CINET publishes a global outlook for an industry that touches almost every part of daily life. Built on the organisation’s own research programme and the judgement of 250 professionals in some 80 countries, with one key to success running through all of it: getting the maximum (lifetime) out of textiles.
Ophemert, September 30, 2026. CINET, the international umbrella organisation for professional textile care, will publish “From Wash to Worth: Growth and Added Value in Professional Textile Care to 2050”. This study gives, For the first time, a clear picture of what professional textile care contributes to B2B industries, consumers and to societies worldwide: in mature markets, and above all in emerging ones.
A sector that carries more than laundry
Clean and safe textiles are a condition for modern life. Hospitals, care homes, hotels, restaurants, food plants, industry, trade, laboratories, transport, offices, public services and households all depend on them. Together these customer groups span roughly half of all economic sectors, and in every one of them textiles has to be clean, safe and available before the work can start.
Read that way, professional textile care is a driver of economic development, of public health and wellbeing, and of responsible production and consumption. The study sets out what the sector means for each customer group today, and what that will look like a quarter of a century from now.
The key to success: the maximum lifetime of textiles
Most of the environmental weight of a textile sits in making it, not in cleaning it. So the decisive question is how long a textile stays in use. That is precisely what professional care does: it cleans, repairs, inspects and returns textiles so that they keep meeting the standard, cycle after cycle and as long and often as possible. High-Quality textiles in professional circulation reach up to around ninety wash cycles, where a fast fashion garment is often worn a handful of times.
- Industrial processes recover water and energy at a scale a household machine cannot reach.
- Longer use means less production, less waste and lower cost per use for the customer.
- New European producer responsibility rules make collection, sorting and reuse an adjacent business for the sector.
Both mature markets and emerging markets
In ageing, high-income regions the story is value: healthcare textiles, hygiene assurance, compliance, automation and scale. In young, fast-growing economies it is formalisation: services that move from the street to an organised business, with employment, training, hygiene standards and safer working conditions as a direct result. India, Africa, China and South-East Asia carry the fastest developments.
How the study was built: validation first
The foundation of this study is the industry itself. CINET ran its own research programme through 25 country coordinators and more than 35 co-host national associations. Out of the CINET Network of 50.000 Professionals worldwide who contributed their figures and their judgement. More than 250 professionals took part, including a panel of over 50 in-depth expert interviews. The work covers ten world areas and roughly 80 countries.
Modern artificial intelligence was used as an instrument to gather and structure that body of evidence at a speed no team could match. It did not decide anything. Every theme was put back to the people who run the industry, and where the validated input and the model differ, the validated figure prevails.
Seven Key Topics underpin the conclusions and expectations: demography, economics, energy, labour, innovation and AI, sustainability and circularity, and business models. The result is depth at three levels: per country, per world region, and worldwide.
All in accordance with a Code of AI Conduct, presented as a reference by a group of independent industry experts and AI consultants.
Presented in Milan
The first copy of the report will be presented in Milan in October 23rd 2026, at Expo Detergo International, the trade fair where the sector gathers. A programme of sector sessions on retail, self-service, industrial and textile services and artificial intelligence accompanies the launch.
