The Coin Laundry Association is requesting that authorities designate laundromats as providing “essential services” during the COVID-19 outbreak. These facilities provide a basic public health service by serving millions of families with a safe place to wash and dry their clothes each and every week.
In alignment with Centers for Disease Control recommendations, American families should continue to observe the best levels of cleanliness and hygiene possible, including regular clothes washing, during the pandemic. Access to services is particularly important for laundromat customers who are often among low-income families with few alternatives to the neighborhood laundromat for clothes washing.
The CLA is sharing CDC recommendations with its members regarding enhanced cleaning of hard surfaces and other “high touch” areas within their stores. The industry is committed to providing the cleanest, safest environment possible for its customers. The commercial-grade washers found in laundromats provide rigorous mechanical action which combined with hot water and proper detergent use effectively flush contaminants from clothing in a manner that far exceeds the capabilities of residential machines. Furthermore, commercial gas-fired dryers operate at higher temperatures sufficient to enhance the cleaning process.
The 30,000 small-business owners of laundromats in the United States stand ready to help families keep their clothes clean during the pandemic. The CLA is ready to work with federal, state and municipal authorities to keep laundromats running during this crucial time.
I agree with you. You are absolutely right. Laundromat business is essential for the low income customers.
I ask people to stay in their cars while washer is washing and dryer is drying and no folding and practice social distancing while in the store.
I removed my chairs and turned the tables around. Posted rules and disinfect after each machine is used.
At end of day I fog the store with virucide and hope for the best.
Stay safe
Where is your laundromat located? I live in MA (Spfld area). I’m so desperate to find one that’s open.
I make $34.72 an hour as a union carpenter. I wash my clothes at a laundromat. Guess that makes me a low income person. Not only low income people use those places. I know people on welfare who have washer and dryer in there government home. And why not the utility’s to run those machines is all free. The poor people have it better than the working man.
I work for a laundromat, we do a pickup/delivery service as well as the public coming in to do their own laundry. I do not agree, we do not know if any of these customers are infected or not. When you come in coughing and sneezing spewing it in the air because you can’t cover your face or you bring your kids with you with snot noses, we the ones who work in such places are susceptible for getting sick. So, laundromats are a catch 22, am I going to be compensated from the government if I get sick?.
You should be wearing a mask, if possible. Disinfect the area as you should be doing regularly. You can make rules like the other laundry places: remove chairs, tables, ask customers to wait in their cars, practice social distancing, ask to keep their snot nose kids out of laundry mats, or ask if sick to stay away for safety reasons. Many businesses are doing the same.
Me too i also work in laundry mat its true people have no regard to protect anyone at the store turn their sick kids loose running wild snot and other body fluids everywhere we work hard enough without all the other more than usual disinfectant for less than minimum wage wow our eeward is high risk due to public contamination me too put my name on the list to go afyer the goverment if me or my fmily is exposed
If your so worried about getting sick you should of never gotten a job in a laundromat ,I mean come on it doesn’t matter what kind of desease it is if you work in a laundromat then your more at risk . That’s called common sense , I mean seriously , you should really think about what your going to say before you say it especially when there’s no thought process behind what you say .
Yeah were worried as employees who work at a laundromat and im pretty sure if we knew a pandemic was coming with no cure we would have found employment elsewhere until u put urself in our situation you can keep your opinion to urself
And yes you are being compensated it’s called hourly pay or salary , I mean I’m sorry but you really should of just kept that comment to yourself .oh n don’t forget about the stimulus check for doing absolutely nothing….
I work at a laundromat and do dip off service. I don’t feel that it is safe to do other people’s laundry during a pandemic. There is no way to stay six feet away also.
For me it is definitely an essential service because it’s the only option I have. Believe me I wish I had hookups in my building but I don’t. And I work for essential businesses so unless I am sick then I have to work so I have clothes to wash and can only do it that once a week that I always do. However I have been wearing gloves no access to a mask though but that would be to protect myself since I am not sick. I would not be able to work if there was no laundromats cuz I have no way to wash my clothes and I know people would say you can watch them in the sink through the tub and dry them around your apartment not that simple for everybody. Apartment does not really have space for that is because it may be and a cat fur with what clothes does not help. Therefore for me a laundromat is extremely essential to be able to still go to my essential jobs. Oh and I don’t have a car so I can’t sit in my car while I was being done granted I try to take a walk if it’s warm enough. And I could walk home but by time I walk home I got to turn around and walk back cuz doesn’t run for that long. Or I might have 5 minutes at home which is pointless.
Laundromats should remain open but warnings should be posted for those coughing, sneezing, and or fever to stay away from facility. And those with children should leave them at home under supervision.
It looks like laundromats must close under the new directive of the PA governor. Is this true?
Laundromats are definitely essential to health
As a laundromat owner, my customers are my life line. It is extremely important that we provide the cleanest and safest environment for our customers. In order to do so we have asked customers to help by WASH-DRY and FOLD at home. That is load washers and dryers, then wait in their vehicle until the load is finished, then take laundry home to fold. This limits the number of people inside the facility at any given time and reduces the number of infected areas to be cleaned. But we also know that some patrons arrive by cab or some other form of transportation and understand the need to allow some patrons to remain in the facility during the wash, dry & fold process. We are a staffed laundromat, so we are diligent about cleaning regularly, but even more so now to ensure the health of our community.
A LOT of dry cleaners don’t use hot water and don’t necessarily dry the clothes. There are a lot that are line dried. Also, a lot of stuff comes in with fecal matter on it and it’s washed (yes, I said washed NOT actually dry cleaned) together leaving all kinds of opportunity for spreading viruses. Dumb idea to leave dry cleaners open. Laundromats I understand, most people don’t take home wet clothes…but not laundromats. They don’t even have commercial dryers to get hot enough to kill anything! https://time.com/4676920/washing-machine-germs/
We don’t even use paper towels in the laundromat I work at, we use rags for the bathroom hand drying. No masks, no bleach, no posted cleaning plan.
I work at a laundromat and my boss is sticking with the 5 person in a group policy so we started a number system like mvd. We let customers start their washers then have them sit in their vehicles same with dryers. However we do allow them to fold their laundry. So far the last two weeks have gone great. Please all stay safe