to be reminded of the prohibitive costs of contamination cleanups.

It should also be noted that the industry’s allied trades companies have done an admirable job of pushing the envelope of technology, building and selling machines that run with more haste and less waste, making the reduction of perc consumption an affordable reality. Adding to the mix are the industry’s trade associations, who may as well be called “PR agents” because, let’s face it, a lot of their work consists of informing the public that cleaners do actually care about the world and the people who inhabit it. The word is getting out. Let’s just hope it won’t be too long before the pubic chooses to listen to it.

Unfortunately, the future is only going to be more arduous. More stringent regulations may loom on the horizon. More cities may join the anti-perc crusade. And, more obstacles will inevitably multiply on the road ahead. Yet, that doesn’t change the scope of what has already been accomplished. The industry has continually improved its environmental practices every single year. So, as it turns out, the industry knows better after all.

As we prepare for the 14th biennial Clean Show, it’s good to remember that the show was created in response to economic hard times for the drycleaning and laundry industry. The recession of the mid-1970s hit cleaners and launderers especially hard, and the manufacturers, suppliers and trade associations that served them shared the pain. It was no longer feasible to have a series of national trade shows for each industry segment.

Out of that difficult time, the concept of holding a single all-industry show every other year was born. It was an invention made out of a necessity, an opportunity created by a crisis. And for 26 years now, the Clean Show has served as the central gathering point for an industry that survived that initial crisis, experienced boom times, met new challenges that threatened its well being and worked through the growing pains of new technologies. The leaders, movers and shakers of the 1970s are mostly gone from the scene. A new generation now faces new challenges in a new century. Times may not be as tough as they were in the bad, old days of the ’70s, but running a successful cleaning business today is not like shooting fish in a barrel, either. Each Clean Show reminds us of the spirit of cooperation and creativity that those original founders brought to bear to solve the problems of their time and build for the future. We should do as well. We can do no less.