(Click Here for UniFirst Sustainability Efforts.)
Long recognized for its attractive uniforms and business service programs, UniFirst has been saluted by many cities and towns nationwide for the laundering processes it has in place that help keep local environments pristine and safe. The Missouri Water Environment Association, for example, an organization dedicated to the improvement of water resources quality in the "Show Me" state, recently presented UniFirst with a prestigious "gold" award for "outstanding achievements" in water treatments and safety, while the Water & Wastewater Utility in Austin, Texas and Houston's Industrial Wastewater Service both made similar presentations to Company facilities. UniFirst's Richmond, VA operation also received
two environmental "Pretreatment and Stormwater Awards," one for the Company's pretreatment practices for its wastewater and the other was for advances in pollution prevention.

Other recent "green" awards for UniFirst came from the Kansas Water Environment Association in Topeka, the Hampton Roads Sanitation District in Virginia, and the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Utilities
in North Carolina. And in the specialized field of laundering and decontaminating apparel worn by
nuclear power employees, UniFirst's UniTech division received an Environmental Leadership Award from Exelon Corporation, one of the nation's largest nuclear power providers.

For more than 30 years, UniFirst has been a member of the Laundry Environment Stewardship Program (LaundryESP^®) which, on an industry-wide basis, has been credited with reducing overall pollutants by 40 percent, water usage by 13 percent, and energy usage by 12 percent. Similar LaundryESP savings have also been realized by individual UniFirst facilities. Most recently
(June 2009), the Textile and Rental Service Association, in conjunction with a third-party judging contractor, awarded UniFirst's facility in Mesquite, TX its "Environmental Stewardship Award." These environmental stewardship results have resulted in congratulatory nods of approval from the U.S.