Laundry Survival Tips

Faced with rapidly rising energy costs, some laundry owners adapt and reduce expenses by taking some unusual steps. As an example, one operator chose to reduce his rising gas bills by converting most of his top loading washers to cold wash only. He retained one bank of washers on hot, but elevated the vend price for those machines by a quarter. He also raised wash costs for each of his front loaders by a quarter each. Plus, he lowered the hot water temperatures at the water heater so that it gave warmish water only, even on the hot setting, regardless of the machine setting being put on hot or warm. He suspects that the laundry''s gas bill was cut by about twenty percent. More important to him, the cash flow of the business stayed about the same. He felt that by using cooler water, he had to keep his dryer prices the same, but looks ahead to adjusting the time downward to save gas as well. What really permitted all of this to happen was the additional step he took to hold the level of his business. They began to offer free detergent. Both he and his attendants told the customers that it was specially formulated for cold water wash loads. The detergent, which they buy in bulk containers, cost them very little. It was sold to the clientele as being worth a half dollar per small scoop. To customers that seemed to make the cold water wash a real bargain. They saved money by not having to buy detergent. All of us know that much of the laundry being processed today is already being done using cold water wash settings. So even if cold water wash settings would trouble some part of the a laundry''s clientele, it really is not a problem for many of the users of coin and card operated laundries. That laundry operator took a risk to -survive the rising gas prices. It''s only been a few months since this all happened, but he tells the News that the plan is working well and he has no expectation of making further changes.