Better positioned than ever

The first drivers have just returned from their early Monday morning drive when Anja Claessens (HR Director), Björn Frijns 14 (Director Technical Affairs) and Bjorn Flos (Finance Director) and step into the meeting room. Behind them, laundry bags slide by and the i-Collector assembles packages of linen. Colleagues move across the spotless floor – the laundry has already been running for hours. Amid that activity, the three MT members look back on an eventful but mostly successful year, in which Nedlin once again showed the best version of itself.

“Nedlin offers colleagues many opportunities to grow. That’s great, but for HR, sometimes challenging. Because it means having to fill the spot that someone leaves. And all that in a – still – tight labour market. In addition, the strict rules around the Wet DBA have kept us busy. We aim to keep the flexible shell small and employ more people on a permanent basis. That process has been accelerated by this law. As a result, there is also less turnover, and our customer scores have risen. 

We also partly digitised our onboarding process, conducted the employee satisfaction survey, developed a new employee guide and completed the RI&E. We also invest in language courses and continue to provide opportunities to people with a distance from the labour market. This lays a solid foundation for 2026, which will be dominated by new laws and regulations and equal pay for temporary workers.”

“Last year, we successfully completed the new construction for Nedlin Healthcare, which was immediately visible in productivity and flow. And we continue to innovate. The residual water, which comes out of the wash pipes at 60 degrees, initially had a temperature of 35 degrees after treatment. Since September, we have been keeping the residual water at 40 degrees. That means we need less supplementary heating, which saves a lot of energy. And because less heat is lost to the environment, we need less cooling in summer. 

For Nedlin Hospitality, we decided to double the capacity. The first engineering steps for the renovation have already been taken. Phase 1 of the conversion, which immediately increases capacity, will start in January. After that, we will continue working on the design. The Hospitality laundry will again be leading, even more sustainable than the Healthcare laundry. In short, 2026 will be a year in which we take important steps.”

“Stability, turnover, new colleagues, energy management: in 2025, we scored better on all KPIs. In a year of political uncertainty and stiff competition, no less. The extreme cost increases from earlier years have levelled off. We are increasingly seen as the best alternative. And with three state-of-the-art laundries on the horizon, Nedlin is better positioned than ever. This stability translated into clear results last year: our delivery reliability has become even higher and partnerships with customers have been further strengthened. 

Sustainability played (and still plays) a central role. We have invested heavily in raising awareness around B Corp and sustainable employability. In addition, we further reduced emissions and energy consumption and further electrified our fleet. However, transport costs have increased because we deliver in a larger radius. In 2026, the introduction of the kilometerheffing will have a major impact. And whatever we can automate or robotise, we tackle. AI will play an increasingly important role in this.”