how much do you charge per wash

[JohnnyG]

going by the washer's lbs

[CanCanCase]

Not everyone prices per pound of capacity, so it's tough to get any useful comparison with these numbers.

I'm at $.15, $.16, $.1625, and $.17 per pound in my stores, but that's for an Express wash and will vary from the $.15 to the $.17 depending whether the customer selects additional cycles or not.

Also, all this talk of "free dry" has me contemplating pricing again. I could very well say that my wash costs $.25 per pound and includes FREE DRY - that would reflect zero change in my pricing structure as it simply lumps dryer price in with washer price.

When the new #4 store opens this summer, wash prices will be a slight bit below the $.15-$.17 range since I'll be pricing a double loader to match my competitor's tops and my 60# Express machine to match my competitor's Wascomat 55 pounder... Now... since it's the largest vended laundromat machine in the State with no comparable, I wonder where I should price my new 90# Express washers? ;-)

-Case

[Howard]

In my first job out of college as a plant engineer I was constantly frustrated by the plant accountant that would never give me a direct answer to a financial question. It took me a while to learn why he would always ask me "why do you want to know that". What I learned was that he was a very smart guy, and he knew there were many sets of numbers, and you really had to know what a person was looking to understand to give them the correct one.

So, why the heck do you want this information?

Seriously, pricing means little without understanding costs, local competition, etc...

That said, when I sold my store last August my pricing was as follows:

18# double 18.8 cents per pound
35# triple 16.0 cents per pound
50# giant 14.4 cents per pound
75# super giant 13.2 cents per pound

Dryers - you did not ask but should know were 6.57 per minute for 30# dryers and 8.14 cents per minute for 50# dryers.

You will notice that I charged less per pound for the larger machines, many do the exact reverse - it depends on your market. I had a very large customer base of single day labor workers and had very high turns on the small machines. Thus I both wanted to maximize profit there and motivate them to go to the next larger machine.

[laundryboy2]

Logically, you should pay less per pound as the machine gets larger.

#12 - .187 \lb (Top Load)
#18 - .125 \lb
#35 - 107 \lb
#50 - .100 \lb
#75 - .103 \lb

[Howard]

Originally Posted by laundryboy2

Logically, you should pay less per pound as the machine gets larger.

#12 - .187 \lb (Top Load)
#18 - .125 \lb
#35 - 107 \lb
#50 - .100 \lb
#75 - .103 \lb

Well maybe. That was my operating philosophy as well. But there is another school of thought that the price should be higher the larger the machine is. That theory is you should pay more for the convenience of being able to dump all your clothing in one big machine.

Personally I think big machines are stupid, except for large bulky items. Why would you want to mix all your family's clothing in one big load and then have to sort it all out and figure out who's stuff is who's? I would rather put each family members clothing in one machine, it makes it much easier on the back end. I noticed many a customer in my store that would use three or four, up to six small machines at once rather than use a big machine just for that reason.

My experience has been the big machines get used mostly be the very price conscious and those that just don't care about their clothing and don't sort or pre-treat. Just dump it in and be done with it.

[surfflite]

20# .1095
25# .1396
40# .1122
60# .1333