Demographics?

[sbaker8688]

Hello,

Stupid newbie here, with stupid questions.

Want to open a mat. Live in a resort type town in Florida, on the beach. I am new to this site and have seen the word "demographics" used a lot. I am wondering what depth mat owners go through to do such a demographic study. I mean, I live here and I can tell you what kind of folks live here based on what I see, but who knows - maybe that isn't the kind of analysis I need.

I suppose my questions are 1) How do I go about doing a demographic study, and 2) What demographics am I looking for anyway?

As to number 2, I had assumed that I should look for apartment complexes, colleges, trailer parks, RV parks, low income (or bad) neighborhoods, etc. Well, this place has more trailers per square foot than any other place I've ever seen in my life, but driving around and investigating has shown me that most of these RV parks and trailer parks and what not already have their own laundromats on premises, or someone has already opened a business close by. Also, apartments already seem to have their own on-site laundromat.

Anyway, if someone could tell me what demographic I should look for, and how to determine if that demographic is here, and in what quantity it is here, yadda yadda, I'm all ears.

Thanks.
Sam

[SecretarytoBraveDave]

Hi Sam.

Not a stupid question at all. I believe in the visual inspection of an area as well as the in-depth analytical view. I suggest you contact the chamber of commerce to get a county/city wide view of the population and income information per capita.

Florida from what I have seen has some saturated areas for Laundromat businesses. So you first want to check out the local competition before you take too much time with an analytical research. Laundromat customers will be doing their laundry somewhere and if you want to add laundry facilities you need to know what the current businesses are doing for the patrons and what type of volume they serve and determine what if any new options are worthy of investment of time and money.

Kitty

[sbaker8688]

I think that's a darn good idea - to go and check out the different laundromats to see what kind of business they are doing. Thanks.

I found some demographic data for the area which I got from the last census. My question is - what do I look for? Can someone tell me something? Is it "Look for X% of the population with income under Y"? Or is it "Look for X% of the population who lives in a rental house/apt"? What should I look for?

Unfortunately, I doubt there is any data anywhere which tells me what the percentage is of people who own washer/dryers, no matter how much I am willing to pay for such information.

Thanks.

[mrcoinop]

try looking for an existing mat building new is risky find an old crappy place with good demographics and remodel almost no risk just dont break the bank.

[petefritz]

If you don't have 400k to drop on a new mat, and willing to loose it all, you should re think your idea. Demograpics mean nothing if there is no need. See if needs are being met, then decide. Try calling the permit dept. and ask about tap, sewer, and traffic impact fees. That should guide you also. You may have a killer location, I don't know. New mats are VERY expensive, beware.

[sbaker8688]

$400K on a new mat?!?!!? Are you serious?!?!?! Holy cow!!!!

Hell *NO* I don't have anything close to $400K. I have $95K saved up, and can't even spend all of that because I need some money to live on in case the thing goes belly up. I was thinking of spending $80K or so. Boy, that was wrong thinking! Perhaps I'm just extremely ignorant and naive. My father owned two laundromats back in the day. He bought one from someone else. He installed the other one from scratch. He put in remanufactured, not new, machines. It was just a small, no frills laundry. Maybe 12 washers, and 5 dryers. He didn't pay anything remotely close to $400K. Hell, he didn't even pay anything remotely close to $100K. I'd wager to say he spent $20 grand tops on it, if that.

Thanks for all the great input, please keep it coming. Perhaps I don't have the resources for something like this, which is a shame. I can't think of anything else I'd want to do. And my job was "outsourced" to India or China.

[SecretarytoBraveDave]

Demographic analysis will give you more bang to your "gut instinct"

Percentage of renters
Percentage of total pop
Percnetage of HH
Get percentaged of this in two different income brackets, those under 20K and those under say 30K Be concervative and see what you determine as potential customers for this area.

[petefritz]

My electric buildout bill for my new mat was a tad more than what your dad paid for his second mat he put together.. times, they are a changin', Crap, I had to spend 17k just on trees and bushes for the city. Welcome to the real world.

[SecretarytoBraveDave]

Find an area, see what the competition is like get some demos to see if what the numbers look like. Calculate the competitors usage and determine what the annual revenue is for the radius you are looking into. If you have 80K to invest that could be about the 20% down. Some mats won't fly with much debt, but you may find some areas that can. Depending on where you live, the laundry revenue per capita could be anywhere from 50K to 1,000,000.00 in yearly sales. You need to understand the market you wish to enter and then you will know whether an 80K investment to a new mat is even worth it. .

[Laundry_Mike]

Ahh, the good old days. I bought my first mat (existing, and unattended) about 30 years ago for $35,000 - and that included the real estate! $400 large? wow. Demographic surveys are more a sales tool for the distributer, rather than a valuable resource for the mat owner. Use it as a guide, but don't place a lot of weight on your demographic survey. Great demographics do not always insure a successful business.