There will be backlash. This is the acclaimed episode the laundry industry does not want you to see. There is a major shift in the laundry business landscape. Individual laundry owners are making more money at the expense of multi-billion dollar manufacturers. That’s not the news they want to hear.
Transcript:
Welcome to the State of the Laundry Industry with ‘Laundry Matt’! Episode 5: The secret the laundry industry doesn’t want you to know about. This is the episode the laundry industry does not want you to see. Several years ago, during a webinar about how to get into pickup and delivery, somebody was complaining about the cost of a vehicle. I mentioned, it’s a lot cheaper to buy another vehicle than it is to buy another laundromat. So, you figure the payments on a van is about $700 a month, somewhere around there, and that one vehicle could service a huge area. We’ve got one laundromat and five vehicles. We just added a fifth vehicle just a month ago and we’re covering a huge territory and bringing in thousands of pounds to our laundromat every single day. And we’re not the only ones. A lot of places have figured this out and now have added a fleet of vehicles. You start with one but keep building up because it’s a lot cheaper than buying another laundromat. This is something that we’ve followed and it’s something the laundry industry probably doesn’t want you to know about because there’s a lot of money to be made when somebody buys a laundromat. There’s a lot of machines to buy, the space, there’s a whole bunch of people who get paid. You’re talking about $500,000-$1,000,000 in contracts out there. Or you buy another vehicle for $700 and now you could bring in a ton of new business without the risk. It’s very compelling.
Just in the last two months, one of our clients went from three laundromats to one. He’s got a kick-butt pickup and delivery business. You know, it took some time to build it up, but he’s been with us for about three years and he’s doing great. I mean, five figures wash and fold, pickup and delivery every single month. He decided, you know what, the other two stores are headaches, take a lot of maintenance, and I’m going to consolidate and close those two stores or sell them. Now he’s doing all the pickup and delivery from a single location and it’s just easier, he’s making more money, and he’s able to focus on growing his pickup and delivery.
We’ve got another client with five to six locations and they’re looking at possibly closing two of their locations. Why? Because they’re focusing on pickup and delivery. They’re not selling their pickup and delivery. No, that doesn’t come with the bricks and mortar. They’re just selling off the bricks and mortar, the machines, all that stuff. They’re consolidating their business and focusing on the money, which is pickup and delivery. That’s a growing shooting star and they know it. That’s why they’re selling. This is a transition, something that the laundry industry probably won’t want to be promoting to everybody because they’d rather everybody buy five or six stores. But what if you could do all that business out of a single location?
At Curbside Laundries, we help laundromats maximize their opportunity. We provide an SEO optimized website made specifically for laundromats that helps your self-serve business, it helps in-store wash and fold business, and it helps pickup and delivery. Then our software is the wash and fold point of sale that works for both in-store and pickup and delivery. So, it allows customers to schedule pickup and deliveries from their home or from their phone. I firmly believe that number one way to maximize your laundromat’s revenue opportunity is not to open another laundromat, which is a good thing and nothing wrong with that. But first I’d get into pickup and delivery because for $700 a month for the vehicle and there are other expenses too, but it’s minimal compared to another laundromat. Meanwhile, pickup and delivery is the fastest growing segment of the market, so I firmly believe if you want to maximize the opportunity, get into pickup and delivery. That’s where 75% of our wash and fold revenue comes from at our laundromat is pickup and delivery.
