Jacob Workman swore he would never own a laundromat. Today, he’s a distinguished guest on the Laundromat Resource Podcast as a laundromat owner and laundromat youtuber. He loves the business and will tell you all about it!
Jacob’s road to laundromat ownership was a wild and winding one. He spins the tale while packing in practical lessons he has learned, sharing his wisdom, and inspiring action! He’s an open book as he shares his experience here on the podcast, and there are many lessons to be learned because of it.
Some of the things we talk about in this episode are:
- Jacob’s parents moving out of state & leaving him behind in high school
- Jacob’s parents’ laundromat
- Jacob’s entrepreneurial journey before his laundromat
- Jet ski flipping (!!)
- Why he bought a laundromat after saying he would never own one
- Free laundromats
- Facebook marketplace and Craigslist
- Location importance
- What to do when you first take over
- Advertising your laundromat
- Can you get into the business without working on machines?
- Jacob’s future goals
- YouTubing his laundromat experiences
- Business details
- Raising vend prices
And much more!
Listen To The Podcast Here
Watch The Podcast Here
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Links from the show
- Live Q&A with Coin Laundry Association President and CEO Brian Wallace! (Subscribe and hit the bell icon)
- There, I Fixed It YouTube Channel
- Free Laundromat Video
- Vending Machine Video
- Quarantine Video
- Laundromat Investor Resources
- Join Laundromat Resource
- Laundromat Resource Forums
- Laundromat Resource Blog
- Be a guest on the podcast!
- Sell your laundromat
- Laundromat Resource Coaching
* Some links may be affiliate links which benefit Laundromat Resource and help us continue to create great resources for you at no extra cost to you. Thank you for supporting us!
Connect with Jacob
There, I Fixed It YouTube Channel
Jacob's Bio
My name is Jacob Workman. I’ve been married to my beautiful wife for 7 years and we are expecting our first child in February. Currently we own 1 laundromat and are actively looking to expand. Our laundromat is the only active investment that we own as of now. In the past we’ve owned rental properties, a custom t-shirt business, and a residential contracting company. During the time of owning our contracting company our main focus was building and selling spec homes. I currently work a full time job, but always have had an entrepreneurial spirit. Mostly, I spend my time working, furthering my skill sets, and working on my youtube channel. I decided to start my youtube channel on a whim. I was constantly doing things at our laundromat and just thought one day that I should start recording and see where this goes. The name for my channel, There I Fixed It, came from my personality of being willing to tackle anything and my love of fixing things that are broken. When I say my willingness to tackle anything means, anything. If I had to cut drain lines in my floor for new hardmounts, I’d be there with bells on my toes.
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Episode Transcript
hey i want to jump in real quick before
we get started on today’s podcast
episode just to tell you that if you’re
listening to this
when this episode comes out then you are
in store for a huge treat because
this thursday january 14th
6 p.m eastern time 3 p.m pacific
i’m going live on my youtube channel to
do a live q a
with dave laundromat millionaire men’s
and also
super special guest probably the most
influential person
in the laundromat industry right now the
president and ceo of the coin laundry
association
brian wallace will be joining us
answering your questions
helping you succeed in your laundromat
business so whether you own laundromats
now or you’re looking to buy your first
one you cannot miss
this live q a it’s going to be on my
youtube
thursday january 14th
6 p.m eastern time 3 p.m pacific time
and you can ask your questions there my
youtube is youtube.com
laundromat resource make sure you head
over there subscribe
hit that notification bell so you’ll be
notified when we’re live
and come ask your questions to two of
the greatest
minds in the industry and i’ll be there
too
all right we’ll see you guys there let’s
jump into this podcast episode because
it’s a winner
hey what’s up guys it’s jordan with the
laundromat resource podcast
this is show number 38 and i’m pumped
that you’re here because today we have
an
awesome guest his name is jacob workman
and you may have seen him around
on youtube he’s got the youtube channel
there i fixed it
he talks a lot about his laundromat on
that channel he’s
showing uh you the the real true
life of a laundromat owner so if you
haven’t checked it out yet
go over to youtube and and search there
i fixed it
i’ll definitely have a link to this and
everything else that we talk about in
this episode
in the description down below if you’re
on youtube or
uh or on the podcast description or you
can check
all of this out at uh laundromat
resource resource.com
show 38 jacob workman today
and i cannot wait for you to hear this
interview it’s awesome
he’s got a lot of really really great
stuff to tell you and his story is very
cool
and his youtube channel also very cool
you gotta check
it out okay uh success
tip i have a success tip for you and
it’s this
it’s gonna sound like something that i
always say
and it is something that i always say
but you need to get on the forums
head over to laundromat resource.com
forums there’s a lot of activity
happening
over there in fact uh this week it was
pretty cool well there’s a lot of stuff
going on over there
this week there’s a lot of posts that
were posted a lot of questions that are
being asked a lot of discussions being
had so don’t get left out be on
uh go go get involved in those
discussions it’s how you learn it’s how
you grow and it’s also how you give back
and i want to say well also i mean we
had
brandon understall who is guest
on show number seven i’ll link that one
too because it was killer show it gets
referenced
all the time and in fact he got brought
up on the forums and brandon made
an appearance over there this week and
not only did he
help out with the question but he
dropped his phone number right in
the forum post so man get a hold of
brandon pick his brain he dropped his
phone number in the forum so at least
you know give him a prank call at three
in the morning or something what’s up
brandon
just kidding don’t do that uh but
seriously awesome dude
he knows this business inside and out
he’s second generation there so go pick
his brain
a lot of cool stuff happening so make
sure every week you’re at least going
over there and asking one question
answering one question getting involved
in the discussion
introducing yourself on the introduction
form all that okay
but i i want to say you need to be
involved
over there and especially if you’re a
current owner
it’s going to benefit you to be involved
helping
out other owners and people who are
trying to buy their first laundromat
and it’s not i said this already but
it’s not my nature to be cryptic
but i can’t really talk about it more
and i can’t really talk about why
but but seriously last week i think i
said
get on the email list you’re going to
want to be on the email list and it was
a little bit cryptic
this week i’m saying get involved in the
forums especially if you’re already
a current laundromat owner it’s going to
benefit you
there’s some very cool things kind of
coming up
down the coming up down the pipeline
coming down the pipeline
and it’s just man just take my word for
it you don’t want to be left behind
you’re going to want to jump on this
train it’s going to be very very cool
so get over there and get involved in
the community if you haven’t yet if you
have
awesome it’s been very very cool to see
everything going on over there on the
forum so okay
enough of that uh i really want to jump
into it
uh with jacob today because it’s an
awesome interview
you’re gonna love it make sure you grab
a paper and a pen or your favorite
note-taking app and let’s jump into it
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well hey jacob thank you for coming on
the show i’ve been super excited
to have you on because i’ve been
watching you on your youtube channel
we’ll get to that in a little bit but
man
it’s it’s an honor to have you on i’m
really excited can’t wait to hear your
story so thanks for coming on man how
you doing
i’m good thanks for having me yeah no
problem no problem like i said i’ve been
watching you for a while so it’s pretty
cool to
uh you know be able to interact we’re
still on a screen obviously but
it’s cool to interact with you this time
yeah so it’s finally nice to have the
camera talking back to me so
yeah i bet i bet uh well cool i mean
i can’t wait to hear about your
experience with your laundromat and also
your experience on youtube but
before we get into that why don’t you
tell us a little bit about who you are
and uh and then we’ll get into how you
got into this crazy
industry uh my name is jacob
i’m from uh east tennessee um
not too far from knoxville about
northeast knoxville um
i’m married i got a child on the way
fixing them i
have it here and i think february all
right um
so we’re pretty excited about that i
have it on good authority that february
babies are the best babies
oh yeah hopefully hopefully she’ll be
interested in the laundry right and i’m
having a little helper later on in the
future that’s what i’m hoping
that’s right um
but you know i got one i’ve been in
laundromat industry for 13 years
owned one for three years so yeah
just going with the flow um just this
past year i decided
after you know just fixing things all
the time
i got this bad habit i love love to buy
broke stuff and fix it
i didn’t realize i had this problem
until someone pointed it out to me but
now i’ve embraced it so i decided to
start a youtube channel
and uh just just put everything out
there laundromats so
yeah well it’s cool i it’s it’s a really
cool channel it’s
what i would probably term as
infotainment uh because it’s
entertaining just to kind of see
you doing your thing at the laundromat
but i also learn a lot just from
watching
you know your channel and watching what
you’re doing with the channel and it’s
you know some of the stuff that happens
is like oh my gosh and
uh you know i i relate to a lot uh
there and i’m sure a lot of people will
relate to this oh yeah
we’ll definitely uh we’ll talk a little
bit more about the channel here in a
little bit and we’ll
we’re going to link that channel so you
know in the show notes so if you’re on
youtube
in the description uh make sure you go
check out the channel and subscribe to
it and hit that bell for him
uh because this channel is getting some
traction and deservedly so so
all right so okay you intrigued me you
said you’ve been in the laundromat
industry for
13 years and you’ve owned one for three
years
what’s going on those 10 years before
you owned one
well those 10 years i was uh i guess i
was
just still in high school i was uh i was
in my senior year in high school
my parents found a deal we were in west
virginia at the time they found a deal
on tennessee
decided to move down here chase after
that deal
turns out it was a zombie map and i
think it was uh
a zombie map before the term was corn
coined
um but yeah i think out of 16 dryers
only one worked
so we dove in head first just you know
fixing everything
and when i say dryers i’m talking 40
year old dryers
so we really got our hands dirty and i
helped him ever since and still helping
him to this day
and and then just recently yeah well
three years ago
um i happened up on this swore i’d never
get into laundromats
after you know seeing those things that
you talk about on my youtube channel
but i guess the bug bit me there and
i’ve been in it and trying to expand as
quick as i can
yeah oh man you got bit all right
there’s a lot to unpack in there so
let’s go back to hold on did your
parents move
states to buy a laundromat a zombie
laundromat
is that oh yeah yeah they they moved
states and left me behind
i don’t know it was fortunate i lived my
senior year by myself
i’d come down here on the weekends help
them with the laundromat back
back up there oh yeah what’s happening
my parents trusted me so oh man okay
this is the story just keeps getting
better okay so your parents
how did they find this laundromat out of
state
we’ve uh they’ve had property down here
forever
um i believe my uncle was down here and
he happened on it for sale
he told them they were already looking
at they were actually looking at a
restaurant at the time
back home and i’m so glad that they did
not go that route
uh hey i don’t want to deal with
restaurants and b
whoever who knows i might not be in the
laundry industry now and
you know my youtube channel could be
about something completely different
yeah no kidding huh okay so your uncle
found it
told your parents about it they said you
know what we’re gonna abandon jacob
and we’re gonna move out of state and
buy a
zombie laundromat how did you feel about
that as a senior
with your parents abandoning you
stoked oh you’re excited of course i was
excited
plus there was all kinds of broke stuff
for me to fix i mean i’ve been doing
this since i was a little kid i just
realized i had a problem the past couple
years
it’s kind of like a fish realizing it’s
in water you just exactly yeah
you’ve been living that life and didn’t
even realize it didn’t even realize it
yeah okay so they bought this zombie
laundromat i don’t know how much of the
details you know but i’d love to hear a
little bit more about it
did they get in there and
you know work with the existing
equipment or did they put new equipment
in what did they do
yeah honestly uh i couldn’t tell you i
know
we visited the laundromat way back in
the day before it ever moved then it
moved
uh so it’s got near new infrastructure
well then near new infrastructure
same old 40 year old machines um they
started taking it over
the dryers they kept forever just
because
they’re well built they’re tanks
the only thing is like they got so hot
that there was almost multiple fires
there was no kind of temperature control
on them whatsoever so
we finally got them replaced for them uh
but yeah they just been slowly adding
new equipment slowly you know
if they finally got rid of the older
wasco mats i introduced them to speed
queen
you know you know you had the old timer
systems
you know because you know they’re old
tommy yeah um
they like the old equipment and i’m like
hey you ever heard of a computer
here you go so they love it
i’m i’m the one that has to go up there
and program everything for him and
set it all up and well that’s right
what’s this oh it’s my fault yeah
it’s so you know it’s so much easier oh
my gosh yeah yeah yeah
okay time out because this story just
keeps getting crazier and crazier are
you trying to tell me that they
moved the laundromat at some point or
like no no
they took over they didn’t move it the
previous owner had just moved it
probably
maybe a year ago or a year prior to
combine it
and then um something happened with him
and he decided he wanted to sell it so
it’s like i said it’s you know 13 year
old infrastructure 14 year old
infrastructure but
still same old 40 machines when they
took it over
holy cow okay so the previous owner
i mean it’s not easy and it’s not cheap
to move a laundromat but not only did
they
move it but they moved this super old
equipment and just threw it in
a new location yeah i couldn’t tell you
why
i mean i knew the guy personally but i
could not tell you why
and now at the old place there’s a
there’s a drugstore so
i’m not entirely sure why they moved it
and
it’s maybe got a thousand more square
feet a little bit better place
but overall i don’t know if it had been
worth his money
but you never know he was also the mayor
of the town so
that helps with you know little things
utility stuff
but especially a small town of like
three thousand people yeah
yeah yeah yeah well maybe he had a lease
issue too i don’t know yeah
it might be maybe it was closer to his
house he just wanted to roll out of bed
and well he got about a half he got
about a half mile closer
yeah all right well okay so
let me just recap where we’re at so far
your uncle tells your parents about a
laundromat for sale
they decide we’re gonna abandon jacob in
his senior year of high school
and go take over this zombie laundromat
with old equipment
we’re gonna uproot ourselves you finish
your senior year of high school
on your own basically living living on
your own
then what happened uh the day after high
school
like literally the morning after i
graduated i packed up the u-haul and we
left i’ve been in tennessee ever since
um and then from there we just you know
i worked i helped them with the
laundromat um
really didn’t do much with the laundry
mount they did they had a small
wash dry fold i’d help them on sunday
mornings
uh with that um and that’s
that’s one of the things that really
said i’ve net i’ve never touched a
laundry mat
i had this one customer that i’d always
sit in the office and he’d roll around
and he would lay on his horn
until i came out to get his clothes
and uh or deliver us close to him
whichever one
and that was one of the boxes that was
ticked that’s i said i’ve never
uh i never owned wonderback but you
see where i’m at now yeah well i mean
again
let’s just be blunt about it it was your
fault for saying you’d never own a
laundromat i mean you never say
i’ll never do something because that’s
what you’re gonna end up doing so
again your fault for doing that okay so
you uproot the day after high school
and you’re you’re you’re living in
tennessee now
and kind of helping the family a little
bit but
but not wanting a whole lot to do with
the business exactly right okay
so what did you do if you weren’t if you
were at the laundromat full-time did you
get a job did you go to school what did
you do well i got a job
you know because that’s what any any
high or any teenager does but uh
i’ve always been an entrepreneur it goes
back to when i was a little kid still
i was making money in grade school got
in trouble for by the principal but
that’s enough about school
but uh we uh me and my dad i’ve always
helped him build houses
and stuff uh any project they were doing
i was right in there with them so uh
i ended up uh going i we purchased a lot
and me and my dad went in on halfs on a
bid
on a general contracting business um i
purchased a lot i got my contractor’s
license uh
from there we built spec homes we uh
we’ve been up
built about three before our market kind
of
ceased off and uh my last house sat on
the market for two years before
me and my wife uh moved into it
and then it kind of things kind of just
fizzled out i mean i gained a rental
from uh
rental property that we or the the home
we were living in and we moved to it we
gained a rental property
and from there i just got a different
job in the uh
in the trucking industry and just kind
of put on cruise control for a little
bit you know
figuring life out yeah man
crazy okay i mean that that’s pretty
cool i love that you had
sort of this entrepreneurship inside of
you and that you just kind of
went for it and now you know any any
entrepreneur journeys got those ups and
downs and all arounds and
never ever have i heard of a straight
line
entrepreneurship journey so it sounds
like this is no
exception uh okay so
did you do that for how long how long
were you doing that
uh that lasted about three years uh what
we didn’t what we would do was we’d buy
the property
it takes about six months to build the
house take us anywhere from just a month
to three months to sell the house
and then repeat the process um
like i said it went great until our
third house and it fizzled out and
it was one of those areas it was in it
just um the area was great
and then for some reason it went south
and so um but fortunately i’m now out
under that house
uh when me and my wife built our current
one we live in
um that one sold within 24 hours
of listing it so that was a godsend
yeah should ask for more money oh yeah
yeah my realtors you know she was
adamant about waiting but i accepted the
first offer i got because
just kidding yeah two years was enough
for me hey man i
feel you on that one so no i’m i’m with
you
okay so after that what did you end up
doing
did you get a job at that point or oh
yeah i had uh
i’ve gotten into the trucking industry
but in the meantime i still did stuff on
the side
a lot of times i would buy cars and i’d
flip them
i think by the time i was 23 i owned
33 or 35 cars whoa i had
i had bought and flipped and then i got
into jet skis
i started buying them parting them out
um
very lucrative market right there
you wouldn’t imagine what people pay for
a
23 year old part i mean it’s it’s
astronomical but
uh it seems like everybody called on to
that trend and
craigslist kind of fizzled out you had
all this facebook marketplace stuff and
they still ain’t got their stuff all
together yet
right so i i kind of went out of that i
continued
with my job i wasn’t at that point i
didn’t know if i wanted to make a career
out of my job
or if i wanted to work for myself
um still i’m still at that job today
uh it’s it’s a great job uh what’s the
trick on what
the trucking company okay i’m able to
work a week on week off so
it works out great um but uh
like i said uh three years ago we
decided to get in laundromat and
that’s what we’ve been doing ever since
yeah
awesome all right so let’s talk about
that
laundromat how okay i mean
what what convinced you like
after your experience with laundromats
that you actually were gonna go buy a
laundromat despite
the quote that i wrote down that said
and i quote
i’ll never own a laundromat so what
convinced you
to buy one i i skipped a part it
involves my parents again
well okay like i said you know i flipped
jet skis i flipped cars
so that meant i’m all the time on
craigslist facebook
offer up everything else looking for
deals
i ran across the laundromat not 20 miles
from their house
that they wanted ten thousand dollars
for so i was like i sent that to them
they went and looked at it they bought
that one
so i’ve helped with that one um
same thing with this one down here i was
on i was in the market
in the marketplace looking around found
a laundromat
just you know again 20 miles from them
or from us and um this time around
i thought about buying it or i i thought
i sent it to them you know
say y’all buy this it’d be a great
investment for you
they toyed around the idea they didn’t
you know really want to take on a third
laundromat um so we ended up partnering
with somebody
uh we got an investor to come in i don’t
know if you’ve seen my
free laundromat video because the free
laundry mat is going wild rampant
and this one truly um me and my wife
completely own it holy um we’re just
basically
paying back our our debtor there uh but
they fronted every bit of the cash uh
did not need a dime out of our pocket
and we uh we acquired us a laundromat
that’s awesome did you yeah uh i mean
i’m gonna link to that particular video
also because i know that people will go
watch
that one because you know with my
coaching calls and stuff one of the
biggest questions i get
and on my youtube channel one of the
biggest questions i get is
you know about the free laundromat so um
there needs to be a little asterisk
there it’s never free
yeah that’s right it’s going to cost you
somewhere whether it’s work ethic or
you know later on down the road some
money it’s it’s not really that free
yeah well i yeah and i think you know go
check out
this video because i think it will be
informative if you’re if you’re someone
who’s looking for
a free laundromat but let’s talk about
this investor that you brought in i
think that’s like the uh
you know everybody’s looking for that
fabled investor that’s going to come
front the money for
a laundromat so was that somebody that
you knew already
like a family friend or somebody in the
family or something or
somebody somebody we’ve known for a
while
it was really i guess they was looking
for something to invest in and
it was just two people met at a at a
great time
i know it’s one of those those very
sought after things that you never heard
and hear of but grace of god it you know
we got us a 100 percent investor and
i mean they like i said they’ve fronted
all the money they
they know the good they knew the game
plan they knew what we had planned and
um it was really they knew we were going
to be able to make money
from the way it had been running so
that’s what helped us out a lot
yeah so can i ask you how did
how did you guys make that connection
that hey i have money
and hey i have this laundromat deal and
and some experience in this industry
let’s
put our resources together and and make
this deal happen how did that
connection happen uh
honestly it’s just one of those things
you know that i mentioned the idea
and um yeah i guess
they just trusted me enough and we we
were able to sit down and
show them our plan everything like that
and just basically asking
you know we asked and they said let’s do
it
yeah ever oh good sorry this never hurts
to ask
never a stupid question yeah and i think
i think
what you just said is the key
is you need to let people know
what you’re looking for and what you
know what what you have planned and what
you’re looking for what you need to make
it happen because i think
you know a lot of times we get caught up
with like ah man it feels weird
asking for money and it does feel weird
asking for money
but that’s not really what you did what
you did was you said hey i have this
opportunity
it’s an opportunity for me and it’s an
opportunity for someone else
who has money to make put their money to
work for them
right right and that’s what you
basically
did right is present an opportunity for
them
and for the people who who ask me all
the time like how do i find somebody who
wants to
you know invest in in me and
and you know in in my laundromat deal
well
kind of the key to it is for one have a
plan
going into it and for two you gotta let
people know that’s what you’re doing
right exactly yeah i’m sure you’ve seen
this through your youtube channel i know
i’ve seen it through my youtube channel
through my podcast but just kind of
putting myself
out there that’s when you start to find
you know opportunities because people
know what you’re doing and want to be a
part of it
right so yeah pretty cool that’s that’s
that’s the the one thing
is you know if you’re going to do
something make sure you have your plan
put together
um just like this house we just built we
built it two years ago
when i walked in the bank just to talk
to them i already had
you know my house plans drone out
i had my material list how much it was
going to cost me
how much you know um i
overflow i might have um and when we sat
down to the bank
the both the bankers were just amazed
and
that right there started a great
relationship with him and now he’s the
vice president
of the bank so you know last time i was
in there he uh
he sought me out in the crowd and come
out and chit-chatted so
i might have me a potential you know a
little bit of money right there if i
ever need it
yep uh you always you know have a good
relationship with your
banks that’s gonna that’s really gonna
help you out
yeah absolutely and and that’s the same
that means the same concept
right like you have you you put yourself
out there
and you built a relationship with this
bank
and and there’s the opportunity again
and who knows
where that’s going to lead down the line
because that seems like a pretty good
person to
have a good role exactly networking is
where it’s at yep
yep and it’s mutually beneficial right
that bank
you know benefits from you when in your
wisdom your experience in running
businesses
you know then they’re going to benefit
from it because when they lend you money
they’re going to make money too
so exactly that’s awesome as long as
everybody makes money
you you you’ll be uh in a good good
place yeah everybody’s happy
right okay so how did you
this particular laundromat okay i mean
jeez man you’re just throwing all this
stuff at me okay
so you’re finding like laundromats for
sale in like the facebook marketplace is
that what you said
oh yeah yeah i still to this day every
day on facebook
craigslist everything looking at
laundromats um
and going and driving for laundromats uh
yeah i don’t know if you’ve ever heard
for driving for dollars for real estate
you can apply that same thing to
laundromats
[Music]
yeah absolutely and i tell people that
all the time like hey drive around and
look at
look at laundromats and look at laundry
mats that are run down go talk to those
owners go let them know what you’re
looking for because that’s where the
opportunities come
yeah you don’t know you don’t know why
somebody’s going to get out i mean
i know there’s somebody made a a
10-point list
i think it might have been dave men’s
don’t quote me on that
um but you know these people
they got in over their head they had the
opportunity to snatch it up for dirt
cheap
uh they weren’t checking out it was
running an unattended still ran
unattended
um but they weren’t checking on it for
weeks at a time
like literally there was a gap a weak
gap
that they did not go and clean this
place take money out or anything like
that
oh yeah oh yes yeah
i do not want to go into a laundromat
that hasn’t been cleaned in a week i’ll
tell you that right now
you talk about getting over a reputation
yeah we
fought two tooth and toenail on that one
yeah no kidding man sometimes i’m
nervous to go into my laundry mat when
it hasn’t been cleaned in
eight hours a week jeez man
yeah i just did that today yeah i
cleaned it at like 4 30 this morning i
had to stop by
and uh get something and of course
there’s customers there you’re not gonna
walk into your laundromat and
not try to do something to make it look
a little bit better so
yeah jeez crazy okay
so you’re i mean dude i love this you’re
on
facebook marketplace you’re on
craigslist you’re driving driving for
i was trying to think of a clever saying
but i guess you’re just driving for
laundromats there
you could say driving for coins driving
for quarters i love it
there you go so i’m talking about good
we worked that one out nice that’s a
thing now driving for quarters
driving for quarters yeah we’ll make it
famous like bigger pockets me driving
for dollars
exactly yeah yeah okay so i mean
i love this i love what you’re doing you
know i again
my coaching calls and stuff i talk to
people all the time who want to get in
the business
and i think that a lot of people have
this
like assumption that you know deals
should just fall in their lap once they
kind of know they want a laundromat it
should just kind of show up
and and be a good deal and yeah it
should be easy
and it’s not easy um or at least you
shouldn’t
anticipate it being easy if it is
awesome bonus
cherry on top there but it’s not easy
and to find the really good deals
this is the kind of stuff you need to be
doing you’d be talking to owners you
need to be searching on
facebook and craigslist and i didn’t
even know facebook
had laundromats for sale on it so kudos
to you yeah
it’s it’s very hard to find laundromats
if you’re searching for laundromats on
uh
on facebook um especially in a
marketplace where my like
mine you know all our laundry mats are
spread out i have to search you know
it’s not a very good algorithm so you
kind of have to you have to spell it
wrong
you have to spell it weird right um you
have to do just
everything and then uh you have to take
out all that little
stuff that’ll ship to you because it’s
going to show you all all kinds of stuff
for
your home your home washer and dryer
that you don’t want to see but
right you know every now and then you’ll
find a gym but most time it’s
craigslist or or a lot of time it’s off
market
yeah yeah all right cool what i mean
awesome awesome tips on how to find a
laundromat for sale
uh man killer i’m just gonna
record this or like take this little
clip and just send it to people when
they ask me
just just watch this this is how you go
find one all right cool so
you found this laundromat and uh
what what was it about this particular
one that that made you think okay
let’s do it uh location
you know like i said i’d already been
involved in my parents
so i already knew what to kind of look
for
but really had no idea how to run the
business so um
just location uh and the town that’s
growing the town it’s in it it’s just
rampantly growing uh the manufacturing
jobs are just i mean
booming uh it it’s it’s pretty much
boomed throughout the pandemic
uh like i said i work at the truck
industry i work at one of the largest
facilities for the the second largest
ltl carrier so i mean
we said we see eight eight million
pounds of freight
a day come through there and a good
million of it comes from my area so
okay so what what was it about the
location that
was attractive for you or like what
should other people be looking
for in a good location for me i like
shopping centers
um i think the only reason i’d ever like
a standalone
is if it ever flooded i could just say
screw it
and you know i didn’t have to rush down
there but
in my old current laundromat and when it
floods i’ve got neighbors
instantly calling you know saying hey
our carpet’s wet
which i went around trying to you know
fix that i wish they
when they had built the laundry mat they
had done that but i think i’ve got the
property
problem remedy that if i couldn’t get
down there quick enough that it might
flow out the front door
they never put drains in the floor or
anything like that
they had some sump pumps rigged up but
it’s not going to do anything um but
that
i’ve always looked for shopping centers
um
but never really i don’t personally i
wouldn’t ever go for a standalone
uh because your custom
customers are there to do their laundry
they’re not there to have fun
um they’re already there doing a task
they don’t most like most likely don’t
like so i mean if you’ve got a dollar
general next door
walmart anything like that they can you
know put their clothes in they can go do
some shopping
you know that’s going to get you some
volume in your store yeah and you’re not
you’re not having to be the sole reason
people are coming to
you know that i have one in a shopping
center and one standalone
the standalone one works because it’s in
like the community
um but you know we have to generate that
traffic there’s nobody
no other stores you know generating
traffic
for us we got to generate it all
ourselves so for sure yeah
and something that’s worked out for this
location that i never you know dreamed
of
uh there’s a pet clinic next door that’s
an emergency pet clinic
so they’re only open on nights and
weekends um
so and now since covet is hit they don’t
let anyone in
they have been having people park in
front of their business and in front of
my laundromat
doesn’t affect my parking because they
have separate parking that just you know
makes things easier for them
but it’s pretty much having a non-paid
security guard in front of my laundromat
you know somebody sitting out in their
car just letting it idle uh
only the crackheads that broke in a
couple of uh
weeks ago was gonna try something like
that
right yeah i am surprised sometimes that
how bold some of these guys are
oh yeah yeah yeah you’re talking this
these did it at 10 30 in the morning
yeah in front of a ups man yeah yeah so
i’ve definitely had people trying to
bust into coin boxes and stuff with
customers there and people just kind of
like
stare at them like hmm that’s my
favorite thing er
our vending machine it was one of the
ones that got broke into we had a
gentleman come in open it up take the
soap out he needed
and then leave the money inside of it
and shut it back never once called me
and my number’s like postured right
there so
that’s crazy that’s crazy okay so
that’s what makes a good location that’s
uh yeah
okay so you i mean you mentioned that
you
feel like you don’t really know or you
didn’t really know
how to run a laundromat um so so what’d
you do when you
you got the keys for the first time what
was that like and and would you
would you start with i just ran through
and started cleaning
cleaning and decluttering um something
you’ll notice when you buy if you ever
get to purchase the laundry mat or if
you have a laundromat
it starts getting cluttered with stuff
over time i’m gonna have to de-junk mine
pretty soon
uh but uh we just started de-junking
um we started these little homemade
signs
they had we got rid of those you know
try making things more professional
looking
uh just really things if you went in a
laundromat you’d want to see
we tried to do um absolutely hated the
floors but there wasn’t nothing we could
do about that for now or at that point
in time
um just we just started cleaning up
making things look nicer
the main thing was keep it clean because
it had such a terrible respirator
reputation um and now i clean it not
just so i’m not in anyone its way
because our volume has picked up
and it has a bowling alley store so i
can easily get in someone’s way
but then we’d go you know try to clean
it during the day that way we could talk
to our customers you know let them know
that we were the new owners
it was under new management you know
things were going to be different and
just you know slowly showed our
uh slowly showed our customers that
we cared about the business we were
going to do something about the business
and that’s that’s how you keep your
customers happy
uh just keep improving your business
yeah did you do anything to get new
customers in did you do any marketing
efforts or did you do any promotions or
anything like that or just
yeah word of mouth um mostly word of
mouth but we also did several facebook
facebook ads like i said i was new in
the business so
you know i didn’t think anything about
direct marketing anything like that
a lot of people knew it was there and a
lot of people knew it was
it was a dirty place so um
just once we started painting paint goes
a long
way these people had painted it when
they took it over
but they painted the most terrible color
it was already a terrible color but they
painted even more terrible color
so we went with white walls or blue you
know accents
just white always screams clean that’s
why hospitals paint their walls white
it’s easy to touch up um you don’t have
to get the exact brand and stuff so
but we started painting and just did it
from there
just started making little changes and
uh biggest thing is also
make sure all your machines are work
working
yeah yeah huge huge especially if you
have a store that
where they haven’t worked for a really
long time exactly
just keeping them working is is solid
but it you know it can also be easier
said than done
sometimes especially if you have older
machines they tend to break down a lot
are you the one working on machines i am
that’s uh
i if i’m can’t do something by myself
i’ll holler at my dad but most time it’s
it’s only me that’s uh that’s tackling
everything uh
from anything from bearing jobs to
getting up on the roof and cleaning out
the ducts with you know
uh i’ve also got another bad habit if i
don’t have the tool i’ll buy it
having the laundromat has uh has
afforded me that and
uh it’s also you know i deducted on
taxes sometimes
so uh yeah anything from
like i said baron and baron jobs to if i
needed to go in tomorrow and uh
rip up the floor uh i’d be all for it
yeah yeah yeah i watched your bearing
job video that’s like one of your more
popular videos actually i think
uh people are always looking to figure
out how to do that so how did you learn
how to
work on the equipment or just because
you’re you’ve just been watching things
i can fix some things and and we got
thrown like i said i got thrown into it
when i was a senior in high school
you know 16 dryers and only one working
that doesn’t make
good for a good combination and then
these are the old dryers that have the
chain mechanisms i mean
you know you’re talking real technical
stuff
uh but and really i’ve been blessed with
this ability that i can just look at
something and figure out how it works
uh so and that’s that’s carried me a
long way
oh yeah i’m sure i could definitely see
how you know having that propensity
would definitely benefit
someone who you know wants to get in
this business and fix their own machines
do you think
out of curiosity do you think someone
needs to know how to fix machines or
needs to at least be willing to learn
how to fix machines to get in this
business what can you do without doing
that
you can do it without it’s going to cost
you um
but if you can figure out how to do the
simple things it’ll save you a
maintenance call it’ll save you somebody
coming out to do it
it’ll save you quite a bit of money most
likely i’ve never had to have a
service person out but i could just
imagine what it costs
if you can figure out how to do your
belts
simple computer swaps and just
be able to learn how to troubleshoot and
program your machines
that goes a long ways i see some people
that they call the technician out to
program their machines and it’s i for me
that’s something simple to learn that
would save you quite a bit of money
yeah it’s definitely expensive having
people even just come out
to look at your stuff let alone do the
work so yeah
definitely definitely yeah all right
i’m sorry i was just going to say i’ve
got a water heater i’ve got to install
well
i don’t get to install it because the
city i’m in requires license plumber
i’m not a licensed plumber so
unfortunately i’m not going to get to do
that job but
i kind of ain’t upset because it’s like
a 600 pound
uh water heater that needs lifted over a
trough so
oh come on you just throw that thing on
your back and you’re good yeah yeah i’m
not too terribly upset
yeah yeah let him deal with it
that’s good and you can watch it and you
can you’ll you’ll learn how to do it
from watching them i’m sure that’s how i
learned a lot of my stuff yeah
if you do have technicians make sure you
watch them ask them questions pick their
brains so that’s
if you’re you’re already paying for it
you might as well get a little extra out
of it
yeah i agree and especially when it’s a
simple task like changing a belt
changing out a
pump you know uh any of those like
simple fixes swapping out a computer
board if you watch them how to
you know how to do it then a lot of
times you can you can pick it up and
it’s a quick quick fix you know it might
be worth it for you to do it
but some people prefer to just pay for
it to be done yeah some people prefer
the only thing we can’t get back is time
so that’s it yeah that’s it uh
all right cool well tell me how
how many hours are you spending at your
your laundromat now
uh honestly probably about 10 to 15 a
week
um i would say four to five of that
is just doing little projects um i do
like to go down there and project it
late at night and
you know try to improve on things uh i
just uh
just recently bought a new vending
machine so i’ve been going down there
and
trying to work on it because i’ve got to
cut some stuff and
you know make it work for me and i don’t
want to cut around customers so
yeah so obviously you bought one that
you needed to fix right
yeah yeah of course of course yeah
yeah that’s what makes your your youtube
channel
name perfect uh well
i want to talk about the youtube channel
in just a second but before we get to
that i wanted to ask
what do you have any goals for your
laundromat or do you want to get more
laundromats or
do you want to do some other things what
what what’s your
what’s the future looking like for you
thought much about that
um i’ve been actively looking for
laundry mats for the past
year um what i want what my plan is and
planning and doing two different things
uh
i planned on a totally different setup
for my my podcast today and all
every bit of that fell through three
hours of planning fell through but
um what we’d like to do is you know
get us some more laundromats uh really
build that out
um i’ve tried buying my parents laundry
mats they won’t sell them to me
uh but uh we want to build that out get
back into real estate once the market
calms down
uh right now it’s it’s too hot
um at least out at least in my neck of
the woods
house is going way uh way higher than
they should
but that just makes my house more
valuable so i’m not going to complain
about that but
i’ve been actively looking exactly uh
i’ve been uh i’ve been actively looking
almost every day uh
for laundromats um we probably about
three months ago we’re working on a deal
on a closed laundromat
bank owned it um somebody you know
the way we had it structured the way the
broker had it structured is
we were going to come in bought zero
percent out of our our pocket
they were going to give us an
interest-free loan for 10 years
it was just you know once a bank holds
on to something so long they’re ready to
get rid of it
and they just so happen to have a cash
buyer come in
and bought it cash for i think 50 some
thousand less than what we were going to
give them
well geez yeah and i
did this yesterday i was supposed to
meet with an owner of two laundromats
which i’ve been working on this guy for
i would say a year and a half now
uh just calling them i started in six
month intervals
um then i dropped it down to three month
intervals
uh because at first he kind of seemed
annoyed with me
and just don’t let that phase you just
keep on powering keep on powering
through it
perseverance um exactly uh but uh
then i dropped it down to um i think
monthly and now we’re on weekly uh he
said he’d been sick and couldn’t do it
but uh
uh the last time i called him before
this before yesterday he said
you know because i asked him i said have
you thought about anything are you ready
to sell he’s like you know
i’m not he said i actually i’ll tell you
what
i and he actually gave me a prize for
the building of one
and two laundromats so
i think he’s he’s getting motivated i i
just drive by sometimes and you can see
those little post-it notes on the
on the machines that say how to order
you you don’t even have to go in the
place and see how many machines are out
so yeah he’s he’s starting to get
frustrated with it and i think he’s
ready to retire so
hopefully uh hopefully that’ll that’ll
go through
time to time to up it to daily calls now
and work that price down
uh yeah that’s awesome all right so
you’re trying to get some more you want
to get some real estate too
and and kind of expand your portfolio
that’s awesome
uh all right well i mean i’m curious i
don’t know if anybody else is curious
but i’m curious tell me about this
youtube channel what made you
start it and yeah well let’s start there
what made you start it
um just i guess a year ago i guess
roughly a year ago rather yet
i started i was fixing everything uh
and i just started thinking you know
well maybe i could put a camera on me
while i’m doing this stuff
and some people might be interested in
seeing it and uh some of the things i
started doing was quarter collections
um i’ve seen brandon from investment joy
doing that
i calm down on the i think i calm down
on the the quarter
quarter collections uh it’s very hard to
keep a conversation going with yourself
while you collect quarters
but uh i just i wanted to be able to
show people you know some of those are
easy fixes
and some of the hard fixes uh which now
i wouldn’t call a baron java a hard fix
it’s just a little time consuming
but i just wanted to it’s never been
about hey i’d like to become a famous
youtube star
um because just like the just like this
the laundromat forums and stuff
there’s a uh there’s a a community there
on youtube i mean i’ve got people i’ve
got people that off youtube
are from youtube that know my general
area
and they see a laundromat deal and
they’ll email me so
that’s awesome i mean yeah yeah that’s
awesome and i bet
i bet there’s just going to be more and
more opportunities coming your way from
doing that because you’re i don’t know i
think you’re
providing uh not just well like i said
it’s infotainment
not it’s not just entertaining content
although it is entertaining content but
there’s also a lot of really good
information in there
i think people really appreciate people
who do that who are trying to help other
people out
and do it in a way that’s easy to watch
it’s entertaining so
i bet you’ll get a lot of opportunities
coming your way
have you enjoyed it oh yeah yeah it’s
no it’s it’s no cakewalk uh keeping up
and trying to get a video
out every week um there’s been a couple
weeks that i missed it you think it’d be
just turning the camera on and
and go but it’s not that easy um
i thought when i started i thought it’d
be super simple
just turn the camera on and fry you know
but uh i finally got got halfway decent
equipment so you know you can’t hear me
and can’t see me halfway decent
yeah no it’s it’s a lot more work than i
think
most people think if you’ve never like
may
even you know if you’ve never made a
video or i
even the podcast you know just it takes
so much
effort and so many hours and it’s just
an audio mostly like
it goes on youtube but i don’t do a
whole lot of video editing with it
that video editing can take a long time
so oh yeah for sure
and then you’re putting yourself out
there for people to i mean they judge
you they uh
they leave the main the mean comments
yeah you know
i think for four or five videos i did
videos with a missing tooth and i mean
it was one of my front teeth it was
obvious is all that all get out
[Music]
did you get comments about that one i
don’t know if i did or not i
think i did but every time my wife would
watch my videos she she’d make a comment
about my missing tooth
i’m gonna go back and comment on one of
your videos about your teeth
oh yeah that’s funny uh yeah cool all
right so yeah i mean you’ve been doing
the youtube stuff
and uh and kind of growing your
community over there again i’m gonna
link to
his youtube channel it’s called there i
fixed it um that way you can go check it
out because he’s got a lot of cool
laundromat related things and also
i will say if you’re looking for a
little bit of behind the scenes on what
it’s like to own
a laundromat you get some of that too
with his videos
which is pretty yeah that’s pretty cool
that’s one thing i wanted to show
is you know i didn’t want to hide the
parts that are
are just you know beyond you um there
was one day i come in and i had horse
hair
someone had come in and washed like four
loads of horse hair or horse blankets
and literally there was horse hair all
over the floors
like it changed the color of my floors
so
i mean there’s just you name it it’s
happened
i’ve seen it happen just you know
but i i love the laundry industry okay
it’s
one of those things you take with it but
i wanted to be able to show that real
side of things
yeah just well yeah i
which i think i mean i i love that and i
appreciate that because
again we kind of mentioned this already
but i think a lot of people get into
this thing think it’s going to be a
cakewalk and it’s
you know and relatively speaking it’s
not
crazy difficult but man stuff happens
and
the stuff that’s happened in my
laundromats i’m sure in your laundromat
i’m sure and everybody’s laundered about
who owns one
like some of that stuff you just can’t
make it up and
i’ve had people tell me multiple times
like man you got to make a show like a
tv show about this because it’s
like just the craziest stuff that
happens so yeah i don’t see how there’s
not a reality show yet
there’s i’m right now i’m dealing with
somebody that keeps coming in and
stealing my soap so
yeah that’s just it happens
it yeah i’ve i’ve been there man i feel
i feel your pain i feel your pain uh
well cool
so i want to get into uh a little bit
about your
business we have a little section called
down to
let’s get business to business over and
out
and that’s just where we talk about some
of the details of your business so
tell us again where is your laundromat
located
uh we’re about an hour from knoxville
northeast
knoxville tennessee cool and i got
i got tons of family back there in
knoxville and then back up in the hills
up there so
i’m familiar with that area a little bit
so
pretty cool um all right and you have
one laundry mat do you have any real
estate now like rental real estate or
have you gotten no uh i lit a bad tenant
or i let a tenant leave a bad taste in
my mouth and just decided you know
we were going to sell that particular
property uh regret it ever since
but fortunately it went to someone that
i i know very well and
they’re great people and they got it on
a great deal so
but uh we’ll eventually get back into
real estate
yeah i think that’s a pretty common
story with rental real estate you know
you get a bad tenant and
man just that frustration that you can
feel
and that it causes in you
man it can it can really put a sour
taste in your mouth uh
but yeah you know at some point you got
to get back on the horse right if you
want to
you want to after building well after
going laundromats for three years
uh i mean it’s yeah you’re basically
renting out your washers and dryers so
it ends up being the same thing you know
i think i’ve built my tolerance up a
little bit better yeah you know what
and that’s actually a really good and
really interesting point just to keep it
on like a serious note actually is
i mean one of the one of the big things
that i’ve taken away from owning
laundromats is i have a much
higher tolerance for things like from
everything from early on
you know i had never missed like a
a bill payment before and early on when
i was bleeding money left and right
sometimes i’d have like a water bill
come through and i was like i don’t
there’s like no money to pay it so i’m
just like i can’t
i’m gonna have to pay it when i can and
you know it was i was like
freaking out that i was like missing a
water bill
you know i was gonna be like five days
late or whatever
and now i’m like well you know they can
they’ll be fine you know
like i’ll pay them when i compare them
and they’ll be okay you know yeah that’s
i i hate i hate being late i like things
to be
on time no matter what um so i always
find a way somehow
my wife she does all the bills so she’s
a little bit more laid back than i am so
i stress a little bit over that but she
always
comes through yeah yeah i me too man i’m
always on auto pays
as often as i can for everything and
mostly that’s just because i’m lazy but
uh but even like things like i’ll have
you know somebody would like graffiti on
my folding table or something and i
would just be like so
stressed out about it now i’m like no
big deal i’ll go get some of that
graffiti remover it’ll come right off no
big deal like
my tolerance has grown tremendously
yeah now mine is when i walk in and see
something out like that i just pull out
the camera and say hey guys look at this
yeah you know you’re gonna enjoy this
one yeah
basically that’s kind of what i thought
the other day when i got broke into i
was like oh there’s me some content but
it’s actually excuse to
buy me a new vending machine yeah yeah
exactly
yeah you kind of want things to go south
now uh no just kidding
all right uh so we already talked about
this but you’ve been in the business
basically 13 years and you’ve owned your
own laundromat for three right
yeah all right well can you tell us
about give us ballpark maybe what does
it cost to
do loads of laundry where you’re at
right now um our biggest machine which
is a 60 pounder is
650 you step down to our 40 pounders i
think we’re doing
450 on those um i just
raised my horizons to three dollars and
i had i made an entire video about
that um i’m right i only have four of
them
and i’m not the biggest fan of them uh
never really have been but uh i just
they’re so easy to over soap and i’m not
there to tell people to
calm down on the soap so i thought you
know let’s make it worth my time
i’m going to raise the raise the price
by 75 cents
if they continue to use it you know at
least i’ll benefit from it
and honestly i think the usage went up
oh really
yeah yeah well that’s on top of my top
loaders at 225
um i like to when i raise my prices
i like to try to do something like my
vending process have been signed the
same forever
but when i got the new venom venom
machine you know it was an excuse for me
to raise my process
um so you know up next is i need to
touch up some paint
but i’m going to redo the bathroom i
absolutely hate that bathroom
um but i’m going to redo the bathroom
solid tile you know make it real nice
uh kind of the match the outside of
laundromat um
at least i think my laundry mat is nice
it’s kind of like an ugly kid
somebody out there loves it but uh
you know i think when i do that then
that’ll be an excuse to raise my
top loaders the only real reason that i
don’t want to raise any of the other
prices right now
is uh we’re still coin only
so we’re looking at some other options
to get in there that way you know
you’re not having to put seven dollars
eight dollars worth of quarters and a
machine
mm-hmm it’s a lot of quarters yeah oh
yeah
yeah what you took took that question
right out of my mouth
your coin only are you uh are you
attended
or i mean i’m assuming you’re unattended
and you’re
you’re doing the the cleaning and
everything right yeah
yeah we’re completely unattended and the
reason why we started unattended um
it was something me and my wife
discussed um
we always like we don’t like to be
bothered
when we go to the store we use
self-checkout
we do you know everything ourselves that
we can
yeah i wouldn’t even say that we’re
introverts
we just you know and i kind of thought
that the same way you know i didn’t want
someone in there
to bug i didn’t want to be there she
didn’t want to be there bugging our
attendants and i wouldn’t say that
or not bugging our attendants but
bugging our customers and i wouldn’t say
that attendance bug customers
but you know most the machines are
self-explanatory
and that’s the that’s mostly the
customers i want is you know customers
that know
how to come in you know read the
instructions on the machine
use the machine and you know
yeah and not put soap in every available
compartment of those horizons and clog
everything up yeah
yeah my favorite is they put soap in a
machine that they’re
uh they never even put any clothes in
and then just
go on about the business yeah yeah i
also love when they put the tide pods
in those little pullout drawers and
you’re like or
anything but i always get them in the
top of my soap boxes i hate toppings
yeah right i know
i i had thought about putting them in
the vending machines and i just thought
that’s a terrible idea yeah i know
exactly what i’m gonna have to deal with
exactly yeah i know yeah and even those
horizons sometimes they get
like the the plastic like the stuff gets
stuck in the
door seal thing yeah gooey and you gotta
like scoop it out it’s gross
well i had one where um see anytime i
have like a water leak or anything i’ll
go back and look on my cameras because
i’m able to see the entire laundry mat
and see kind of what
caused the problem uh i had a mess in
front of my horizons like it went all
the way across the store
and i looked back on it and they had
started to load and there was a
waterfall coming out of the soap tray
and i guess they had put that todd pot
in there just in the moat
the perfect spot to where it wouldn’t
let any water drain into that machine
yeah so oh man the stories the stories
we could probably go on forever yeah
well how many how many hours do you say
you
spend at your laundry matter working on
your laundromat
roughly 10 to 15. it just depends on
what’s going on and
what i have to do yeah yeah that’s not
too bad
i mean i’m good i’ve tried to buy stuff
to you know make my job easier
um you know like mopping uh
you’re already pushing around a dirty
mop so
i ended up buying me a forest rubber and
that was probably one of the best
decisions i’d made
i can clean the entire laundromat within
about five to eight minutes
with one gallon yeah with one gallon of
water
and just maybe a cup of a cup of soap so
that really saved me time what did that
cost you
uh it cost me by the time it was all
said and done i bought it for 200
used and broke of course naturally um
it was used and broke it had a broke
wheel broke off and then i fixed it
and i had to buy two marine batteries
which was like 150 bucks so
about 400 all together okay that’s not
bad man to
especially to get get the whole store
you know mopped up cleaned up in less
than 10 minutes man that’s awesome
yeah yeah it’s that’s it saves time so
that’s that’s the thing that was most
important yeah that’s huge
i’m gonna have to look into that it’s a
good tip what are your floors
what what kind of floors do you have uh
they’re uh
flaked epoxy okay yeah they had uh we
had originally had tile in there
um and i don’t know they
had carpet glue down before they never
took the carpet glue up
they grouted over it and put tile down
um and literally i had a
i used to have maytag neptunes in there
i had one spinning out
and i had two tiles just pop up into a t
or into an angle um and then from there
we just decided to redo it and it
honestly took us
no more than an hour maybe an hour and a
half
to rip the entire laundry mat up of all
the tile
that was supposedly you know grouted
down yeah
oh yeah it was terrible and where there
had been so many floods there was
mildew under it it was the reason why it
smelled so bad in there but
we did the epoxy and which we did it
ourselves of course
um but that’s probably one of the best
decisions we’ve done
my wife hates it but she don’t clean it
all the time
yeah does she help out at all or is it
just you doing stuff
she was helping out um and then she got
you know we got pregnant
uh and then cove would have or you know
well code would happen she got pregnant
so
i forced her to stay home that way you
know she wasn’t
she wasn’t exposed but she ended up
getting it anyway somehow
oh geez she okay yeah yeah yeah we’re
both we both went through it and had it
already and
moved on with our lives so oh yeah you
have a video about that so yeah
yeah yeah i had to that’s right i had to
call a friend of mine and i said uh hey
i’ve got covered you uh come get the
keys and
take care of the laundry mat for me and
sure enough you know he come through
uh and that that’s another thing uh and
it pays to have somebody that’s already
familiar with your business
uh he was uh he had already took care of
us before when we went on vacation so
it was a great resource because i had
my wife had it my parents had it and
everyone around us
that we knew had it so it was one of
those things
yeah well it’s a good thing you had you
had that friend uh serious question
do you think your wife got pregnant just
to get out of cleaning the laundromat
i think so yeah i would i would think so
yeah
she likes those midnight you know or 3
a.m phone calls you know hey i lost 25
cents
yeah yeah will you come down here and
give me right anyway well who doesn’t
like those yeah
exactly i look forward to those every
night the nights i don’t get those
i’m disappointed you think something’s
wrong yeah right
uh that’s funny all right we have a
section
called secret sauce listen up it’s the
secret sauce
secret sauce is just hey do you have any
tips something maybe that’s working for
your business that other laundromat
owners can implement into their
businesses to help them
find greater success the number one
easiest and free completely free thing
to do
is keep it clean no matter you know
that’s if you’ve got top load motors
they get
nasty little spots in them keep them
clean keep your shop trays clean
just keep the overall laundry mat super
clean
and even if you have old equipment
people’s going to want to go to the
place that’s clean
and another one is use all this
technology out there to your advantage
um just recently i purchased two cameras
that have two-way communication they
have 355 degree
field of motion 110 up to up and down so
you know use all that technology out
there that’s available to you
and you can you can take a you can take
an older machine and make it into a new
one
that was something we found out quick is
uh
we were getting those phone calls hey uh
you know
this cycle has been going through for
like an hour now and there’s no water
filling up and of course it’s that raw
underwire brawl um so i went through
yeah exactly
i went through and put uh put relays on
them that way
or installed relays in them that way i
could just click it off from my house
and you know they could just switch
their clothes over we can send them a
refund out
we sent them a refund out for their you
know wash and their original wash
that way we you know that customer feels
like we
took care of them so do you have a video
on putting those relays in
i feel like people would watch that
video i don’t know
i’ve still got one machine
[Music]
i’ve still got one machine to do i was
doing it in the middle of the day
and i didn’t turn the electric off
always turn your power off
i didn’t turn the electric off and i
sent 220 all the way through a circuit
board and fried the board
yikes and so yeah i i’ve not got around
to finishing that but
that’s a good idea for a video i might
finish that one up because
i was saying that the other day you know
hey i really need to fix that machine
because that’s going to be the machine
that messes up
yep yeah so if for nothing else you got
to subscribe
to his youtube channel so you can learn
how to put relays in
in on your machine so you can shut them
off for customers windows pesky bra
underwires the bane of my existence in
the automats
uh you know it’s going to happen it’s
going to happen
and it’s probably going to happen often
i don’t know
yeah yeah i had i had two of them doing
the same night so
oh gosh it’s gonna happen yeah
definitely
uh awesome awesome secret sauce uh next
section is called pro tips
pro tips pro tips is for the people who
are trying to buy their first laundromat
what tips do you have for them
uh stop thinking about it and just do it
and then another one is
don’t convince yourself that a bad deal
is a good deal
because in the end a bad deal is still a
bad deal
you’re gonna you’re gonna regret it and
it might not be something you uh
you come out floating on so
that is a huge huge pro tip right there
and i see this
all the time where people get stuck on a
deal
and you know i’ll i’ll watch people
find a deal they they for whatever
reason have fallen in love with it
they’ve convinced themselves it’s got a
lot of potential or somebody has
convinced them it’s got a lot of
potential
they’ll ask around people who are in the
industry people who’ve been there who’ve
done that
and when they get advice that hey maybe
this is one to pass on
or you know maybe you need to structure
this deal a different way because it’s
not what you think it is
and they explain it away in their own
minds and go through with it anyways
it’s a recipe for pain
i’ll i’ll tell you that from experience
my first line oh yeah
the recipe for pain yeah i argue with
myself a lot when i convince myself i
want to buy something or
that’s going to be right for me and i
finally you know
i always talk it over with my wife and
she’s usually my
my weight that keeps me down so uh it
keeps me level-headed
so if it’s a bad deal usually she can
pinpoint that for me
yeah it’s nice to have that kind of
one-two teamwork
there yeah two perspectives don’t don’t
let yourself just make the decision at
least get someone else involved
to look at it because sometimes the
heart heart wants
what it wants but it ain’t right man
that was that was deep right there
that was real deep and let’s just let
that sink in for a second
there you go yeah that’s one of them
quotes you put on a shirt that’s right
that’s what i’m talking about
uh all right uh hey do you have any
resources you would recommend
for you know anyone in the industry or
getting in to help them improve their
business or to improve personally
uh get on the facebook forums
they’re really good they’re they’re full
of chock full of information uh
someone’s almost but by now already
asked a question that you’ve
you’re going to ask um just recently
with the
the whole people breaking into our
vending machines
this dude that’s probably well he’s in
knoxville uh
he joined one of the facebook’s groups
started sharing about it and i was like
okay that’s the same people that you
know
robbed us and we were able to get
together they’ve already found out this
woman’s name
whole nine yards so i mean yeah
definitely on the forums
uh you’ve really got a good thing going
with laundromat resource the podcast
forms
um just the forms forms is free
information pretty much
because there’s a lot of there’s a lot
of people with uh
really really talented people uh
really high up in the uh industry well
you know
you’re talking multiple store owners
luke’s on there
he’s got 37 what is it 38 stores now
38 i don’t know just and
you ask these you ask these people
questions and i mean you’re getting
hundreds of responses sometimes so yeah
yeah and and not only that but you know
the answer is some of these questions
they’re they’re worth like tangible
dollars right like these people
have learned how to make these
businesses legit
and so man tap into
tap into their experience and their
wisdom uh and benefit from it
and let your customers benefit from it
too you know exactly
yeah yeah if you’ve got a problem i mean
most time you post it up there
you can either especially like if it’s a
physical problem somebody’s bound to
send you a video of
how to fix it so yeah a lot of awesome
people helping out there very cool
awesome recommended resources i have a
just one other question uh that’s
unrelated to pretty much anything else
do you have a favorite one of your own
youtube videos like if if somebody was
like hey i want to watch i have time to
watch
one of your videos which is the one you
think they should watch
oh that’s a tough one uh one my memory
is terrible
that’s that’s why i have to whenever i
edit my videos together i have to watch
the whole thing
i have to watch every clip um
but let’s see here i really did enjoy
the my vending one last time
just recently um but
yeah i’d probably go with my vending one
or uh
the one about me having covered i
thought it did pretty well
awesome i’m gonna link to both of those
so if anybody only has time to watch one
video for the rest of your life i don’t
know maybe on your deathbed
watch one of these two i’ll link it
below the vending machine one and the
quarantine one
uh and jacob this has been awesome
uh not just to hear your story and to
hear all your wisdom
but in some ways i kind of feel like i’m
chatting with the star here
and i appreciate you taking the time and
coming on
and and sharing your uh sharing your
story and wisdom here but also for doing
that for
for everyone on your youtube channel so
thanks man really appreciate it oh yeah
i appreciate you having me on here yeah
and we’ll chat again
yeah we’ll chat again soon and maybe we
should uh do some kind of collab on
youtube one of these days and
and uh and make it fun for everybody
exactly yeah let’s do it
all right sounds good man all right
we’ll talk to you soon oh man that was
such a cool
episode i loved talking with jacob i
love what he’s doing not just with his
laundromat but also with his youtube
channel
somebody who’s on youtube myself i just
i love to see other people doing it and
he’s doing a little bit different than
me and he’s got more of that
you know that infotainment than i have
and i love that
i love getting the sneak peek inside his
laundromat
so cool definitely uh subscribe to him
if you haven’t yet link again is down in
the description or in the in the podcast
description
or on the show notes at
laundryresource.com show
38 so make sure you do that every week i
want all of us myself included to take
away
one thing that we are going to implement
this week because when we start stacking
those things on each other
we get better and better so my one
takeaway i want you to choose one for
you steal mine
take your own whatever it is put it into
action
my one takeaway i loved what he said
in the pro tip he said stop thinking
about it
and do it and i loved
that stop thinking about it and do it
and for me it’s not about buying my
first laundromat obviously but for me
i’m thinking about all the things i’m in
my life and
with laundromat resource and all this
stuff that i want to do
and i just you know it was an awesome
reminder for me stop thinking about it
so hard and just do it you know get your
plan in place
and then do it take the action take the
scary step
even though it’s super scary even though
you don’t really know
what the path is gonna be down the rest
of the way
you don’t know what’s around that first
bend uh just take the step
and do it and uh man again
i say it all the time action paves the
way to success so this week make sure
you take some action wherever you’re at
on your
journey you’re trying to buy your first
laundromat take some action
if you already own one laundromat take
some action if you own multiple
laundromats
take some action and we’ll see you again
next week all right
[Music]
1 Comment
Jim Morgan's Cleaners · January 27, 2021 at 6:33 pm
Thanks for the knowledgeable article. I appreciate your suggestions and tips which you have mention.Keep writing informative articles.