Being truly green is a multi-faceted matter, explains Darrell New, who, for the past 21 years, has worked with the dry cleaning industry to improve quality and services. “Green cleaning is a combination of environmentally responsible policies, programs, and priorities,” New adds.

At Classic Cleaners, we know.  As the very first dry cleaners in the Indianapolis area to earn the designation Certified Environmental Drycleaner from the Drycleaning & Laundry Institute, we are proud to put a checkmark next to each one of the items on Darrell New’s how-to-tell-if-your-dry-cleaner-is-green list:

Responsible waste disposal:
None of the chemicals used at Classic Cleaners ever go into city sewers or underground tanks.  Used-up cleaning agents are saved in above-ground tanks to be removed by licensed chemical companies, who either recycle the chemicals or dispose of them through state-approved processes.
 

 Recycling:
 As New points out, many cleaners accept used wire hangers and plastic bags, but the question is – what happens from there. At Classic Cleaners, we gather hangers (not just ours, but any hangers customers collect). We reuse some, and have the rest professionally recycled.   

We encourage our customers to return plastic bags to us by putting them into the cleaning bag with the next order.  Classic Cleaners has contracted with a green recycling firm to turn that plastic into trash bags and other reusable items.     

Proper machine maintenance:
At our Classic Cleaners processing plants, the machinery is constantly being updated and replaced with energy-efficient, cost and labor-saving models.  Keeping the building itself in tip-top shape in terms of insulation and repairs helps further reduce energy costs. 

Carbon footprint reduction:
The biggest “carbon footprint” reduction of all, though, comes from reducing our customers’ need to drive their cars to drop off and pick up their laundry and dry cleaning!  Our free and convenient pick-up and delivery route service adds convenience while reducing carbon emission from automobile travels.

In this case a plus and a minus equals – green!  Not just green, but true green.  At Classic Cleaners, we don’t mean to boast, but we can’t help crowing about our Indiana 5-Star Environmental Recognition award!

By Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog team

Andretti Race Team uniforms at Classic Cleaners

When the Andretti Auto Sports racing team was looking for the best dry cleaners in Indianapolis to take care of their racing uniforms, their manager made it clear they meant the best green dry cleaners in Indianapolis.

Since the Andretti team is highly environmentally conscious, their managers were happy to learn that Classic Cleaners was the first dry cleaners in Indianapolis to earn the designation Certified Environmental Drycleaner from the Drycleaning & Laundry Institute.

Classic Cleaners veteran Lorraine Rork (manager of the Bash Street store) took the lead on the ambitious project, organizing the pickup and delivery of the garments. The specialty laundering job includes 75 fire suits along with special flame-resistant underclothes and socks for the race team, plus nearly 200 garments for pit crews and other Andretti staff.  Golf shirts for the team are turned in with each order along with the uniforms.

Each of the Andretti garments is labeled with an individual’s name, beginning with the four principal drivers Tony Kaanan, Danika Patrick, Marco Andretti, and Ryan Hunter-Reay. The racing uniforms are made of a polyester-like, quite heavy, flame-retardant fabric called Nomex.  The undergarments and special socks are made of a special cream-colored cotton fabric (Now you know the “inside story”!).

Lorraine Rork considers the Andretti assignment one of the most exciting she’s handled in her more than twelve years with Classic Cleaners.  She’s become a regular racing fan, keeping track of the Andretti Auto Sports team’s latest two July competitions in Canada, and looking forward to cheering them on (from her Bash Street desk) as they compete in Lexington, Ohio next week and in Sonoma, California and Joliet, Illinois later this month.

It’s always a race for the Andretti team. Meanwhile, though, Classic Cleaners takes extra time and special care to protect the environment while producing top-quality cleaning results. It’s not easy being green, but Classic Cleaners knows how important it is to constantly monitor environmental issues and best practices.

It’s a green light all the way to the finish line for the team of Andretti Auto Sports and Classic Cleaners!

 by Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog team

Back in the day, our great-great-grandparents knew Milk of Magnesia was a good remedy to “buffer” stomach acid.

  But, along with preventing acid indigestion in our own bodies, did you know that books and clothes need to be protected as well?

When Classic Cleaners professionals are preserving an heirloom or a wedding gown, for instance, they use layers of acid-free paper to stuff the garment, and then pack the item it into a box made of acid-free material.

"Buffering" clothes with acid-free paper

(The definition of acid-free paper is paper with a neutral PH of around 7.) 

Up until the middle 1800’s, paper was made from various plants, including mulberry and flax.  Then it was discovered that paper could be made more cheaply from wood pulp. It took chemicals to break the wood down into pulp, however, and that process left a residue of acid. The problem was that the acid would turn the pulp yellow and cause it to deteriorate over time.  In fact, many valuable books in libraries became illegible over time, all due to the effects of acid in the paper on which they had been printed!

Today, much of the commercially produced paper is acid free because, during the processing of the wood, “buffers” are added to neutralize the acid in the pulp (kind of like putting “Tums” or Milk of Magnesia in the mix).

Layered with acid free material and loaded into the acid free archival quality preservation box, your gown or heirloom can “breathe”.  Good thing, too, because at Classic Cleaners, we work hard to preserve our reputation as the best wedding gown preservation service from Indianapolis to Noblesville and everywhere in between.

Acid indigestion for clothes?  No way!  After all, as a Classic Cleaners customer, you’ve got a “buffer” in the dry cleaning business!

by Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog team

Put metal edges next to clothing and what do you get? Snags.

At Classic Cleaners, we see snags of every sort.  Sometimes, a wood splinter or a broken fingernail is the culprit, but more typically, garment snags are the result of metal things that go “pinch” or “pull”.

When the prongs on jewelry are loose, not only can precious stones be lost, those loose prongs can be very bad news for clothes.  Quick! Take your ring to your jeweler, while your dry cleaning professionals make the needed repairs to your garment.

Ladies, even your not-so-precious costume jewelry, especially if it hangs below the neckline, can snag your clothing.  Earrings that dangle can cause amazing damage as clothing is pulled over the head. Gentlemen’s and ladies’ belts can include metal edging or clasps that go “pinch” and “snag”.

The jury is still out on cell phone use being bad for human health. For sure, though, cell phones can be bad for clothing: the clips on belt cell phone holders often cause snags in the waistbands of skirts and trousers. Pin-on – and clip-on – name badges at business meetings? Those can snag woven fabrics of tops and sweaters.

Metal hoops in Civil War-era dresses

Repairing fabric tears is just one of the services Classic Cleaners provides, along with patching jacket elbows, replacing buttons, fasteners, and zippers, and hemming dresses, skirts, and pants.  With our decades of combined experience, you can bet those fasteners and zippers no longer go “pinch” in the night – or in the day, for that matter! 

 by Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog team

WomansDay.com lists Ten Things Your Dry Cleaner Won’t Tell You.  But, when it comes to do-it-yourself dry cleaning at home, there are almost as many things we at Classic Cleaners feel obligated to share with our customers and blog readers.

There are several products available on the market today that promise to clean clothes at home. including Custom Cleaner (Dial), FreshCare (Clorox), and Dryel (Proctor & Gamble). However, cleaning your clothes in your home dryer is not as good an idea as it first sounds.  Here’s why:

1.  You’re only spot-cleaning. Garments are never totally immersed in solvent.  (That may sound like an advantage, but it’s not.)  Professional dry cleaners immerse clothing in solvent, with computer-calculated mixes of detergent, brighteners, and sizing, all of which restore freshness and cleanliness to the clothes.)

2.  Home dry cleaning never rinses out the spotting solution.

3.  With home cleaning, there’s no way to regulate how much extraction of solution there should be for each fabric.

4.  Home spotting solutions can be effective on many water-soluble stains, but those solutions are not effective for solvent-soluble stains or on combination stains.

5.  Home cleaning doesn’t include professional finishing, such as pressing creases in trousers or steaming ruffles.

6.  Home dryers are rarely temperature-controlled for each type of fabric.

7.  Some stains are invisible.  That means stains that were not treated are going into the heat of the dryer, which can further set the stains!

Now that Classic Cleaners has told you all this information, ask yourself: Are there things you’re not telling your dry cleaner?  A large part of dry cleaning success, says WomansDay.com, depends on customers being honest about stains.

The professionals at Classic Cleaners are proven experts at removing stains.  Honest!

by Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog tream

Sometimes you’ve got to take back in order to give, that’s all there is to it!

Dry cleaning plastic bags

One of the small but very important ways in which Classic Cleaners fulfills the dry cleaning industry’s highest standards of environmentally responsible practices is how we handle – bags.

It’s simple.  Plastic bags help keep clothes clean and fresh while they’re being transported from our plant to customers’  homes.  But, as the first dry cleaners in the Indianapolis area to receive Certified Environmental Drycleaner certification, we know throwing away those plastic bags isn’t good for the environment.

Some 89,000,000,000 plastics bags are used each year in the U.S.. According to Earth911.com, plastic bags are produced from natural gas.  When bags are recycled, the energy is available for new products, not only for bags, for products such as composite lumber and decking.  A five-year long study by the Ocean Conservency found that plastic bags make up 9% of the debris found along U.S. coasts.

We make it easy for our loyal customers to do the right thing, reminding them to return those plastic bags (and, wherever possible, hangers as well) to us by putting them into the cleaning bag along with their next order.  Classic Cleaners has contracted with a green recycling firm to turn that plastic into trash bags and other reusable items.

Our Classic Cleaners team has made a commitment to the environment.  We believe keeping our planet a safe place to be is every bit as important as producing quality cleaning. Plastic bag recycling is just a small part of that commitment.  We stay up-to-date on environment regulations of all sorts for proper waste handling and dry cleaning operating procedures and follow them all to the letter.

 At Classic Cleaners, we’re proud that we’ve never been cited for an environmental violation, and that we’ve never been required to clean up any of our sites.  You can bet, everyone on the Classic Cleaners team is proud of our “clean” environmental record!

Bags to give back, anyone?

Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog team

Worried because you’ve heard that dry cleaning plants can cause chemical contamination in ground water, air, and municipal sewers? Worry no more with Classic Cleaners.

 None of our chemicals ever go into city sewers or underground tanks.  Instead, used-up cleaning agents are saved in above-ground tanks ready to be removed by licensed chemical companies.  From there the chemicals are either recycled or disposed of through state-approved processes.  At Classic Cleaners, we’re really proud of our Indiana 5-Star Environmental Recognition award.

Classic Cleaners was the first dry cleaner in the Indianapolis area to become a Certified Environmental Drycleaner.  This designation comes from the Drycleaning & Laundry Institute. In the many years we’ve operated as a dry cleaning and laundry chain in the Indianapolis area, we have never once been cited for an environmental violation or been required to clean up any site. We’re very proud of our “clean” record (pun intended!).

We continue to grow and to open new stores in – and all around – Indianapolis.  For us, it’s all about neighborhoods. If we’re not already your neighbors, we will be soon. We aim to be the very best of neighbors, taking the best care we can of the environment.  We protect your heath while we take care of your clothes!

by Reb of the Classic Cleaners blog team

These days, people are concerned about the environment and want to do business with companies that operate in an environmentally responsible way. Rightfully so, since few things are more important than the health of our planet!

You can be confident that Classic Cleaners adheres to the highest standard of environmentally responsible dry cleaning practices. Not only have we never been cited for an environmental violation but we have earned Certified Environmental Drycleaner (CED) certification from the Drycleaning & Laundry Institute International.

According to the official website,

CED must demonstrate knowledge regarding environmentally appropriate ways of operating drycleaning equipment, disposing of hazardous wastes, and industry-related EPA and OSHA regulations.

This is a voluntary certification that not every dry cleaner chooses to receive. Classic Cleaners, however, was the first company in the Indianapolis area to receive the certification because we recognized how important it is to do right by the environment.

When you use Classic Cleaners, you don’t just get great dry cleaning; you get a great company, too. That’s why I’m proud to be a customer and proud to be a member of the blog team.

–Matt
The Classic Cleaners Blog Team

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