Linencare founder hails team for keeping hospitality supplied

Linencare founder hails team for keeping hospitality supplied

The man behind Ireland’s biggest independent linen supply company has hailed his team for making sure their clients were never let down during the pandemic.

Jim Creaney, who started Linencare more than two decades ago and has 35 years of textiles industry experience under his belt, told LCN: “Covid and Brexit was a perfect storm. Not just in shutting down hospitality for so long but in creating the supply chain challenges which we had to overcome when the industry reopened.”

The Linencare founder and managing director, who now boasts Hastings Hotels and the McKeever Hotel Group among his many clients,  managed to keep customers across the island of Ireland supplied with clean, quality linen at a time many other companies were struggling with logistical challenges.

A drone shot of the state-of-the-art Linencare facility in Co Louth

The company, which has agreed a three-year sponsorship deal for the prestigious LCN Awards, was met with a unique set of challenges in the past 18 months, as its founder explained.

“Staycations saved the hotel market in 2021, there is not doubt about that but short stays, which there were a number of, present their own problems for hotels and companies like our own,” said Mr Creaney

“While hospitality was still shut down in the Republic people were heading up to Belfast for a one-night break to escape and when you’ve a one-night stay in a hotel that means a complete set of fresh linen every day.”

Linencare, which boasts the highest possible accreditation ratings, not only supplies hotels with freshly laundered sheets, they source and buy them for them – ordering the finest Egyptian cotton from farmers and using an algorithm to accurately predict what each client will require moving forward.

A £20m-plus investment in its facility in Ardee, Co Louth, means thousands of items can be sorted, washed and ironed every hour at a location within an hour of 70% of Ireland’s population.

Looking to the future, Mr Creaney said that while he was confident Linencare’s work and client satisfaction would speak for themselves the hospitality industry as a whole would need to see the return of foreign tourists.

He told LCN: “As the summer staycations market comes to a close hotels which have been booked out will look to a different clientele. There may not be the same number of coach parties for a while but there is plenty of money in many people’s bank accounts and they will look to treat themselves with a weekend away somewhere nice.

“We also need to see the return of the Chinese, American  and European tourists who were coming to Ireland, north and south, in bigger numbers than ever before Covid hit. There is always an appetite for good hospitality.”

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