Wednesday, September 01, 2010

Laundromats Still a Great Business Despite the Economy

Deborah Dower, pictured August 18, 2010, turned a run-down Citrus Heights, California laundromat into Paradise Laundry. The 'green'-themed business opened in March and has already added a new site. (Paul Kitagaki Jr./Sacramento Bee/MCT) ( PAUL KITAGAKI JR. )Here is a great success story of one of my star one-on-one coaching students, Deborah Dower, who was written up in the Sacramento Bee newspaper. When Deborah was forced into early retirement, she decided that she would need to make some major changes and perhaps go into business for herself.

Deborah found me on the internet and purchased my 'Own a Laundromat Teleseminar' home study course. She fell in love with the idea of owning a Laundromat and got to work right away. Within just a few months, Deborah found two Laundromats that met her criteria and decided to buy them both! Deborah then decided to remodel one of the two stores, so she would be able to enjoy a store with new equipment and less maintenance. Because she can run her businesses part-time, she now has more time to spend with her husband, Jim.

Here is what Deborah had to say about the course:

“Brian’s course ‘Own a Laundromat Teleseminar’ provided me everything I needed to enter the coin op industry which in Brian’s words is A Clean Cash Machine. Within 30 days of taking his training and applying the due diligence process he outlined I made on offer on our first laundry, five months later we purchased our second store. Thanks to Brian I have successfully made the move from a corporate America W2 employee to independent business owner earning passive income.”
- D2

Way to go Deborah, Here's to your continued success!
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Here is the Sacramento Bee Article:

Entrepreneurs Forge Ahead

By Darrell Smith
dvsmith@sacbee.com
Published: Sunday, Aug. 22, 2010 - 12:00 am Page 1D

Deborah Dower was met at the door Monday morning with a smile and a greeting.

"Oh, you're the boss's wife," the smiling man said.

"No, I'm the boss," Dower said, shrugging off the mistake with a smile of her own.

After all, her customer has been there from the beginning in March when Dower opened her business, turning a run-down laundromat at Sunrise Boulevard and Old Auburn Road in Citrus Heights into a Paradise – Paradise Laundry.

With its motto "Wash Green. Save Green," Dower touts Paradise as a "green laundromat," with biodegradable detergents, energy-saving washers and dryers and discount rates for customers who use cold water instead of hot to wash their loads.

"If anybody thought I would own a coin laundry, I would've thought they were crazy," Dower, of El Dorado Hills, said. "But it's recession-proof. People need clean clothes."

Yes, the economy is struggling, but some entrepreneurs still have energy, dreams and drive, developing ideas, opening storefronts, starting businesses and finding ways to succeed amid the deep recession.

Today, Deborah Dower is her own boss. She'd been the boss before, supervising hundreds of employees, overseeing nearly $1 billion in sales accounts as a national vice president at Hewlett-Packard.

Then came June 22, 2009, the day she was laid off, ending her 25-year career just days removed from her 50th birthday.

"I wanted to retire at 50, but I didn't know it would be forced," she said. "The layoff was a shock. I didn't see it coming."

Dower may have been shocked, but she didn't panic.

She decided to turn her layoff into a business opportunity, opening a new door when one closed behind her.

Some studies have found that new business creation nationwide has grown during the recession, but Sacramento city and county officials said that's not true locally.

The city's Department of Finance said there were 4,021 new business applications in fiscal 2009-2010, down from 6,350 in fiscal 2007-2008. County tax officials similarly said there were 4,341 applications in 2009-2010, down from 5,204 new filings in 2007-2008.

Still, Dower and others aren't afraid to swim against the stream. And they're finding some advantages to hanging their shingle during a downbeat economy, including plenty of commercial space available at prices far below just a couple of years ago.

"Space is not an issue," said Greg Roquet, a business broker at Davis-based Murphy Business Brokers. "Now, landlords are hungry" to work with potential tenants, he said.

That aided Dower, who investigated several business concepts before finding a website on owning laundromats that helped her plot a new course.

Dower had rejected the notion of returning to corporate America after her layoff and wasn't convinced that buying a franchise was the answer.

With a franchise, she felt that "I was buying a job, not owning a business – that's not automony," she said. "It was deja vu all over again."

So Dower went to work. She found a newspaper announcement that led her to an orientation session for would-be business owners led by volunteer counselors at the nonprofit group SCORE. The meeting convinced her she was on the right path with her "green laundry" concept.

Dower found business counseling, one-on-one coaching and, finally, a workshop through SCORE to fine-tune her plan for lenders and private investors.

She did her homework, scouring census reports to learn neighborhood demographics – renters are more likely to patronize laundromats than homeowners – and sought out a laundry broker.

"She came up with the concept of the green laundry, SCORE just put the polish on the plan," SCORE chapter chairman Jeff Hendy recalled. "You could tell that she had the energy and drive to make it happen."

She bought the run-down laundromat at Sunrise and Old Auburn last December after whittling down the as-is $50,000 asking price to $30,000, selling off company stock to fund the deal. She was also able to negotiate a 10-year lease with two five-year options with the landlord, who was happy to get a long-term deal in a building that had other sites vacant.

She and husband Jim Dower, now the business's vice president, then pulled $150,000 from a retirement fund to renovate the space, and worked with the washer and dryer manufacturer to finance another $150,000 in equipment.

Small but sparkling with new equipment, Paradise Laundry is now busy with patrons toting and sorting loads. It's a dramatic change for customers who used to dread coming here; who used to wonder whether the washers would work; who are so grateful now that they embrace Dower when they see her.

"Cleanliness is very important to me," said customer Crystal Corbin of Citrus Heights on Monday, washing a load for her family before heading off to work. "Everything works. I'm so happy they're here."

Dower concedes setting out on her own is a risk, but she's not being timid. Already, the Dowers have opened a second Paradise Laundry in Roseville.

"It's scary," she said. "I'm not going to consider myself successful until the two-year mark." Still, she's not nostalgic for corporate America.

"I don't miss it," Dower said. "Customers are happy to see us and I get to build something from the ground up."



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Click the link below if you would like to learn more about the Laundromat business and listen to a FREE call explaining how to get started in this exciting business!

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