Dry cleaning as a business is quite profitable. In Western Europe, laundries and dry cleaners are everywhere, but in Ukraine this niche is not yet overcrowded. Meanwhile, every year Ukrainians buy more and more leather and fur products, and even a student can afford to buy good jeans at Levi's on discounts. All these things require special care that cannot be provided at home. Therefore, people go to places where they can quickly and for reasonable money clean their sheepskin coat and remove a stain from their favorite thing.
With this material we want to help young entrepreneurs. We will tell you in detail how to open a dry cleaner and what kind of investment this venture requires.
Content
How to Open a Dry Cleaning Business: Action Plan
Before you start getting customers in droves, you need to take the following steps:
get acquainted with the legislation, study sanitary and epidemiological standards and fire safety requirements;
choose a room and a favorable location;
select dry cleaning equipment , furniture for staff and waiting clients;
purchase cleaning products;
hire and train staff;
develop a dry cleaning/laundry promotion plan.
There are few steps, but each requires detailed elaboration. In this article, we will not dwell on the legal component. We want to delve into the practical: what exactly is needed for a dry cleaning business. Let's get started.
Selecting a room
Opening a small dry cleaner requires a space of 80 square meters. m. Of these, 60 square meters will be occupied by production premises, 15 square meters. m – clothing collection point and 5 sq. m - bathroom. Ideally, about 100 square meters are allocated for business. In this case, you can set aside a place for customers who are waiting for their order, and for lunch and rest for employees.
Important requirements for the premises:
Ceiling height from 3 m.
Electrical network 380 V.
Water supply, heating, ventilation and sewerage system.
Tiled or painted walls in the dry cleaner's itself.
A hard floor designed to support the weight of industrial equipment for washing , drying and ironing . Dry cleaning equipment works with vibrations, so the floor must be resistant to them.
Please note that opening a business on the first floor of a residential building is prohibited, as well as in close proximity to restaurants, cafes and grocery stores. There are 2 possible scenarios:
Set up an enterprise in the basement/ground floor of a public building converted to non-residential use. In this case, everything will be in one place: clothing reception, dry cleaning, and storage space for consumables.
Open a dry cleaning collection point in the center, and production in a building on the outskirts with low rent.
In the case of a dry cleaner, as with a restaurant, the location is important. Don't try to get into the city center - you can go broke renting here, and although there are many clients, they are "not in the right condition". What does this mean?
Usually people go to the center to take a walk, go to the movies or shopping, and spend time with family and friends. They come here light to have fun. Taking a pile of dirty clothes with you, and after a walk picking them up and dragging them home is inconvenient. But if your dry cleaner ends up under their house, that’s a completely different matter. You can always go downstairs, have your clothes cleaned, and go about your business. Conclusion - it is better to open a dry cleaning service in a residential area of the city with a large number of multi-storey high-rise buildings, sports schools, kindergartens, schools and hostels. This is where your target audience lives, works and studies.
Equipment selection
Once the issue with the premises is closed, you can start looking for equipment. First of all, a dry cleaner needs washing machines and dry cleaning machines . These units must be professional, with a large number of settings and programs for different types of fabrics - household machines will not do.
The next point is the volume of the drum/chamber. Models of different sizes are available for sale. Washing machines 6-9 kg are suitable if you want to open a dry cleaner in a small town. Heavier and larger ones are needed for dry cleaners with a large flow of visitors. In this case, the equipment will work at full capacity, serving 18-120 kg of clothes at a time.
By the way, please note that there are energy-efficient machines on the market. For example, the yishiwashing series is equipped with a short drying system and uses 7% less water with the same washing quality.
What else needs to be included in a business plan when opening a dry cleaner?
ironing table , calender , steam dummy ;
stain removal products and a special table for this procedure;
drying units (machines);
drying cabinet ;
consumables (bowls, chemicals, etc.).
The set may vary depending on what products you will be working with. If you plan to focus only on clothes, from all the variety of ironing equipment for dry cleaning, you need an ironing table and a mannequin. The first one is convenient for ironing shirts, T-shirts, T-shirts, trousers and jeans. A mannequin is an even more convenient way to dry and straighten shaped products. The operator will not have to bother with processing sleeves, cuffs and collars. You just need to attach the product to the mannequin and turn on the unit - the steam will dry the clothes and remove bruises left after washing and transportation.
A big plus of steam mannequins is that they allow you to “bring your outerwear to life” without much effort and with minimal time. And if you open close to plants and factories, a drying cabinet will serve you well - a special compartment where you can dry uniforms, gloves, shoes and hats of workers.
How much does dry cleaning equipment cost? It depends on the manufacturer and the characteristics of the equipment. For example, American equipment tested with more than one thousand kilograms of dirty laundry will cost more than Chinese equipment. However, such equipment will serve longer and better. By the way, it is not necessary to buy new machines. The price of used equipment is much more pleasant. However, here you need to look at the condition of the units and choose them together with an expert.
Staff
Experienced businessmen say that their most valuable resource is people. The development of the business depends on how competently the employees are selected, on their qualifications. You can be located in a good place with a large daily flow of visitors, install the most modern equipment and comfortable sofas for those waiting. But if your employees do not know their job, you will spoil the things of customers and lose not only money, but also reputation. So, before they can get on their feet, many businesses close.
If you are opening a dry cleaning collection point or a full-fledged enterprise where everything is together, hire people with experience. If there are no qualified employees, hire promising ones and those who really want to develop in this direction. Such people can always be taught.
How many workers are needed again depends on the size of the dry cleaner. Quite a lot of people can work at such an enterprise, it all depends on the laundry work schedule. If the selected equipment does not allow the process to be fully automated, the operator must take over the work. For example, the process of ironing clothes. Any ironing equipment, be it a calender, press, roller or board, requires a specially trained employee. If the unit is large, several operators can do the work simultaneously.
If the express dry cleaner works daily, at least 4 employees will be required. In addition, there should be at least one receiver working on the reception and delivery of linen. In the case when the entrepreneur does not plan to manage the establishment, it is necessary to hire a director.
By the way, you can stand out from your competitors by introducing a mobile service. This is a rather promising path that only a few take. Save your client's time. Offer them the collection of dirty clothes directly from home and delivery of clean and pleasantly smelling laundry to the door. Of course, such an innovation will make dry cleaning more expensive (after all, you need to hire a driver, fill the car with gas and do maintenance). But! A modern person does not have much time to waste on such unpleasant things as trips to the laundromat and back. The main thing is to present the service "under the right sauce" - come up with an enticing slogan and sell it. Something like: "We save your time", "We will take away dirty clothes, wash, remove stains, iron and deliver to the door!" or "While you are resting, we clean your clothes!" Believe me, young parents and busy people will gladly respond to the offer.
How to attract clients?
It doesn't matter whether you are starting a business from scratch or buying an existing one, you need to advertise your services to attract customers. And you need to think about it at the launch stage. Of course, the best advertising is location. An eye-catching sign, leaflets with smiling people (ideally a family) holding clean and perfectly ironed clothes in their hands - show real customers that after visiting your dry cleaner, they will be just as happy and satisfied with the quality. Launch a bonus system, and at the initial stage, offer customers a discount. You need to attract people, and the low cost of dry cleaning workwear and shaped items is the most tempting bait.
Be sure to run advertising on the Internet, social networks, and forums. Good results can be achieved by creating your Instagram profile and promoting it.
Create your own website (at least a one-page one) where you will have all the important information about yourself: address and how to get to you, phone numbers, price list and list of services. By the way, this is not very common here, but experts recommend launching a package sale of services. For example, 5/10 dry cleaners at a price slightly lower than these 5/10 dry cleaners would cost if a person bought them separately each time. This way you can increase your profit.
conclusions
We tried to tell you in as much detail as possible what you need to open your own dry cleaner. But, of course, it is impossible to cover all the nuances in one article. In any case, it is worth starting with a business plan. In addition to production and organizational plans, registration, include advertising in your expenses. The more people know about you, the greater the chances of success. In general, you can earn good money from dry cleaning. The average bill for the capital, big city is 8-10 dollars. With minimal workload (20 items per day), the revenue will be 6 thousand dollars per month, and the net profit will be about $1.5 thousand. The higher the reputation of the company, the better. Even a small self-service dry cleaner or dry cleaner at home becomes a profitable investment. Competition in this area is still not great, which means that in a year or a year and a half you can recoup your business and become a profit.
