When it comes to selecting the right luxury hotel bedding for your property, it’s easy to get swept up in the latest textile trends, from high thread count sheets to Egyptian cotton that’s been dipped in the River Nile (just kidding about that last one).
But keep in mind that the trends may be untested. While a certain kind or brand of hotel sheets might have the guest-pleasing softness you’re looking for, you could end up sacrificing durability and lifespan.
As you’re gearing up to upgrade or replace your stock, here are some recommendations for what to look for in luxury hotel bedding.
Durability
In the course of their lifecycle, your hotel sheets ease guests to sleep then are whisked away to be washed, dried, ironed and folded over and over again, either by your on property laundry or your laundry vendor. That first job means they need to be soft to the touch, the second means they need to be strong enough to last.
As you’re shopping around, ask the hotel linen sales and service reps for durability data and for a list of similar properties you can speak with in order to get a reference. Your counterparts at other hotels, resorts and spas will know best what you can expect in terms of linen longevity.
Not Necessarily a High Thread Count
High thread counts have been all the rage for luxury bedding for hospitality properties and hospitality-inspired consumer products alike. But experts in the textile industry have found that high thread counts don’t correspond to long lifespans, at least not for properties.
The nature of how high thread count sheets are made may make them more vulnerable to wear and tear in hotel laundry equipment. That’s true even for sheets handled by hospitality linen services that use machines proven to be tough on dirt but easy on materials.
Make sure to ask the hotel sheets sales reps about each products’ susceptibility to damage.
A Blend of Polyester and Cotton
Those River Nile-dipped sheets are certainly soft, but they’re also more expensive and more likely to shrink or thin over time. See above, re: durability.
Polyester sheets are less expensive and more durable, but also have some attributes that can make them more difficult to keep clean.
For the best of both worlds – comfort, durability and affordability – find a cotton/polyester blend. A blend also allows you to avoid the potential pitfalls of both fabrics.
Recommendations from Your Laundry Vendor
This isn’t an element to look for in luxury hotel bedding, it’s something to equip yourself with before you go shopping in the first place.
If you contract with a laundry outsourcing provider, get their input into what products to choose for your hotel linen supply. They’ve seen the durability and performance of a vast range of bedding products, and they’ll have a sense of what will meet your needs and what may fall short.
Strategies to Protect Your Investment
After all of your hard work and research to find the right luxury hotel bedding, you want to do as much as you can to protect your investment. You’ll negate all of those durability and lifespan claims if you don’t care for your bedding properly.
Here are two important tips for maximizing the life of your hotel linen inventory:
Have at least four pars. If you don’t have the desired par level for hotel bed sheets, you’ll end up washing your supply more often and not giving it enough time to rest between uses. You need at least four pars: one in the guest room + one in storage + one dirty that just came from a room + one in the laundry.
Make sure your storage is safe. Like your guests, your bedding also needs a safe place to rest. Make sure your storage area is temperature- and climate-controlled and protected from cleaning or maintenance chemicals.
When it comes for what to look for in luxury hotel bedding, it’s important to look at a range of factors, including durability and lifespan, rather than what’s trendy at the time. Gather all of the information you can before you buy or rent and invest the time and resources to protect afterward.
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