New facility to do hospitals' laundry
october 13, 2010
By Carl Kieke, Abilene Reporter-News
Ground was officially broken Wednesday for Texas Healthcare Linen, a 48,000-square-foot laundry facility to do hospital laundry in the Five Points Business Park.
Once completed, the facility will do the laundry for Hendrick Medical Center as well as hospitals in Midland, Odessa and several other smaller towns.
The $12 million project will be equipped to do 15 million pounds of laundry each year, with the capability to expand capacity to 25 million pounds yearly. It should be completed by mid-2011.
The Abilene, Odessa and Midland hospitals are part of the Health Care Coalition of Texas, said Tim Lancaster, Hendrick Health System president and CEO.
At one of our meetings, we were having round-table discussions about what are some things that we could do to work together that would benefit each one of our hospitals. Midland, Odessa and Abilene are very similar types of communities. Our hospitals are very similar. It was just a natural for the three of us to start talking about some things we could do.”
Bill Webster, CEO of Medical Center Health System in Odessa, said the facility will be a major boost.
“We’ve run our own laundry for many years,” he said. “It was a very old facility, leased, with very antiquated equipment.
“It was a make-versus-buy decision for us. In doing the analysis, we figured financially it would be a lot better for us to be a partner in this and get our laundry through this rather than investing millions of dollars building a new laundry for ourselves. We’re pleased to be part of this.”
The Abilene facility also was looking at replacing equipment. With the three partners working together, more can be done to keep equipment up to date by spreading the cost, Lancaster said.
Midland Memorial Hospital was contracting its laundry service and finding it difficult to get vendors to bid.
“There was a laundry in Midland that was able to serve us for a while,” CEO Russell Meyers said. “The last time we bid the contract, one firm was the only bidder.
“The costs are very high, they’re not in our control, so becoming a partner with people like us who have similar values and similar expectations for quality and cost control means that over time we’re going to save money, get a better quality service and be in business with people we know and have similar philosophies.”
None of the executives saw any problem with trucking laundry.
“We get our laundry out of Lubbock today,” Meyers said. “It’s not really any further to get it from Abilene. It’s on an interstate, not a bunch of back roads. We’re also going to get it at a lower cost.”
Ellen Gutierrez, general manager for Texas Healthcare Linen, will manage the new facility.
“We’ve been very lucky and never had that (ice) affect us, even going through Lubbock,” she said. “You always want to have a little extra on hand just in case something like that happens. You don’t want to go day to day on what you’re going to need. They’re taking that into consideration.”
The Abilene facility currently has one tractor-trailer, two smaller trucks and one in-town truck, Gutierrez said. Another tractor-trailer will be added to the fleet, with more additions as needs arise. The facility will operate five days a week and should be able to offer 24-hour service in most cases.
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