ACLS Opens Doors to the Disabled
Atlantic City Linen Supply LLC (ACLS), which expanded its business to Philadelphia in May, recently received a Business Leadership Award at JEVS Human Services’ annual Strictly Business luncheon. JEVS Human Services is a nonprofit organization that helps individuals with physical, developmental and emotional challenges enhance their employment prospects, independence and quality of life through a broad range of programs, according to local media reports.
Held in conjunction with National Disability Employment Awareness Month, the award recognizes how ACLS executives “partnered with us and have opened their doors to hiring our clients as employees, now in their workforce, and seeing the benefit sometimes in taking a little bit of a risk,” said Jay Spector, who has headed the employment assistance organization for the last 20 years.
ACLS, which provides commercial laundry services for the hospitality industry, is run by brothers Daniel and Eric Goldberg, of Linwood, NJ. They took over the business in the late 2000s from their uncle, David Goldberg, who founded the company in 1986. David Goldberg “hired from Jewish family services, Catholic charities, the local courts, re-entry programs – regardless of the organization, if someone needed help and opportunity, he gave it,” said Dan Goldberg, 43, the elder of the two brothers. “That type of opportunistic environment has spread down to Eric and me.”
The ACLS facility in Philadelphia can handle up to 100,000 lbs. of linen a day, all of which must be sorted, washed, dried, folded and packaged, according to the plant’s general manager, Daniel Labov. It currently serves 18 local hotels including the Sheraton Philadelphia Downtown Hotel, where the JEVS ceremony was hosted, and Le Meridien. There is little room for time-wasting mistakes, Labov said, adding that the JEVS hires have not only fit right in, they have excelled. Of the 140 or so employees at the Philadelphia plant, who work roughly 12-hour day or night shifts every day of the week throughout the year, 15 found their position through JEVS.
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