Commercial Cleaning 101: How to Care for Your Hotel Linen

Hotels are renowned for having some of the most comfortable and welcoming beds with soft, crisp white hotel bed linen, along with luxury feeling towels and bathrobes - it’s part of what makes them feel like an indulgence to stay in.

As a hotel owner, it is part of your responsibility to ensure that this expectation of quality linen is upkept, and that includes ensuring it is all maintained to a sufficient standard.

Read on below as we give you our top tips on caring for your hotel linens, as well as why utilising hotel linen hire might be a better solution than cleaning your own.

Separate Your Linens

Before washing your hotel linens, it is important that you remember to separate the bed linens from the towels. There are a few good reasons why these should not be washed together; firstly, due to the size of bed sheets, it’s all too easy for towels to get caught up in these mid-wash, meaning they will not clean as effectively this way.

Furthermore, the two are made of different fabric types. Bedding sheets are made from pure cotton and are relatively thin (so that they feel soft and smooth against the skin) compared to towels, which are instead made of a more durable double cloth or Terry towelling fabric. As such, it is best to wash these separately to avoid the roughness of the towels from compromising the delicate nature of the bedding.

This means you normally need different washing machines for different materials, which can be a big drain on space and resources. If you utilise hotel bedding suppliers instead, a company like us here at Stalbridge Linen Services can handle the washing of your hotel linen.

Use the Best Water, Detergent & Temperature

Though a ‘standard’ wash may be good enough to get the job done, there are optimum conditions that you should be washing your linen to ensure that they’re cleaned thoroughly. In regards to temperature, it’s often recommended that you wash bedding and towels at 40-60°C since this is hot enough to sufficiently kill all bacteria.

Washing at 40°C is slightly gentler on the fabric since excessive heat can damage the yarns, yet it is important that a high-quality detergent is used in conjunction with this to fully ensure a thorough clean. Invest in one that is biodegradable and free of phosphates to remain eco-friendly.

Using soft water as opposed to hard water is also preferable since this will allow the detergent to be more effective and leave your linens feeling just as soft after every wash.

Hotel linen suppliers will often know the exact products to use on particular linen, ensuring that they are washed to keep them in the best condition possible.

Fold and Rest

It’s important that, once your linens have been washed, you don’t put them back in the rooms ready for use again straight away. Instead, they should be folded neatly and left to ‘rest’ for at least 24 hours.

Resting your linens in this way allows them to ‘condition’, whereby the cotton is given ample time to rehydrate after drying and develop a pressed appearance - just as is associated with luxury hotel bedding.

Hotel Laundry Services

An alternative solution to maintaining your hotel linen in-house is to instead outsource your laundry to a professional service.

Here at Stalbridge Linen Services, we are a trusted hotel linen supplier that also offers professional laundry services, taking one less responsibility off your plate and ensuring that your linens are maintained to the best standard.

Our range of hotel linen products includes premium hotel bedding sets, comfy bathrobes and luxurious towels. Our services are flexible and can be tailored to you, and you can even get a free quote if desired.

Get in touch with us today for more information regarding our services.