I have been in the vended laundry business for more than 30 years, and I\u2019m now ready to retire. My question is how to establish a fair selling price. I own the building and the business. How do I value each?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The first step is to get a bank appraisal on your property. This will help to determine the value of that property. Also, with this appraisal, it will be much easier for a potential buyer to receive a loan. <\/p>\n

To determine the value of the laundry business, use a factor of two to five times your net income. Yes, that\u2019s a very wide margin \u2013 but, then again, laundromats vary greatly. Be brutally honest with yourself about the condition of your facility. As a general rule, if your store is in excellent condition \u2013 with newer equipment, great parking availability, etc. \u2013 it will be worth more money because the buyer likely won\u2019t have to inject much cash into the business for several years. In some ways, it\u2019s like buying a used car \u2013 the less mileage, the longer you will drive it without spending money on repairs. <\/p>\n

The best suggestion I can offer to any store owner looking to sell his or her laundry business is to hire a reputable broker. In the long run, a good broker will get you more money at the sale, and with much less aggravation.<\/p>\n

I own a modern, well-equipped self-service laundry. However, I\u2019m not happy with my commercial accounts business, which has reached a certain dollar amount and has sort of leveled off. I can\u2019t seem to push past this plateau. I\u2019ve sent out promotional mailings, hung signage in my windows and advertised in our local newspaper. What am I missing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Perhaps, the first \u2013 and most critical \u2013 change you need to make is to your attitude toward your commercial accounts business. Maybe change your self-image and the image you have of your laundry operation. Remember, when seeking out commercial work, you\u2019re no longer in the self-service laundry business anymore \u2013 you\u2019re in the full-service laundry business. With a strictly self-service facility, the owner simply waits for the customers to walk through the door. With a full-service laundry business model, you must aggressively go out and attract new clients.<\/p>\n

Visit retirement homes, smaller hotels and motels, hair salons, massage therapists, rehabilitation centers, schools and any other businesses or facilities that may require laundry services. Be sure to bring business cards, a price list and positive attitude. In other words, to build your commercial accounts business, you have to go out and get it. You\u2019ll be surprised how much extra business is really out there.<\/p>\n

My sister and I have a great wash-dry-fold service. However, our clients don\u2019t typically tip the attendants who process their laundry. As a result, our employees feel unappreciated. As the owners, we compensate our attendants at above minimum wage, and we also provide bonuses a few times a year.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure that our wash-dry-fold customers tip their hair stylists, valets, etc. What about the people who wash their dirty clothes?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Allowing or encouraging your customers to tip the attendants who do their wash-dry-fold laundry is a bad idea. Most customers will feel slightly offended with regard to this process. You may create an uncomfortable situation, and your customers shouldn\u2019t be put into that position.<\/p>\n

In addition, this policy could backfire if certain customers don\u2019t tip \u201cenough” or decide not to tip at all. Then, your employee may decide to only take good care of the clients who pay big tips.<\/p>\n

A better idea may be to compensate your employees, based on a certain percentage of your wash-dry-fold revenue. If you\u2019re going to compensate your staff, do it out of your own money, where you have complete control over the process. The employees will take more pride in doing a great job all of the time for every customer \u2013 and you\u2019ll essentially be turning them into salespeople for your wash-dry-fold business.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have been in the vended laundry business for more than 30 years, and I\u2019m now ready to retire. My question is how to establish a fair selling price. I own the building and the business. How do I value each? The first step is to get a bank appraisal on your property. This will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":953,"featured_media":1805,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[137],"tags":[9424,9153,10119,312,413],"class_list":["post-1766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wash-with-wally","tag-business","tag-business-ownership","tag-business-tips","tag-laundromat","tag-laundry-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/953"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1766"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1766\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1768,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1766\/revisions\/1768"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetlaundry.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}