In hairdressing towels for clients have been used for years. A client is usually given a fresh towel when they arrive at the hair salon. The salon has a continuous laundry cycle cleaning and drying towels or the salon may not have its own wash facilities and wash them once a week and just dry them over and over in the salon.
One of the latest ideas is to use and take advantage of use once throw away towels. There are lots of different companies providing this service. Most offer a bulk buy monthly delivery service for various size and color towels. The towels composition is made to be biodegradable so they do not contribute to landfill. Some start from as low as 15p per towel and even lower for larger regular orders.
Washing towels inside the hair salon is very time consuming and can be costly. Salons who have already invested in washing and drying facilities may not see a great benefit from switching to disposables. There is a strong argument for and against.
If your hair salon does not have laundry facilities you may want to consider throw away towels. This system could be viable if you are spending over £15 to £20 per week on laundry. On the figures quoted above you could purchase one hundred and sixty towels per week. There is also not just the cost benefit, other benefits include a consistent towel quality (some salon towels although clean suffer from peroxide and hair color stains and can look quite rough and faded over time). It can be that little bit more reassuring for clients that they receive a brand new towel every time they visit the salon.
If you have your own laundry at your salon it's very difficult to justify the costs. The initial outlay on a washing machine and a tumble dryer could never be recouped from switching to disposables. It's a decision in terms of preference, although the environmental claims could be questioned. Re-using and washing a towel with an A rated washer has to be more environmental that creating trade waste, which although disposable towels are biodegradable there are still in direct costs involved. The extra waste in the bin, the transport to move it to landfill are all hidden costs we do not see, also how long the towel takes to biodegrade is also an issue.
Disposable towels are a great way for a hair salon to add value to its retail offer. If you are purely making a buying decision based on costs then I would really do the figures before making the plunge.
