After a sharp drop caused by a pandemic in 2020, the cleaning business grew steadily again in 2021, showing that a smart businessperson could make a lot of money.
We all have different clothes in our closets that need special care, which is why cleaning is always a popular topic. It’s also usually easy to grow by opening new buds.
Obviously, starting a business is usually hard. It takes hard work and good information. You’ve come to the right place, as this step-by-step guide explains everything you need to know to start and run a successful cleaning business.
Step 1: Find Out if this is the Right Business for You?
Before you send off a business, you should make sure it fits you and your lifestyle. For example, cleaning companies offer steady pay increases, but there isn’t much room for creativity.
Let’s look at some pros and cons of starting your own cleaning business:
Positives Vs Negatives
| Low starting costs Easy to expand and handle Consistent and reliable earnings Making customers loyal is easy if they buy from you again. | There isn’t much creativity or thought, and the work might be boring. Responsible for clients’ expensive clothes Cleaning toxins could cause insurance rates to go up. |
Industry Trends
- Size and history of the industry: The US cleaners business is worth more than $6 billion, according to research company IBISWorld.
- IBISWorld thinks the business will grow modestly, by 1% in 2022.
- Number of organizations: There are more than 14,000 cleaning companies in the US.
- Number of workers: The company employs about 94,000 people.
Cost of Starting Dry Cleaning Business
If you start as a solopreneur, run your business from home, and use your own car for deliveries, you can start a cleaning service for only $8,000. On the other end of the spectrum, starting a full-administration store wall cleaning service could cost $50,000 or more. Starting a laundry business costs, on average, $30,500.
Investment Items:
- Cleaning device(s)
- Presses and socket setups
- Holders and clothing covers
- Labels and shelving
- Equipment and furniture
- Retail location (POS) progress
- Solvents and cleaners for substances
- The biggest expenses include buying cleaning products, a car for transportation, and advertising and publicizing.
Is Dry Cleaning Business Profitable?
The average annual salary for a cleaner in the US is about $250,000, but someone starting out on their own should probably aim for 33% of that total. With an annual income of $84,000 and an 80% increase in total income from working from home, you can expect a gain of around $67,000.
With a good location, a medium-sized cleaning shop can make an average of $250,000 a year. But if you have higher operating costs, especially rent, your advantage will drop to 60%. In any case, that leaves a good advantage of more than $150,000.
One benefit of owning a laundry business is that it can grow. When your main store is set up, you could hope to open branches in other good locations. In a couple of years, you could have five sites bringing in more than $500,000 total. Your pre-tax gain would be a cool quarter of a million dollars if you expected a 50 percent profit margin because your working costs went up.
Entry Barriers
- There aren’t many barriers to entry in the dry cleaning business.
- Because dry cleaning is a business that depends on people having extra money, it suffers when times are hard. Also, well-known dry cleaning companies like Martinizing.com have a lot of loyal customers, so it might be hard to create your own brand and get people to buy from you.
Step 2: Create a Strategy
Identify a Gap
Before you start your new cleaning business, you should do a thorough data study in your area to give it the best chance of succeeding.
Find all the competitors within a five-mile radius and compare their services, sticker prices, and online customer reviews. Which governments sell well in your area, and can anyone explain this? Think about how you could take advantage of your competitors’ weaknesses or beat them in areas where they are strong.
One trend you could use to your advantage is that customers are becoming more interested in “green” cleaners that use eco-friendly methods instead of harmful chemicals. The Eco Clothing Organization is a good example of a group that has made this a selling point.
Once you’ve done your research on competitors and customers, look for the best way to position your business in the local market.
Solutions
As the name suggests, a laundry’s main service is washing clothes without water. All things considered, liquids that don’t contain water are used to remove soil without hurting delicate textures. But you could also give useful services like changing, heating and pressing, and storage to make more money.
Pricing
Prices vary depending on materials and location, but a good rule of thumb is that a shirt costs $5 and a blanket costs $30. Pullovers, pants, skirts, sweaters, overcoats, and coats usually cost $10 each, while dresses and suits cost $20. On average, cleaning should cost about $10 per item.
If you know your costs, you can use this Bit by Bit overall income number cruncher to figure out your rise and final sticker costs. Remember that the prices you use at send-off should depend on what happens in the future if the market justifies it.
Target Market
Most of your customers for a cleaning business will be local people who always wear high-quality clothes to work and special events. Make time to learn about the area’s economy and the number of potential customers. You could also make money by working for local businesses like hotels, cafes, emergency hospitals, and cheap food stores.
Location
Picking the right location for your cleaning business is important if you want to attract customers and make sure it does well. Find a place with a lot of foot traffic and good visibility, like a busy shopping area or a well-known part of downtown.
Think about how accessible and comfortable the area is, making sure that it can be reached by public transportation and has enough places to stop.
By choosing the right area, you can set up a successful cleaning business that takes care of a lot of clients and stays in the tough cleaning industry.
You can find commercial space to rent in your area on websites like Craigslist, Crexi, and Moment Workplaces.
Step 3: Write a Business Plan
A plan is important for any business. This will help you guide your new business through the launch process and keep your eye on your main goals. A business plan also helps possible partners and investors understand your business and its goals better:
- Executive Summary: A brief review of the full business plan that should be produced when the plan is completed.
- Business Overview: An overview of the company’s vision, mission, ownership, and corporate goals.
- Product and Services: Describe your offers in depth.
- Market Analysis: Conduct a SWOT analysis and evaluate market trends such as variations in demand and development possibilities.
- Analyze your top rivals, analyzing their strengths and flaws, and compile a list of the benefits of your services.
- Sales and marketing: Examine your company’s unique selling propositions (USPs) and build sales, marketing, and promotional plans.
- Management Team: An overview of the management team, including their positions and professional backgrounds, as well as a corporate hierarchy.
- Operations Plan: Your company’s operational plan includes how it will get supplies, where it will put its office, what its most important assets and tools are, and other practical details.
- Financial Plan: A three-year plan for money, including start-up costs, a break-even analysis, predictions of profits and losses, cash flow, and a balance sheet.
- Appendix: Add any other papers related to money or business.
Step 4: Create a Marketing Plan
Some of your business will come from people who see you or find you online, but you should still spend money on marketing! Getting the word out is especially important for new businesses because it will bring in more customers and raise awareness of the brand.
When your website is up and running, connect it to your social media accounts. Social media is a great way to promote your business because you can make interesting posts and sell your products.
- Facebook is a great tool for paid ads that lets you target specific groups, like men under 50 in the Cleveland area.
- Instagram has the same perks as Facebook, but its audience is different.
- Website: Search engine optimization (SEO) will help your website show up near the top of relevant search results, which is important for making sales. Make sure the calls to action on your website are effective. Try changing the wording, color, size, and placement of calls to action like “Come visit us now.” This could greatly increase the number of customers.
- Google and Yelp: Listings on Yelp and Google My Business can be very important for companies that depend on local customers.
- Competitions and freebies: Get people interested by giving them perks for doing certain things, like cleaning their first item for free.
- Put up signs that draw people’s attention in your store and on your website.
- Pass out flyers in your area and at business meetings.
- In-person sales involve pushing your products or services at local markets or trade shows.
- Make a movie to promote your dry cleaning service. Use humor, and it might go viral!
- Ask for referrals. Give people an opportunity to tell others about your business.
- Paid social media ads: Choose sites that reach your goal group and run targeted ads.
- Share examples of how your service has helped past customers.
- Create diagrams and include them in your work.