Tracking System Uses RFID Technology to Monitor Linens and Garments
Casinos such as Rivers Casino in Des Plaines, IL and the Odawa Casino Resort in Petoskey, MI are using advanced tracking systems that use high-tech radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology to monitor their garments, linens and uniforms.
Why? An RFID tracking system can help to tighten loss control and reduces costs in non-revenue producing departments of their large scale facilities.
One of the toughest challenges in the hospitality industry is the growing cost of linen supplies and the difficulty of managing the inventory of bed sheets, tablecloths, towels, bathrobes, uniforms, hampers and other washable garments. With today’s high vacancy rates at hotels and casinos, coupled with the increasing cost of cotton, it is especially important to maximize the use of each item.
Several innovative companies such as Fluensee, Linen Tracking Technology and Invotech have created high-tech RFID tracking systems for the hospitality industry.
InvoTech Vice President Jeff Welles told the Hotel News that “the biggest benefit of the RFID tracking system is that it eliminates daily manual tasks and reduces the labor required to operate a facility…there are cost saving benefits. The RFID technology provides the ability to read entire carts of soiled uniforms and racks of clean uniforms at one time – automatically.”
Tracking System Monitors 20,000 Uniforms for Rivers Casino
Rivers Casino has nearly 1,300 employees and 12 to 15 different uniform styles to match each of its seven food and beverage outlets, each having unique themes and uniforms. Now they’re using an advanced tracking system from Invotech to manage their 20,000 uniforms.
Before installing Invotech’s garment tracking system, casino employees had to hand-sort garments and manually track the data in a computer. This was a very labor intensive process. The RFID tracking system can count and sort hundreds of garments per minute, much more than human. Now that a computer does the work, it is a much more efficient process.
Invotech’s garment tracking system uses RFID readers located in a facility’s laundry area to track when each uniform is sent to be cleaned, along with the time of laundering and when that garment is ready for reuse. Conveyors transport the clean uniforms to locking windows outside the laundry area, which are picked up by a facility’s restaurant, hotel and casino workers at the beginning of each shift.
Not only does this improve the efficiency of providing staff members with uniforms, but it also allows you to manage how often the garments are laundered, and when they need to be replaced. (For more info on how the tracking system works, click here.)