Ya gotta love N’awlins.  It’s a place unlike any other.  And the food!  The History!  The people!  The beauty of the city!  And the Clean Show every 6 years! 

I have been attending the Clean Show for 20 years now.  The first for me was in Dallas in 1989.  It never fails to excite me.  I love the show, I just hate that all of my friends in the industry, many of whom I only see at the show, are all 2 years older! 

In years past, the first column that I write after the show features the new offerings from the manufacturers of shirt pressing equipment.  I have often included more photos than my editors can handle and my best attempt at describing the improvements via a computer keyboard.  The following month, I have featured new products that are helpful to those in the business of washing and pressing shirts.

For 2009, I am doing something a bit differently.  For the August issue of <this publication>, I will feature movies of the equipment that I saw (and was permitted to photograph) on my website in conjunction with the photos and in-depth descriptions in this publication.  I am really excited to bring this to you, so don’t miss it! 

Just as business has been tough for so many of you during the past year or two, so has it been for those in the business of trying to sell you products and equipment.  But the best advice that you can receive is that you continue to advertise, become more efficient and always put your best put forward.  The exhibitors at the Clean Show surely did that!  What an array of products!  I tip my cap to engineers and product developers and inventors who haven’t skipped a beat just because the economy has!

Unipress, Sankosha, Forenta, Itsumi, FujiStar (to name but a few) were all on hand to showcase their new products.  At the risk of sounding too much like a middle-aged man, I must say that shirt pressing equipment is completely different than it was when I first entered the business over 30 years ago.  And, at the risk of sounding like an old man, can I say, “What will they think of next?”  If you missed the show and you need to buy a shirt unit within the next year or so, you are in for a heavy dose of culture-shock.  Some think that the show is only for those that “need” something.  I heard that very phrase a few times just last month when I’d query someone; “Going to the Clean Show?”  The response: “Naw!  I don’t need anything!” 

That thought is flawed in two ways.  First, you do need something.  You just don’t know what it is yet.  You need to cut costs, become more efficient, reduce your labor costs and offer your customers a bit more.  Learning how to do that is why there is a Clean Show.  Secondly, you must remain informed about the things that you will eventually need so that when the time comes, you will make the correct informed decisions.  If suddenly, in January, you find yourself in immediate need of a new shirt unit, what will you buy?  Sad to say, but you will probably buy the shirt unit that your local equipment distributor has in his warehouse.  And perhaps he has that machine in his warehouse because the customer that ordered it a few months earlier actually did go to the Clean Show and discovered that that machine was the wrong purchase for him.  He cancelled it in the nick of time and you made an uninformed decision to buy his reject.  Knowing what is in the marketplace is critical.

Ok.  On with the show!

Forenta introduced – get this – three new single buck shirt units!  One of the machines is a combination body & sleeve press with Pleat Finishers. The second unit is different style combination body & sleeve press with cuff clamps and the third unit is a revision of our single buck press used in a three piece set up.  Stayed tuned for movies of these units next month.

Unipress raised the bar on their NT Lightning series.  The units now feature a sleeve pleater. The new models are called the AP, AP1 and the AP2.  They will eventually replace the NT, NT1 and NT2.  The AP2 is the latest version of their rotary double-buck.  It is the great-grandson of the now seemingly ancient CRD introduced in 2001 at that Clean Show, also here in New Orleans.  The AP is the single-buck Sankosha clone and the AP2 is the latest incarnation of Unipress’ exclusive “all-in-one” units where the one machine does the body, sleeves, collar and cuffs.   See it “live” (sort of) next month when I post movies on my website!  But you’ve seen the sleeve pleater before; Sankosha has been making them for years.  So Unipress is the last onto the dance floor, but did they get the best girl?  You decide.  This sleeve pleater is unique in two critical ways.  First of all, the steam plate is made in such a way that it also presses all of that thick fabric around the sleeve gusset! This is a major breakthrough in the industry.  That thick part of the shirt near the elbow has never gotten pressed on any blown-sleeve unit, until now.  Secondly, the sleeve pleater doesn’t need to be dressed.  The operator simply attaches the cuff and the machine does the rest.

FujiStar has changed its name to YAC and introduced a very unique single-buck shirt unit.  The buck doesn’t move.  The steam chests do!  YAC is claiming 70 shirts per hour!  I’ll have a movie for you next month as well as in-depth discussions of these and the other offerings that I witnessed in Louisiana.  This was a banner year for the Clean Show! 

"If you do what you always did, you'll get what you always got