Longtime Laundromat Owner on 23 Years of Service, Challenges, Community Impact

For more than two decades, Lee Ann Geurts has been a steady force in her Brooklyn Park community in Minnesota, running three laundromats that have become known not just for clean clothes, but for connection, comfort, and care. What began as a business venture for her...

Green is Good Business 

Green Operations Increasingly Important to Feed Consumer Demand  When Green Laundry Lounge co-owners Pulin and Krishna Dasai got into the vended laundry industry, they wanted to change a narrative: laundromats are water and energy-intensive businesses.   “The...

Leveling the Playing Field

John Um wanted to make sure small business owners could get fair pricing and access to reliable suppliers without needing to have significant buying power. As a leader whose career spanned several major retail and e-commerce companies, he had seen firsthand how hard...

Staying Fierce: Haley Gould Finds Perfect Fit in Vended Laundry

Haley Gould is the Director of Partner Success for HappyNest. She manages an internal team while leading more than 100 partners across the United States building a successful pickup and delivery operation in addition to running their laundromat business. A consummate...

PlanetLaundry Podcast

America’s #1 Resource for Vended Laundry News & Info

PlanetLaundry is the official publication of CLA and is trusted by thousands of laundry professionals to deliver the latest news and industry-specific topics.

Delivering the Goods (Part 1)

Delivering the Goods (Part 1)

Marketing and Growing Your Laundry Business’ Pickup-and-Delivery Service Three years ago, Peter Lowin was considering building a third laundromat in southern California. However, primarily due to the cost, he decided against opening that third store – instead opting...

Tricks of the Laundromat Trade

Tricks of the Laundromat Trade

Industry Veteran Shares an Operational ‘Hack’ and a Rule of Thumb to Help You Better Run Your Laundry Business As we journey through our laundromat ownership experiences, we all tend to find innovative ways to make our business lives easier. Some of these innovations...

The Headlines That Shaped the Year in Laundry (Part 1)

The Headlines That Shaped the Year in Laundry (Part 1)

The Four Most Prominent Story Lines Impacting Owners in 2021 If this were a typical year, we’d likely be using these pages to recap a successful Clean Show. However, 2021 – much like its predecessor – was anything but typical. Early on, it became apparent that Clean...

Headlines

Ohio Laundromat Installs Children’s Library

Laundromat Libraries, a pilot program of the Marietta Community Foundation, recently established its first library at Old Town Express Laundry in Marietta, Ohio. “We are just happy to be able to provide a means to encourage young minds to cultivate a love for reading,...

’Zoned In, Part 1

What Can Ozone Do for Your Laundry Business? [This is the first of a two-part feature article on the use of ozone in a laundromat setting.] Art Jaeger knows a good marketing idea when he sees one. And, at the Coin Laundry Association’s Excellence in Laundry Conference...

Getting the Message Across

Tiffany Outdoor Enables Laundromat Owners to Benefit from ‘Place-Based’ Media In 2008, with more than a decade of media experience, Bert and Barbara Rosenthal decided to branch out from their printing business, Tiffany Press, and create Tiffany Outdoor – an...

Starchup, ZIPS Cleaners Announce Software Integration

Garment-care software provider Starchup and ZIPS Cleaners recently announced that ZIPS will be using Starchup’s software platform and API tools to launch a new mobile app for customers using home delivery, locker drop off and pickup, and EZ DropSM at ZIPS stores. ZIPS...

CleanCloud Partners with Gusto on Payroll Feature

CleanCloud has teamed up with payroll services provider Gusto to introduce its new CleanCloud Payroll feature. This new product enables laundromat owners to run payroll quickly and easily from the CleanCloud platform. All relevant data, including staff hours, are...

Wash with Wally: Parking is Paramount

I own a 4,000-square-foot laundromat that does a good business. However, I’ve noticed that on Saturdays and Sundays we often turn business away because we simply don’t have enough parking availability on those busy weekends. The building next to us is for sale. Do you...

Whirlpool VP Named ‘Corporate Women’s Champion’

Seramount recently named Whirlpool Corp.’s Vice President of Channel Sales and Marketing Lynn Moersch its 2022 Corporate Women’s Champion, as part of Seramount’s Women of Excellence program. Moersch was honored for her outstanding leadership and business success, as...

Anticipating the Renewal of Clean 2022

“The waiting is the hardest part.” – Tom Petty, from “The Waiting” Although many of us initially assumed this classic rock staple from Tom Petty was yet another song about pining for the return to that special someone, Petty himself actually described it as an...

Entrepreneurship is Risky Business

Here’s a Look at What Makes Certain People Willing to Take the Plunge into a Life of Business Ownership Starting or buying a company is not for the faint of heart. The statistics tell us that roughly one-third of all small businesses fail within the first two years....

City Officials Tour New Speed Queen Franchise

Although open just over a month, California’s first Speed Queen Laundry franchise, located in Long Beach, recently attracted attention with visits from a pair of city officials. The store played host to visits from Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia and Long Beach...

Productive, Efficient and Motivated

Three Keys to Building a Strong Wash-Dry-Fold Team With both the post-COVID-19 era and the laundry outsourcing revolution upon us, many store owners I speak with are seeing their wash-dry-fold businesses growing rapidly. Given that, how do we – as employers, without...

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September Magazine Issue

This Month's Issue

 

  • Tech on the Rise: How Operators Are Using Innovation to Run Smarter, Faster Laundromats: From AI phone systems to real-time data tracking, operators and suppliers share how technology is reshaping the modern laundry business and what’s coming next.
  • Business Profile: Delivering a Superior
    Laundry Experience
  • Member Spotlight: Rick Rome –
    Innovating Laundry, One Customer at a Time
  • Guest Column: How AI Changed Google Reviews (What Laundromat Owners Need to Know)
  • And More…

THE LATEST ON LAUNDROMATS

Industry News

Tax Changes Taking Effect in the New Year

On January 1, 38 states enacted noteworthy tax changes, according to a report by the Tax Foundation, an independent tax policy nonprofit organization. Most of these changes represent net tax reductions, which are the result of an unprecedented wave of rate reductions...

Cents Launches Lending Service

Venture-backed technology company Cents has unveiled a new lending arm – Cents Capital, which was created to facilitate low-interest loans for its customers. This new offering will help laundry owners grow their businesses, whether it be through expanding their...

Laundromat Software Startup Raises Pre-Seed Funding

Turns, a vertical SaaS startup for the laundry industry, has raised $500,000 in pre-seed funding, led by Better Capital, along with participation from PointOne Capital and a group of angel investors. Turns provides laundromat owners with an integrated software and...

Laundry Owner to Speak at Women’s Conference

Monica Wales, owner of Happy Laundry in Spokane, Wash., will be a featured speaker at the upcoming WE Ignite Conference 2023, a virtual event scheduled for February 9-11. Wales’ interactive session – “From Paycheck to Paycheck to Abundance” – will be held at 1:00 p.m....

FROM YOUR FAVORITE INDUSTRY EXPERTS

Columns

The Laundry Doctor

When ‘App-ortunity’ Strikes…

Consumer Awareness of On-Demand, App-Based Laundry Services is Growing – And That May Change the Game for Many Operators Early last year, this magazine published an in-depth cover story examining the on-demand home delivery and locker-based drop-off models that were...

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The Business Mind

The Art of Self-Discipline

The Art of Self-Discipline

Master These Five Key Aspects of Your Entrepreneurial Life As once noted by a brilliant psychiatrist, “life is difficult – but once we realize it is so and accept that fact – it becomes much easier because we don’t expect otherwise.” What’s more, our most common,...

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Wash With Wally

Viewpoint

Clean 2017: Las Vegas (or Silicon Valley?)

"Let's go invent tomorrow instead of worrying about what happened yesterday." – Steve Jobs Of course, the industry's largest biennial gathering is coming to Las Vegas next month. But, you would be forgiven for mistaking the acres of new equipment, products and...

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Digital Marketing

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Strategic Corporate Allies Program

Our Strategic Corporate Allies support CLA’s mission through advocacy, education, and innovation to strengthen the industry, advance our members’ businesses, and prepare the next generation of laundry professionals for the future.

Interested in becoming a Strategic Corporate Ally of CLA? Contact President & CEO, Brian Wallace via email at [email protected] or call (630) 491-0499.