The Smart Linen Revolution: Southern Events’ Transition to RFID

Industry

Party Rental

Eliminate order errors, save labor time, and gain visibility into linen inventory throughout the order lifecycle.

Southern Events manages a high volume of rental linens every week. Manual counting and checking created three major pain points: Packing errors risked under-shipping to customers, labor-intensive returns slowed down check-in after events, and limited visibility into where linens were in the laundry cycle.

Results

RFID tags sewn into every new linen purchased from Ultimate Textile improved packing accuracy, faster check-in and inventory churn, and streamlined laundry tracking.

Key Product

Table Linens

southerneventsonline.com/

$5.4M+

Manage Spend

100+

Deals Completed

7.6x

ROI

$2M

Cost Savings

We wanted a way to reduce mistakes and make our team’s job faster and easier. Manually counting linens over and over wasn’t sustainable as we grew.

Jordan Bason

Linen and Inventory Manager

About Southern Events

Chip and Jill Cole started Southern Events to meet the demands of Williamson county’s growing community of families and businesses who had occasions to celebrate. Their business began in their garage and has grown in tandem with other local companies, building the relationships they now enjoy in Middle Tennessee’s event planning community. The Coles employ nearly fifty full and part-time staff and are deeply committed to their customers, clients and their families.

The Coles work together, contributing their unique skills to make Southern Events successful. Jill’s years of experience as an event planner allows her to handle the creative and client facing aspect of the business, while Chip’s project management background makes him the perfect head of logistics. When they’re not planning events, you’ll find the Coles on the lake fishing and boating with their young sons and spending cherished time with family and friends.

The Challenge

Southern Events manages a high volume of rental linens every week.
Manual counting and checking created three major pain points:

Packing errors risked under-shipping to customers.
Labor-intensive returns slowed down check-in after events.
Limited visibility into where linens were in the laundry cycle.

Jordan Bason explained:

“We wanted a way to reduce mistakes and make our team’s job faster and easier. Manually counting linens over and over wasn’t sustainable as we grew.”

The Solution

Ultimate Textile introduced RFID-tagged linens as an optional service. Southern Events began transitioning their inventory by sewing RFID tags into new purchases.

Now, every linen can be scanned instantly at each stage:

Outbound Orders
- RFID is used to double-check packing accuracy before shipment.
- Result: No under-shipped orders.
Returns
- Upon arrival, linens are scanned to automatically count and check them in.
- Result: Significant time and labor savings.
Laundry Process
- After washing, linens are scanned again to confirm cleaning and track progress.
- Result: Visibility into where every item is in its lifecycle.

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The Results

Since implementing RFID, Southern Events has seen measurable improvements:

Zero packing errors on outbound shipments.
Faster check-in of returns with major labor savings and faster inventory churn.
Full visibility into inventory status during laundry and prep.
A smooth transition process, steadily moving all inventory to RFID.

“Ever since Ultimate Textile started offering RFID, it’s been a tremendous help. We’re slowly transitioning everything to RFID, and it’s making a huge difference in efficiency and accuracy.”