With facilities cutting cleaning budgets and clients always searching for the lowest bid, is paper one area where building service contractors can skimp to win the price war? Short answer: No.

“You get what you pay for. It depends on what your motivation is,” says Stan Shelton, vice president sales and marketing, Millennium Building Services, Portland, Ore. “The cheapest price is not always the greatest value in the long run.”

Cheaper paper tends to be of a lower grade. When the paper isn’t strong or absorbent enough, people tend to use more to dry their hands. And then, it stops being the cheapest. With a better grade of paper, people may only use two instead of three towels, causing less waste, says Shelton. In turn, the dispenser needs to be refilled less often, thus saving on labor costs.

Know your product
Staying on top of current trends in the industry is not only a good way to impress customers, but the new innovations may also be effective for cutting down waste and cost.

“I think as janitorial contractors, we have the opportunity to keep the client informed. They don’t know. They don’t ever ask,” says Don Mittelstadt, president, Assisted Building Services, Inc., Salt Lake City. “They appreciate that we keep up with the latest products.”

If the price is right, clients may be very responsive to retrofitting dispensers with new technology such as touchless applications or coreless toilet tissue.

For paper towels, roll towel is generally preferred over multifold towels. Even though rolls may cost more, there’s usually less waste, says Shelton. Multifold towels tend to fall out, or users pull more out than they need.

This is similar for touchless dispensers with electronic sensors that force a delay between each towel, says Mittelstadt. People aren’t patient enough to wait for extra towels, so they only use what is absolutely needed to get dry.

Comfort costs
Buying cheaper paper can get BSCs into other trouble besides accumulative waste. When it comes to comfort, better toweling and tissue is going to cost more.

“To my clients, [softness] is a big deal. You put in cheap paper, they squawk,” says Dennis Richards, president, Puritan Cleaning Services, Missoula, Mont.

Know what the client wants. If they demand comfort, but don’t want to pay the higher prices, explain to them what the reaction might be. But, don’t assume that all clients look for softness.

“I have some clients that are schools, and they don’t care what a second grader thinks [about toweling],” says Richards.

Going green
The benefits of quality towel and tissue extends beyond less trash or the soft touch. Paper is also an easy switch for clients who want to start using environmentally preferable products. Most, if not all, janitorial paper products contain recycled fibers. But recycled papers also vary and BSCs should take a look at the label — specifically at the percentages of recovered and post-consumer waste.

Green Seal defines recovered paper material as “paper waste generated after the completion of a paper-making process.” Though it has never left the plant, it is still considered recycled paper. When the paper has “served its end uses” and is then brought back for recycling, it is labeled post-consumer material. To qualify for Green Seal, paper has to be made with 100 percent recovered material and at least 40 percent post-consumer material.

Though “green” paper products are not the cheapest, they are competitively priced.

However, not everyone feels that paper made with post-consumer waste is the best value. Recycled paper has shorter fibers which decreases wet strength.

“Every time you recycle the paper, it degrades the fiber. When you degrade the paper, you’re not going to have wet strength,” says Fred Kfoury, Jr., president and CEO of Central Paper Products, a distributor in Manchester, N.H.

But others, like Shelton, find the toweling to be up to par. He also views it as an added sales incentive because clients appreciate that the product is beneficial to the environment.

“If you show them that not only are you getting a good value, but you’re saving the environment, it’s a double bonus,” he adds.

Purchasing cheaper paper may shave a few extra dollars off the bid price, but this immediate quick fix will only be temporary. Using quality paper products can provide lasting value-added services well worth any added costs.




POSTED ON: 5/1/2004