What rising energy prices could mean for the laundry industry

Despite being a key support industry to many of the UK’s leading manufacturers, laundry's are experiencing an unprecedent rise in the cost of running their plants. At time of writing, there seems to be very little, if any, government support and there seems no end in sight to high bills. So what does high energy cost mean for the laundry industry: 

The Cost Of High Energy

Energy costs are increasing across the board, affecting both commercial businesses and individual consumers.

The Textile Services Association (TSA) has already warned the government that serious support needs to be given to the laundry industry to combat the ill effects that rising energy prices will cause. Without any help from outside sources, the whole industry will face significant challenges.

The laundry industry is very energy-intensive, this is because despite trying to become more sustainable, it takes a lot of energy to wash and dry products in a hygienic way.

Energy equates to 10% of a typical laundry company's overheads, with such a large amount of money already being spent on energy, these price increases could severely eat into profits.

How do rising energy prices affect the laundry industry?

Commercial laundries have already missed out on support over the pandemic, unlike other industries that the government rushed to protect. Similarly, other mainstream manufacturing industries have received energy grants while the laundry industry had to figure it out for themselves.

Over 24,000 people across the UK are employed in commercial laundry, washing 90% of NHS products and 95% of hotel linens. Without this industry, many other parts of the UK economy would grind to a halt.

Many industries will feel the impact of rising energy prices, but for the commercial laundry industry, these prices could have severe consequences.