Now, corporate uniforms on rent

Chennai, October 25:

It is not only bridal dresses and jewellery that are available on rent. Now even corporate uniforms can be rented.

Chennai-based Lindstrom India Services Pvt Ltd, a 100-per cent subsidiary of Finnish company Lindstrom Oy, has laun-ched work wear services in India, which will include renting uniforms to firms.

Ajai Bhaskar, business unit manager, Lindstrom India, said, “Rented work wear is new only in Asia, whereas in Europe and the US it has been in vogue for quite some time.”

“Our services include designing work wear, sourcing the fabric, tailoring, laundry, storage, repair and replacement of corporate uniforms,” Jukka Roiha, president and CEO of Lindstrom Oy said. According to him, Indian su-bsidiary will target electro-nic item manufacturers and other industries.

The company has bagged Perlos Telecommunications & Electronic Components (India) Pvt Ltd, a Nokia vendor, as its first client. “We are talking to other vendors of Nokia located in Nokia Telecom Park in Sriperumbudur near Chennai,” he added.

Traditionally, Indian companies source their uniform cloth from mills and dealers and issue them to their workers at the time of joining the company and also at the beginning of the New Year. Companies also pay workers tailoring allowance and a monthly washing allowance.

According to Bhaskar, firms need not get bogged down with sourcing clothes, which actually is not their main business. He said under the traditional system, the money spent on cloth is wasted when a worker resigns.

In the new model, Lindstrom will collect the uniforms when a worker leaves the company and would issue it to another worker who fits that size. “Recycling depends on the choice of our clients,” said Varis Smilga, director, Lindstrom Oy.

To start with, the Chennai facility will be capable of handling 50,000 garments a month. The Indian subsidiary has rented commercial washing machines and driers from a sister company in Finland.