new source for 'stealer' towels???

i've been buying the towels for my free towel dry station from ERC wiping for years. I used to have a salesman that would call me every so often and check on my needs which was great. Something has changed in the company and the service is just not the same. No more phone calls from a salesman. Difficulty getting through on the phone. Online ordering only.

I buy the 50 pound box of bulk recycled large piece terrycloth towels. I call them Stealers because they walk away on occasion and I have to restock every year. So.....I ordered two weeks ago and they haven't arrived. I called and they said they are on back order. They are set to restock on the 29th but I'm supposed to call the company back on the 29th and make sure that the towels are allocated to me because if other people have ordered ahead of me they will be allocated to them. this seems like poor service and a bad business model. So I guess I'm shopping around and trying to find another source for these bulk recycled large piece Terry towels. Any ideas? Thank you.

I’ve used the Dr. Joe towels that Kleen Rite carries but have always used the microfiber. I don’t know if they have a terry cloth version.

What are you expecting to pay per towel? I have some time to do research while a wait for my friend to meet me for lunch

Probably not the cheapest but I buy the white terry towels at Costco and wash them with a bottle of rit black dye they come out a bluish-gray color. I think they cost 19.99 for a pack of 52 towels. My towel loss comes in spurts but I usually lose 1-2 bags every Month. I think soapy uses red dye so they come out pink and may be less desirable to towel thieves.

I think the 50 pound box is about 100 bucks. You get tons and tons of towels with that so I think the price is going to be hard to beat.

these

yeah thats cheap. My 19.99 pack of 52 towels weighs about 8 lbs. But I am WAY too OCD for those you're buying. I throw out towels that don't match. But I'm in a good neighborhood and theft is minimal.

Here’s my towel station

Greg, do you have an onsite attendant? How do the towels get washed? How many times a week do you need to replenish the cart? Is it always out or does the clean up crew put the cart out in the morning and back inside in the evening?
I’m considering adding a towel station but I am almost certain it will be abused and discontinued within a couple of weeks

Eric H said:

Greg, do you have an onsite attendant? How do the towels get washed? How many times a week do you need to replenish the cart? Is it always out or does the clean up crew put the cart out in the morning and back inside in the evening?
I’m considering adding a towel station but I am almost certain it will be abused and discontinued within a couple of weeks

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Keep in mind I do this at my neighborhood that's in a good area. I did it primarily for auto customers but SS customers found it and use it more than the auto customers. This is a pretty busy wash with my office in it and I spend a enough time there to call it attended.

The cart stays out 24/7 unless storms with high winds are expected. If it's a light rain I just close the lid. I have a stacked whirlpool washer/dryer combo I put in maybe five years ago and so far it's been a champ. Those plastic boxes hold right at 60 towels. That's also an ideal load size for the washer/dryer. I usually put out half a box (30 towels) in the morning and half a box in the early afternoon. On weekends I go though a second box each day. Customers are really good at this place and many '"good customers" will actually use towels out of the used box or just grab one new towel. The occasional jackass grabs a stack. I do need a bilingual sign. Theft happens mostly at night so I'm stingy with them in the afternoon hours.

When the attendant or I get there we process a load: We take the towels out of the dryer and fill an empty box, then take the towels out of the washer and put them in the dryer, then dump the box of dirty towels in the washer and start the washer. Takes 10 minutes because I do fold them. I try to keep three boxes total in rotation.

I did notice most expresses use the black microfibers but I haven't tried them yet. Since soapy has used both maybe he can comment. Might be a better system with less hassle to just wash them and dump them in the container. I was concerned about metallic brake dust particles getting embedded in microfibers and causing micromarring.

I leave my cart out 24 seven as well unless it's really bad weather then I just park it inside one of the self service bays. mine has a lid on it that we made to be hinged and so it's mostly always closed. I don't police the towel usage too much. I see people grabbing huge handfuls once in a while and a lot of times it's my regular customers so I don't want to give them too much pushback because usually they return the towels and are pretty neat. It's one of those things where there's always going to be abuse and there's always going to be theft. that's just human nature I guess. I'm definitely the only one in my area that's doing this type of service and it has alot of appeal to the customer. I can tell by the amount of usage the towels get. We do laundry several times a day. Someone is here every day of the week and every day of the week laundry is being done for the towel dry station and for the detail shop.

In my experience terry cloth dries the car much better than microfiber. I've never used microfiber for drying a vehicle. Again this is just my personal experience.

The drawback with a terry towel is that they have some fibers that may stay behind. Any towel works better when slightly wet. When I switched from Terry to microfiber I got a lot of positive feed back from customers. The microfiber towels take much less time to dry in the dryer, probably half the time or less. I had stainless steel bins made that are anchored in to concrete, with a covered top and simple reach in design. I do have a sign that says 2 towels per car but I do not really police it much.

Right on the slightly damp towels. Operators used to use unimac extractors to get an almost dry, but still slightly damp towel for drying. Often used without a dryer.

One huge factor is if you are drying after a self serve when the car is 100% wet, or after an automatic where the car might be 10% wet.