Arrow Linen Supply Company

Family-owned for four generations

Business View Magazine interviews representatives from Arrow Linen Supply Co., as part of our focus on the laundry and linen supply sector.

Arrow Linen Supply Company, Inc. is a leading linen supplier servicing all types of industries, including Food & Beverage, Hospitality, Beauty & Massage, Physician Offices, Schools & Camps, Corporate & Office, and Industrial, throughout the five Boroughs of New York City, plus Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, Rockland and Putnam Counties, as well as New Jersey. The company offers its customers clean and sanitary uniforms, aprons, towels, table cloths and napkins, walk off mats, and bedding.

Arrow Linen Supply was established in Brooklyn, NY in 1947, by Ambrogio Magliocco, who came to the U.S. from Sicily at the age of 17. In 1958, Ambrogio’s son, John Ambrose Magliocco, took over the company and remains active in the business to this day as CEO, even at age 89, coming in at 9AM, six days a week. John Magliocco, John Ambrose’s son, joined the company in 1985, after graduating from college with a degree in engineering. “My father had passed the bar as a lawyer and then got drafted into the army,” he recounts. “When he came out, my grandfather, who started the business with my uncle, needed help. He said he’d help for six months before opening a law practice and ended up making a career out of it. Then my two older brothers, Ambrose and Salvatore, and I came into the business.” John took over from his father in 1990, and implemented major operational improvements with state-of-the art technology, which allowed Arrow Linen to handle significantly more volume and enhance its quality standards. In 2005, John was named President and his brother Salvatore was appointed Vice President. “Now, my three boys are in it,” John adds. “They’re fourth generation.”

One of those sons, Anthony Magliocco, is the company’s Operations Manager. He and his brothers helped open up Arrow’s new Garden City location several years ago while still in school, and now work full-time for the family-owned firm. Today, between the two plants, the company processes approximately 600,000 pounds of linen every week: 250-280,000 pounds in Brooklyn and about 330-350,000 pounds in Garden City. John notes, “At one time, the Brooklyn facility was doing all of that in a shift-and-a-half over six days. When we opened up the Garden City location, it left a void where we can still do more volume in both plants if we have to.”

That void has promoted a desire to acquire other linen suppliers in order to absorb their volumes. “Right now, we’re focused on acquisitions,” says John. “One of the things in our industry – a lot of the private companies have no generations to leave their business to, so, eventually, they’re going to want to sell. And we have a good reputation for doing the right thing. So, people like to sell to us if they’re going to sell, at all.

Anthony says that he and his brothers also have some new ideas for the business. “In addition to growing in the area we already service, which is F&B – table linens, napkins, and providing garment service – hopefully, we can expand our services,” he proposes. “If we’re in the restaurant business already, who’s to say that we’re not going to be able to sell someone soap or paper towels? We’d like to try and tackle all services needed for the restaurant, instead of just linen.”

In what is a pretty competitive sector, Anthony believes that one of the things that separates Arrow Linen from other suppliers is its very responsive customer service. “If you call in the morning, we promise delivery the same day or within 24 hours,” he states. “Another item that I think separates us from other laundry services is our operations – the clean energy that we use at our facility, and our efficient operations.”

Those efficient operations include a combined heat and power (CHP) system in the company’s Brooklyn plant that uses exhaust heat from two 150-kilowatt generators to heat boiler feed water. Before this system’s installation, Arrow was operating at 40 percent energy efficiency; it’s now 65 percent. In 2005, the company received an Energy Star CHP Award by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Energy in recognition of the pollution-reduction and energy-saving features of its CHP system. In Arrow Linen’s Garden City facility, a 480-kilowatt solar panel system is replacing 73% of the company’s power requirements when combined with new LED lighting installed in 2018. Combined, the two installations have allowed the company to reduce carbon emissions by 578 tons, annually.

“We’re also in the process of setting up a water reclamation system which will consist of ceramic filtration and reverse osmosis,” Anthony adds. “This was done for two reasons. We were told by the town that our fat, oil, and grease (FOG) levels in our discharge water were approaching limits that weren’t safe, so we were forced to find a system that would clean the hazardous materials from our wastewater. And since we were cleaning our wastewater, we were interested in possibly re-using that water in the facility. So, we purchased an additional reverse osmosis system. It will take the ceramic filtration water and clean it even further so it’s serviceable to be used in our washroom equipment. At the end of the day, we’ll be reusing 70 percent of our wastewater.”

Another improvement at Garden City is a new bar mop bagging system. “Instead of folding our bar mops and strapping them, they’re going to be processed through a machine and bagged automatically,” Anthony notes. “It’s going to keep our products cleaner because they’re going to be wrapped and sealed tight in plastic.” “The bar mop bagging system will also be energy saving because we’re not going to have to process the bar mops through an ironer which uses steam,” John adds. “So, there’ll be less steam that we need to produce.”

Arrow Linen’s efficient operations notwithstanding, John relates that the company’s over 250 trained union employees are still key to its ongoing success. “We treat our employees well,” he states. “We provide health insurance and pensions to all of them.” Anthony contends that the fourth generation of Maglioccos will continue that legacy. “Treating your employees fairly and with respect is something my dad taught me and my brothers,” he asserts. “Every morning, when we come in, we walk the entire facility; we say ‘Good Morning’ to all the employees; we show our faces. We’ve been family-owned and we like that family culture and that’s something that people see and the employees feel. It’s not a corporate culture where you’re forgotten. That’s something that we pride ourselves on at Arrow.”

AT A GLANCE

WHO: Arrow Linen Supply Company

WHAT: A leading linen supplier

WHERE: Brooklyn and Garden City, NY

WEBSITE: www.arrowlinen.com