About Chris Foulkes

Chris Foulkes was recently recognised for all he has contributed to the industry with the LADAs 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award. Chris was born in 1949 into a family of launderers at a time of austerity and shortage of many things post WW2. This has played a huge part in Chris’s life, where ‘storing’ anything that still worked or nearly worked is part of his character. From an early age, together with his father Bernard and brother Francis, Chris developed his mechanical passion for cars, vans and machines. Working together with his brother, the family were the Isle of Wight Laundry Company and supplied over 75 per cent of the domestic and hotel market requirements. They also held contracts with the southern area of the Army and Butlins at Bognor Regis and Minehead. Chris, always keen to be at the forefront of innovation, spearheaded the family’s investment into machinery – with the third Voss CBW in the UK being fitted into the Island laundry together with state-of-the-art feeding and folding equipment. Chris retired from full time work in 2017. He is still very much involved in the industry following an investment in the Regency Laundry in Bath. He works part-time with the team there often working long days that start on the Isle of Wight, where he still lives with a growing collection of mowers and tractors. His hope is for Santa to bring him a nice excavator to play with around the pond in his garden.

On his career in the industry…

In 1989 Chris led the sale of the Isle of Wight Laundry family business and his second career in the industry moved ahead as he joined the Sunlight Service Group. He moved to London and joined the flagship factory in Wimbledon as a general manager. The facility was already busy, and with Chris’s ‘hands-on’ approach and optimisation skills, the site continued to increase its throughput, allowing the group to finance the move to a new site at Merton a mile away. Chris helped spearhead this project and so the new site was built – evolving over the following five years to become the largest laundry in Europe, processing some two million units per week! Chris’s natural ability to adapt then took him to Paris to lead the French ‘Modeluxe’ business for Sunlight leading La Bievre Laundry, alongside learning to speak French, and integrating the groups outsourced business in to one laundry. This extensive knowledge and experience of a European approach has been extremely useful in problem solving and sharing with colleagues. Returning to the UK after four years Chris then took on a national role – working with factory teams to optimise process, efficiency and to assist management teams through change. He is known amongst his colleagues as the ‘Steady Captain’ at difficult and challenging times, and has supported countless operational and engineering managers who have just needed a ‘calm voice of reason’. Chris is always tinkering, looking at energy efficient, environmental and more sustainable ways to operate. He has worked with suppliers developing the ‘little extras’ to reduce manual handling/ repetitive strain in a physically hard process. More recently Chris has been leading the development of a new site for Regency Laundry in Corsham – tirelessly refurbishing equipment, upgrading software and renovating the site, resulting in a very presentable, fully equipped and effective number one factory. Not content there an opportunity arose to take additional space across a driveway from the Corsham site. Chris has owned the new build project for installing a second fully functioning laundry, including a tunnel and two ironers at Corsham, utilising some of the old equipment as the business relocated from Bath. This was quite a feat during Covid!

On the industry’s commitment to sustainability …

Over many years the industry has sought to reduce its impact on the environment. Continued work with the washing product suppliers is needed as utility costs, especially water, effluent and gas, increase above inflation. The nature of materials in our products, as well as the size and weight, particularly towels and robes where drying is a high cost, must come under review, plus recycling of water by using effluent treatment units. The use of solar panels on our large factory roofs for either electrical production and/or water heating must also be looked at. Ensuring the ‘first time hit’ is as good as possible to avoid re-processing can also have a significant effect both on the life of a product, as well as the overall cost of production with the use of utilities. The list of opportunities is vast, and we need to create a priority list and make a start.

On industry developments …

The industry has been very cut-throat over the years, hampering investment which ironically would have produced lower costs and controlled prices. This has also been depressed by the power of some large hospitality groups merely seeking the lowest price rather than the right deal. Often speaking with the actual operators on a machine could lead to some significant ideas which could be incorporated into a new design. I remember the Stones continuous washer at an exhibition some 60 years ago and wonder if this sort of idea could be resurrected with modern engineering advances used. We have developed a lot but need to drive this forward. I have always felt that we do not communicate enough with our customers to see how they view us, and we should work better together to correct a minor whinge before it becomes a critical situation. A simple regular call is probably all it would take.

On collaboration with the industry …

We are in a competitive industry but we need to integrate our ideas more as a team, make the TSA a stronger voice, price what the job costs and seek to provide a career path for youngsters joining to show a professional approach. We do need to get our message over to our customers that we are a vibrant and essential partner who does provide a cost effective service. My career relied on many people alongside my family and notably among these were Peter Wason, Tim Mitchell, Rodney Beale, Ray Latter and Chris Hancock at Sunlight. Julian Carr has been a stalwart friend over many years and, along with Stuart Calder and Guy Turvill (and his family), have provided a great few years in developing Regency – may there be many more to come!

Left to right: Guy Turvill, Chris Foulkes, Stuart Calder, Julian Carr

Chris picking up his Lifetime Achievement Award in November 2022