Newcastle – EN14065 Hygiene Excellence

For John Welford, Operations Manager at Fishers’ laundry servicing Newcastle-upon-Tyne, investment in the plant there has paid dividends not just in terms of efficiencies, but in gaining the accreditations that help reassure Fishers’ customer base in the area on the steps Fishers are taking to ensure their laundry is hygienically clean.

Here’s what John had to say:

“Fishers have invested in Newcastle quite heavily over the last couple of years including in a state of the art laundry bagging sorting system and a state of the art ironer, which has helped increase productivity and quality.”

This investment gave the local team the confidence to seek EN14065 accreditation,
a European standard which ensures that laundries take a risk management approach designed to enable them to continuously assure the microbiological quality of laundry processed textiles.

John went on to say:

“At Fishers Newcastle in the past year we’ve recently acquired accreditation EN14065 which is a microbiological hazard identification. What that means for us is that every bit of linen that goes out to our customers is hygienically clean and free of any microbiological hazards.”

“When the examiners come in for the accreditation for EN14065 they are looking for evidence of how we can prove that we are checking for any microbiological hazards within the plant, control points, any systems we have in place to control those measures and make sure that we are conforming to that standard. We had to put a team together which included myself and several other managers and team leaders and the engineering team.”

“They all played a part within that role to make sure they have all the control points, such as the wash process, the clean-down of the vehicles, the machinery – all those had to reach that standard to make sure the product is microbiologically free.”

And as we all look to the future, John is confident that Fishers Newcastle’s EN14065 accreditation will stand it in good stead for the months and years ahead. Here’s how John summed things up:

“Getting the EN14065 accreditation in a post Covid world we think is very important for ourselves and our customers. What that will do is give the customers the confidence that the products we are supplying them are going to be clean, hygienically clean, and microbiologically free.”