Let’s Talk Towel Care- the Do’s and Don’ts

What is the best way to wash window cleaning towels? 

Towels are important to window cleaning. Whether if it is for detailing the edge, polishing off residue, absorbing puddles of water on the ledge, a good towel is essential for a window cleaner. 

In other blogs, we have discussed the different types of towels available on the market. Towels come with different weaves, fabric, and shape. There are a variety of features that can help you decide which towel is the best choice for specific job challenges. However, even after you have picked the right towel for the right use, one heavy job or day of use and then what? The towel needs to be washed to be ready for the next use.   

What is the best way to take care of towels used for window cleaning?  Check out our 10 do’s and don’ts tips for taking care of your towels! 

1. Never wash your window cleaning towels with other household towels or clothes! Simply put, your window cleaning towels do not need to borrow any lint or fuss from items like bath towels. Set up your routine so that work towels are washed separately. 

2. Avoid using soap! Maybe a little touch of soap can be used, but it needs to be generic, plain soap only. Nothing that has built in fabric softeners or extra fragrance. All of these extras are designed to leave articles soft and smelling pretty. While this is nice, this will not help the materials to absorb and can cause residues to be left in the towels. Function is what we are after for your window cleaning work towels! Just stick to plain towels. 

3. HOT water only! To follow up on the no soap concept, many window cleaners find that a hot water wash will take care of getting residues and dirt cleaned from your cloths. For ordinary grime from window cleaning, hot water should do it for you. 

4. Extra grime, vinegar time!  If you have a batch of towels that are greasy or extra dirty, add some white vinegar to the load. Maybe ½ to 1 cup of vinegar to a full load of towels will do. Vinegar will cut the grime and leave the towel free of residues that will show up on the glass. 

5. NEVER – no not ever – use fabric softener! Fabric softener will not help your towels to work better. The softeners are designed to make items feel, well, softer. This extra softness will cause the fibers to not be as absorbent right out of the machine. Save the softener for your bath towels. 

6. Be mindful of what was washed in your machine right before your work towels! If the house towels and bed sheets were washed in the batch right before, the fabric softener might very well hang around a little bit. This is not a big deal, but if you can, be mindful of what was washed right before. Fabric softener is great, but it will prevent your work towels to swipe swiftly and absorb water. 

7. Replace your towels as they wear out! Chances are, your towels will wear out at different rates. As you launder, watch for the ones that are beginning to deteriorate. If a towel goes too far and starts to unravel in the wash, it makes a mess and leaves all the fibers free to grab onto the rest of your towels. 

8. Don’t overload your load! Too many towels in one batch will not wash efficiently. The size of the load will vary based on your specific washing machine. But “I think they will all fit” is not a good way to decide how many towels to launder in a single batch. The overloaded batch will not clean up as well and as consistently. 

9. But no, never, not ever use fabric softener sheets! Drying is the easy part. Regular heat is fine. Clean the lint trap before the load to make sure the dryer can work to leave your loads free of fuss and lint. Same as with washing, do not overload your dryer. 

10. Develop a system and schedule and do it the same every time! For sure, washing towels can easily be pushed off of the list of things to do after a full day on the window cleaning schedule. Organize your business and schedule so that tasks like washing the work towels falls into a rhythm that works for you. Stick with your routine of how you wash. This will give you predictable results and get you ready to hand off the responsibility to a new team member as needed. Consider stocking up on a few extra towels so that your schedule of cleaning is realistic for you. Most towels we sell offer bulk discounts. Once you have the towels you like picked out, take advantage of the discounts and get a bit ahead with your towel rotation. 

Window cleaners realize that towels are important tools for their craft. With these 10 tips, you should be best prepared for having towels that are ready to go for your daily work. Check out the full inventory of towels for window cleaning on our site here. If you have any of your favorite tips that you want to share of how you launder your towels, send them to us! We would love to share them with other window cleaners. 

The team at Detroit Sponge would love to hear from you. Email us at customerservice@detroitsponge.com or call us at (800) 535-6394. To stay up to date with our products and additional resources, follow us on social media!