Coming in November … Insights on Unitex’s Centennial Salute

On July 25, Unitex marked the family-owned healthcare launderer’s 100th anniversary. Due to Unitex’s rapid growth since the mid-’90s, top managers planned events at 11 different facilities to mark the centennial. Based in Elmsford, NY, the company’s family executive team, including Chairman Michael Potack and sons President David and CEO Rob, led the festivities at plants in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Connecticut.

During the two-hour celebrations they oversaw at various sites, the leadership’s remarks centered on thanking employees for their efforts. Attendees also enjoyed a catered lunch. They received commemorative clothing as well, including T-shirts and backpacks with the centennial logo. These events also featured games (cornhole and for winners, “dunk the boss”), plus prize drawings. The latter included TVs and laptops, raffles and other gifts to help make the day special. Social media outreach and specially designed posters helped build excitement leading to the July 25 program. Additional efforts have included a video highlighting the company’s century of service to customers.

Planning for the Founder’s Day program began nearly a year before the event. When the centennial date arrived, the Unitex team and its partners executed their plans to mark the company’s 100th anniversary with precision and verve. We asked Seth Gershman, Unitex’s director of marketing and communications, a few questions about how the company had run its successful series of commemorative events. Highlights of his responses from a forthcoming article in November’s Textile Services appear below.

How did the plants plan their events?

For example, Linden, NJ, divided the prize drawings by department: soil, sheet, dry/fold, packout, maintenance, transportation and management. Drawings for a gift card and a laptop or TV for each group. After we confirmed the date of the event with all the plants, we began planning on both the corporate and local, facility level. All of the promotional and branding efforts were managed by corporate (leadership) and communicated to the plants. But each plant managed their events independently. Catering, rental equipment, decorations and some of the raffle items, the plants handled. Corporate supplied some of the raffle items, as well as 100-year-branded backpacks and shirts that were given away to all team members.

Who did the artwork for the logos?

We worked with Harquin Creative Group, New Rochelle, NY, on our 100-year logo designs, and Infinite Laundry designed our Founders Day T-shirt and posters. Both did fantastic jobs in coming up with visuals that really brought to life the importance of this event and helped create extra excitement for the day. The process was similar to how we come up with all of our branding and marketing materials.

How did you lead up to the big day?

We started planning for our centennial in 2021, knowing that we wanted to make our 100-year anniversary a really special celebration. The first step was getting the right logo. Once we had that, it was just a matter of making sure we had it ready to go everywhere in January. Once we got the new year started, we started rolling out the logo and the messaging that 2022 was our centennial and July 25 was the day. The list of where our logo is displayed is really everywhere. We tried to replace the traditional logo with the new one in all realistic places we could and tried to create a slow build-up to July 25. The plants promoted the day to their teams with posters that went up in May/June, and we promoted the day on all of our social-media outlets. On July 25, we also premiered our new “100 years—Leading the Way in the Medical Uniform and Linen Rental Industry” video and website historical timeline.

How long will you use the new logo?

We believe our 100-year logo is timeless. I don’t see the need to remove it anytime soon. So I foresee us continuing to use it well into the next year or so, and then probably transitioning to a “over 100 years” “100+” in our logo.

How did you involve customers?

We recently completed a post-July 25 video that features video messages from customers congratulating Unitex and the Potacks. Click here to see the video.

Did you work with local businesses?

Since each event was planned and organized locally, all of the vendors were from the area, and in some cases the same ones we use for these types of events all the time. In each of the communities where we have facilities, we try very hard to be engaged and give back however we can.

Who took the lead on these events?

In Linden, it was a fun job for the plant manager (PM) and his assistant to figure out the “game of skill” (cornhole) that enabled the staff to dump buckets of water on the PM. Again, I’m sure it varied by plant, but I was told that in one plant someone had a family member that did decorations, etc. So we communicated with the GM (general manager) of the plants, and then they delegated the rest. Many of the plants typically do employee-appreciation events throughout the year, so they didn’t need to recreate the wheel for this. But for our 100-year milestone, they took it to another level!