Dirty Clothes, A Goldmine For University Students

A small group of University of Arizona students work together after starting AZ Laundry. It provides laundry, folding, and dry cleaning services for the UA community. All partners in AZ Laundry wanted to start some kind of a business of their own but had no idea what they could start on campus. It was at the same time one of the partners pile of laundry was growing in his dorm room, and the rest is history.

For one reason or another many student do not like to use laundry facilities on campus, but they didn’t have a way get to a laundromat either. A spark of genius hit and AZ Laundry wondered how many more freshmen didn’t have a way to get to laundromats and realized there was no pick-up and delivery service for laundry on campus.

It took the next few months for the group to iron out particulars of how their business would run learning everything they could. Then the partners attended all of the new student orientations giving away T-shirts and pens. They also signed up 30 volunteers to promote their business during freshman move-in week in order to spread the word and take orders.

They initially had planed 30 students would respond, which would provide them a part-time job. Students are able to buy from various plans, from half-semester to whole semester, and an all year long plans or pay-per-wash - a pay as you use plan. The pay-per-wash plan allows student to see what the service is like before signing up for a bigger plan.

Two months after starting AZ Laundry bought a 14-foot truck, had more than 220 clients, averaging 1,000 pounds of laundry each day providing a 24-hour turnaround and hired 4 employees. Rapid growth for such a small business. The business also needed a place of it’s own so AZ Laundry signed an agreement with Sparkle Cleaners.

The key to their success has been keeping customer's happy – doing a job with the laundry, quick turn around, folding it nicely and not losing anything, or mixing up orders. To keep track of orders each client is given two bags to use, one for dry cleaning the other for laundry. Each bag has a bar code that is scanned and weighed. The weight is deducted from the clients plan. Each load is separated into lights and darks, washed individually, folded individually and put back into the clean bags which is now ready for delivery that night.

Not only does it take a chore off students minds, but AZ Laundry also has a number of disabled clients who can’t do laundry on their own.

A great example of where a need was seen and a service was provided. A model everyone can follow in starting their own business.

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