Providing specialist services to the industry

As a provider of specialist services for several years, the team at 2Xcel has accumulated a depth of knowledge and skills that may lie beyond the scope of a high street cleaner who is more used to dealing with general, everyday clothing, says Stuart Coupar.

“My business is experienced in dealing with items that could cause problems for cleaners that offer more generalised services.”

The Coupar family has been in drycleaning since the 1970s and Stuart Coupar came into the business in 1991/1992.

2Xcel was established in late 1999 when Coupar purchased the assets of a local company that had failed. He negotiated a short lease with the landlord of the premises and re-hired many of the original staff, all of whom had been employed and trained by Leathermaster UK.

In 2003 2Xcel moved to larger premises occupying a 800m2 site. Currently the business has eight staff engaged in cleaning, repair and logistics. It provides a range of refurbishment services to the drycleaning trade, mainly on a sub-contract basis.

The company is well known for its specialised leather and suede cleaning, restoration and repair service but, as Coupar stresses, this is not the only expertise on offer. Services also include:

• Wax items cleaned, re-waxed and repaired;

• Cleaning textiles, garments and soft furnishings that are labelled with the circle F care symbol;

• Cleaning puffa jackets, down-filled garments, sleeping bags and other padded items;

• Wedding dress cleaning;

• Full laundry service for household linen such as table cloths;

• Pillow re-covering and laundering pillows and duvets;

• A horse rug service that includes cleaning reproofing and repairing;

• Applying flame retardant finishes;

• Rug/carpet cleaning.

Coupar says that leather cleaning has noticeable seasonal variations so the additional services bring in extra business both for 2Xcel and the drycleaner customers year round. The company provides a nationwide weekly collection/delivery service with its own vehicles, right across the country from Brighton to Inverness.

Coupar’s business uses the Leathermaster system, which was introduced in the 1960s and has been refined and developed over the years so that it now includes products that allow the business to refinish a wide range of skins.

The 2Xcel leather service is much more than a cleaning process, stresses Coupar. He explains that the machines are task specific. “We have imported equipment from Leathermaster in Germany that is specifically designed to process goods and clothing made from skins.

“We operate cleaning machines that are dedicated to particular colour ranges as we process garments in batches of items that are similar in colour, weight and finish.

“The cleansing procedure is just one part of the system. After cleaning and inspection, suede-finish garments are then conditioned in purpose-built tumblers with additives that are applied to feed and restore the skins.

“Grain leather garments are processed to restore colour and surface finish as required.” In addition to handling leather garments, the business processes handbags, leather accessories and cushion covers. It can also handle leather furniture provided that suitable transport is available.

The service pays great attention to detail. Each trade customer is given duplicate pads to record the items sent for processing or appraisal. Customers are also given forms for recording the history of each item – its age, condition, and value.

The drycleaner completes these history sheets at the counter in the presence of the consumer customer. When the goods are received at the factory, each piece is inspected for defects such as missing buttons, broken zip pulls or flaws in the skin.

If the inspection reveals that a garments has a specific fault or there is a risk of problems in processing, then Stuart Coupar or a member of his team will contact the drycleaner so that they can discuss the fault or the likely risk of cleaning the garment with the customer. The customer is often unaware of the flaws and defects in leather, which are apparent only to the trained eye.

Coupar finds that items tend to be more heavily soiled when sent for cleaning as they may be cleaned less frequently. This particularly applies to cheaper garments and lower quality skins, especially pigskins.

Specialised cleaners such as 2Xcel allow high street cleaners to expand their business by offering services they could not otherwise handle.

One of the advantages of a business such as 2Xcel is that it has invested in specialised equipment that a typical high street cleaner might not be able to justify.

This applies not just to the leather processing equipment but to that used in other services.

For example, 2Xcel uses larger capacity textile processing machines so that it can handle heavyweight goods such as stage curtains.