The laundry and dry‐cleaning industry is part of the fashion and textiles sector, represented by Creative Skillset, which also includes: apparel; textiles; and footwear and leather; advertising; animation; computer games; facilities; film; interactive media; photo imaging; publishing; radio; and television. The fashion and textiles sector as a whole employs an estimated 340,000 people across 79,000 enterprises, which are predominately small and medium sized employers. The sector contributes around £10 billion to the UK economy each year, but due to the current economic downturn, product exports have fallen. However, employment in the sector has remained relatively stable level.
The laundry industry includes: dry‐cleaning services; laundry services; textile rental; and clothing repair and alteration. In the current economic climate, commercial laundries are reporting their best year ever, while customer‐facing, high‐street laundries are not doing so well.
Key facts:
- The industry contributes £1.1 billion to the UK economy each year.
- There are around 13,000 enterprises in the textile services industry, of which 11,000 are sole traders.
- Most of these businesses are small, employing 250 people or fewer.
- There are around 50,000 people employed in this industry in the UK.
Jobs in the industry include: laundry operative, dry‐cleaning operative, presser, branch assistant, repair/alteration hand, machine maintenance technician, laundry engineer and production manager.
National and regional data
This industry is fairly evenly spread across the UK. The greatest concentrations of activity are in urban areas, including parts of London and major cities such as Leeds, Birmingham and Liverpool.
East Midlands – There are more than 5,000 people employed within the industry in the East Midlands. The majority of the workforce is based in Leicester.
East of England – There are almost 7,000 people employed within the industry, making it the third largest region. Tendring in Essex and South Cambridgeshire have the largest workforces.
London – There are almost 8,000 people employed within the industry, making it the second largest region for laundry and dry cleaning in the UK. Merton has the largest workforce, followed by Lambeth and Ealing. Employment is fairly evenly distributed throughout the remaining districts in London.
North East – There are almost 2,000 people employed within the industry, which represents the smallest proportion of the total UK employment in this industry. County Durham and Newcastle have the largest number of people employed in the industry. Employment is fairly evenly distributed throughout the remaining districts.
North West – There are over 5,000 people employed within the industry in the North West. Tameside has the largest workforce, followed by Lancaster and Chorley.
South East – There are over 9,000 people employed within the industry. The workforce is fairly evenly distributed across the sector, but Medway (Kent) and Reading have slightly higher numbers.
South West – There are almost 4,000 people employed within the industry, with almost half working in North Dorset.
West Midlands – There are more than 3,000 people employed within the industry, who are mainly located in Sandwell and Birmingham.
Yorkshire and the Humber – There are over 3,000 people employed within the industry. The workforce is concentrated in Calderdale, Leeds, Sheffield and Wakefield.
[N.B. Data derived from Annual Business Inquiry, 2007.]
