Q4 2021

Call for DLI Board of Directors Nominees

DLI is seeking nominations for DLI members qualified to serve on the Institute’s Board of Directors for terms beginning in Summer 2022. The DLI Board is comprised of business owners, top-level managers, distributors, and manufacturers who volunteer to act as DLI’s policy-making body. Nominees should have a strong interest in serving their fellow industry members and be willing to accept the responsibility of guiding the Institute’s activities into the future.

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Q4 2021

Time & Change

Reflecting on 2021 & Preparing for 2022

CONGRATULATIONS! You survived the challenges of 2020 and most of 2021. Given the recent turmoil, many of us are wondering what 2022 might hold. We asked a group of DLI leaders and staff members to share their thoughts about the year ahead. These sources have their ears to the ground closer than most in the industry by regularly hosting DLI’s weekly Peer-to-Peer Zoom sessions and participating in DLI’s weekly virtual training sessions. Their positions also put them in direct contact with many members daily. Few people share this perspective.

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Q4 2021

Meet DLI’s 2021-2022 Executive Committee

DLI’s Board of Directors recognizes valued contributions and inducts new volunteer leadership each year. New Directors are sworn in as their predecessors move to an executive position or become DLI Senators, an exclusive title for previous members of the Board. This year DLI welcomes a host of new faces to its governing body.

We asked this year’s group of DLI Directors a few questions to help members get a better sense of who they are and what they are striving to achieve.

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Q4 2021

Water Boiler Testing, Part 2

There is a long list of impurities to be found in water entering a boiler. However, in the drycleaning and laundry industries, the major impurities affecting the operation of boilers are dissolved solids (known as TDS, or total solids) and oxygen which is dissolved in the city water entering the return tank. This oxygen combines with carbon dioxide to form carbonic acid, a destroyer of the metal in the boiler and piping throughout the steam/return systems. The concentration of acids in boiler water is indicated by the Ph (Ph-is a scale used to specify how acidic or basic [or alkaline] a water-based solution is). TDS and Ph levels indicate the condition of the treated water entering as well as inside the boiler, allowing us to adjust the blow-down frequency as well as the volume and timing of boiler compound addition to the return tank to prevent boiler damage.

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Q4 2021

Full Steam Ahead

My name is Bobby Patel, I introduce myself humbly before you as the new President of DLI. I sincerely thank my peers was putting me in this position.

About myself, I have a loving wife, Kamini and three terrific daughters, Shiya, Krisha and Riya.

I was born in a tiny village called Ode in Gujarat, India. I grew up in Zambia, Africa, where my dad practiced law. I immigrated  to USA in 1986 with my parents, studied to be a Civil Engineer, and graduated from California State University, Long Beach. Being an entrepreneur at heart, while in college I dabbled in various businesses. I bought and sold used cars and sold the world-famous Ginsu Knives door to door. I also helped out at a family business, Alta Dena Drive-In Dairy, while working at a travel agency.

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Q4 2021

Moment with Mary: Gratitude & Awe

 

Grateful. We are hearing this sentiment a lot these days, even with what we have all endured and, unfortunately, continue to endure. I want to add my voice to this chorus. I am grateful for so much not only on a personal level but a professional level as well. This may seem strange with all the industry has suffered and all the unseen challenges still out there but I am overwhelmed by the resilience, fortitude, and just damn determination of DLI’s membership. Members came together, shared with one another, adapted to the current business climate, and as we are slowly pulling away from the pandemic, have found themselves in a better position to meet future business opportunities.

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Q4 2021

What Good Can Come of This?

By Don Desrosiers, Tailwind Systems

Maybe this whole COVID thing is close to being behind us. Hopefully the lessons learned will stay with us for a lifetime. Whenever something monumental occurs, it is very important to gather some sort of lesson from it. Sometimes it can take a very long time, especially when a lot of healing needs to happen first. When 1,500 people died on the Titantic in 1912, it took a long time for people in that era to make sense of the tragedy. Similarly, COVID-19 has killed more than four million people at the time of this writing. Eventually, we will want to know how many people it has saved. On a more local level, COVID-19 has cost you a lot and there needs to be a lesson in there somewhere. Twenty years ago I published a piece about 9/11. Here is what I wrote then:

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