41. My How the Tables Have Turned- An Interview with Host, Jordan Berry

Laundromat Resource Podcast guest from show 33, Peter Mayberry, turns the tables on host Jordan Berry. For the first time ever, Jordan releases the reins and hands them over to a guest host for the day.

Peter and Jordan delve deep into Jordan’s experience getting into the industry, details of his businesses now, and goals for the future, both in his laundromats and with Laundromat Resource. With raw, honest conversation, they discuss their views on running a successful laundromat business.

And for the first time on the podcast, Peter and Jordan have an open conversation about running a laundromat in a rough area. Rarely addressed, or even acknowledged, both Peter and Jordan share some stories and lessons learned about owning laundromats on the wrong side of town.

In this episode, host Peter and guest Jordan discuss:

Jordan’s entrance into the laundromat industry
Expensive lessons learned
Rehabbing a zombie mat vs. rehabbing the reputation of a zombie mat
Who should buy a laundromat in a rough part of town
Networking as a superpower
Why Jordan might sell one of his laundromats this year
An opportunity to invest in laundromats passively
The future of Laundromat Resource
Why YOU should be active on the forums
Making opportunities for more voices to speak into the laundromat industry
Why books are so powerful

And so much more!

Watch The Podcast Here

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Episode Transcript

Read the Transcript Here

hey what’s up guys it’s jordan with the

laundromat resource podcast this is show

number 41

and i am actually a little bit nervous

about today because today i hand over

the reigns

and peter mayberry a former guest of the

laundromat resource podcast

i’ll link to his episode down below

because it was awesome

uh but he actually takes over as host

for the day

and he interviews me about my experience

in the laundromat industry uh we had

a ton of fun we talked about my

experience

getting into the industry and my

experience in the business

uh and a lot lot lot more and because we

get into so much

i’m we’re just gonna jump right into it

so here’s your ad for today

it’s a great time to be uh refreshing

retooling your

website if you don’t have a website for

your laundromat or any other business

uh now’s the time to do it so if you’re

interested in a website check out

laundromat resource.com

get online we do laundromat websites we

know laundromats

we know websites uh we also build for

other businesses so if you’ve got other

businesses going on

let us know we can help you out uh all

right that’s enough of that

and let’s jump into it i’m gonna hand

over

the reins to peter wish me luck

hey welcome everybody to the laundromat

podcast i am super pumped

because today we have an awesome awesome

guy that’s going to be coming on here

he’s doing some really really big

innovative things in the industry

so again i’m peter mayberry for one day

only

i’m taking over the podcast i don’t know

what jordan barry’s doing he must be on

vacation or something

i’m just kidding that actually our guest

today is

the jordan berry how you doing today

jordan

is that what i sound like

uh hey man i’m doing awesome today thank

you for having me on

your show yeah i mean if you’re gonna

host it for one day and you could have

anybody on it and you chose me i just

feel honest right now

well actually this is my first podcast

ever so i’m actually i mean this is my

first

actual podcast since i’m taking it over

i mean i did yours

which was my first time being a guest on

one wow now this is my first time

hosting one

you’re you’re like moving right on uh i

know i’m loving this

yeah so we might as well get into this

though because i know that i seriously

do believe

and i told you this beforehand i mean i

was very fascinated by your story and

just talking about some of the stuff so

so why don’t you start with just kind of

telling us your background and who you

are

yeah uh man i’m so nervous man this is

how everybody feels when they call on

the podcast i’m just i’m so nervous

yeah i think at first i was actually a

little bit

probably like the first like couple

minutes but then you just

you know so much about the laundry

industry so like honestly when you start

talking

well i told you too like i started

reflecting on stuff that i probably

hadn’t even reflected on

because nobody else asked me laundry

questions i mean

when i go out with friends and stuff

they’re like hey tell me about

laundry you know we’re we’re with you on

and the people that we deal with in this

industry i think

you do get more of those thought

provoking questions yeah

yeah okay well i’m gonna i’m gonna

swallow the nerves and get going but

i’ll tell you a little bit about me so

uh you know i’m here in southern

california and i’ve lived here

most of my life i lived up in northern

california for eight years for a little

while

my wife’s from up there um and funny

side note i just had to drive

up and back to san francisco last night

or yesterday

it was a long long day but uh i lived up

there but

back down here again in southern

california and i

my my background is in ministry

actually i was a pastor for 15 years

um and did that as a

job and then at you know at some point

i just was like you know i think it’s a

good time for me to kind of transition

out of doing this as a job you know i

love helping people

i love being a part of people’s lives i

love having conversations with people

um but it was just a good time for me

we had young kids and uh

you know i just wanted to spend more

time with them

so i actually got out of ministry and

you know doing it as a job and i

uh we had like a little i got out with

like no plan

at all like no plan and we had a little

bit of money

and we were trying to figure out what to

do we owned our house

here in uh in southern california in

whittier

at the time and uh

we were trying to figure out to do and i

had this genius idea and my idea was

why don’t we our kids were like one and

like three

they were like young and i said why

don’t we take

our money we’ll rent out our house in

here in southern california we’ll take

our money we’ll go buy like a condo

on the beach in hawaii somewhere live in

hawaii for a couple years rent out our

house in

in southern california then when our

kids are school-aged if we want to come

back

to southern california we can move back

to our house and

you know rent out our condo in hawaii

net game condo

in hawaii and i thought that was a

genius plan

still think it’s a genius plan but my

wife funnily enough

her her thought was well why don’t we

take that money and buy a laundromat

and thus begins the saga of the

laundromat

so that’s kind of where your wife’s idea

it was my wife’s and what’s so

surprising is okay so me like

i’m like the idea guy i’m like let’s do

this crazy idea let’s go on this crazy

adventure let’s take this

like left turn out of nowhere in life

like i’m always saying these ideas my

wife is very like

she likes calm and stable and

and but it was her idea to get a

laundromat um

and i think nobody saw it coming

including me but

we decided to buy a laundromat and i i’m

i still debate whether that was the

right call or not

uh you know because you know why she

thought laundry

yeah so

the reason was because um you know we

wanted

we wanted to be able to spend some time

with our kids and so we were looking for

a place to put our money

where it could work for us and it didn’t

have to necessarily support us

completely but we wanted we wanted money

coming in that

wasn’t tied to our time and that was

before i mean

literally for for us shoot that was like

kind of like incredible foresight for us

because we didn’t know anything about

business we didn’t know anything about

investing

you know like she’s a teacher i was a

pastor

like we we didn’t know we’re dumb like

i’ll just say we were dumb we had no

idea

but that was really good uh mindset for

her to

to kind of come up with and i don’t know

where she got it but

that was the idea behind it is let’s

let’s put that money to work and then

maybe later down the line we can go get

a house in hawaii

so still on the docket maybe who knows i

think

that that is awesome goal i actually

love that i mean

my wife talks about like maybe going to

florida or something in orlando but

i don’t know why hawaii would be perfect

i mean isn’t like the temperature always

70 degrees there or something yeah yeah

air and water man it’s like

awesome that’s crazy so so your first

so you bought the laundromat your wife

got you into it you what was your first

experience like when you got your first

laundromat

and actually i do have some follow-up

questions too on this when you get going

because

i thought before we we kind of talked

but we talked

before this kind of before the interview

started and

i also am fascinated to know more too

about the era that you got

because i think even for me like i have

water mats in all types of areas right

and i think that one thing that is

probably overlooked and not talked about

a lot is sometimes you can get these

laundromats that are not in

the greatest of neighborhoods and

truthfully probably

i mean a lot of your viewers would

probably like to know especially the

ones that are trying to get into

laundromat business

certain areas are not for everybody

right i don’t want i don’t want to take

anything over here but like

i just i hope you expand on that too

because i think that’s a really really

important thing

and like i said i know we talked about

beforehand so i know the viewers didn’t

hear that

but i want them to hear it so don’t let

me forget that part yeah

no i’ll i’ll definitely share some of

that and

uh you know i’ll get into you know i

mean you asked about my experience

getting in and it was

i don’t want to like depress anybody but

i mean it was

depressing like it was bad it was rough

um so kind of how it went down was

okay we decided we’re going to get a

laundromat and we’re like okay

what do we do like right i don’t know

like so

i tried doing as much research as

possible

um i checked out stuff at the cla i

joined the cla i checked out

their stuff i tried to reach out to

people i got kicked out of a lot of

laundromats i tried to go talk to like

laundromat owners and

there were like so many not not

everybody some talked to me but a lot of

them were like they didn’t want anything

to do with me they didn’t i don’t know

if they thought i was like

trying to move into their turf or i

don’t know what but

um that kind of inspired there’s an

earlier podcast episode i did

that i called the laundromat industry

needs to grow up

and uh that’s it was kind of from some

of those experiences and some other

experiences but

yeah so i just i struck i learned

everything i could

um and but i just i struggled finding

enough solid information hard numbers

like stuff like that

where i just didn’t know i just didn’t

know anything and i didn’t know anything

about business either

i didn’t know anything about investing

so i was we were just green everywhere

we started looking for laundromats on

online just like

most people like biz buy sell or biz bin

or whatever

um and you know you you may know but

like most of those deals are not

necessarily the best deals those are the

ones that kind of got passed over by the

investor list that these brokers have by

and large

and i didn’t know that and found one

that i really liked

called the broker went and checked it

out the

the owner was super unreasonable needed

a complete retool

and wanted like a crazy amount of money

for it wasn’t

there it wasn’t making any money it was

losing money and

um and the broker said well hey i have

this other one that i want to show you

[Music]

and it’s um on the border of east l.a in

montebello

and so we went and checked it out also a

dump there’s you know

roaches the the the walls had

you know different kinds of wood

paneling

a lot of the machines were broken a

bunch of top loaders

old machines and and it just kind of

looked dark and dingy most of the lights

were out

and the broker said hey you know i know

it doesn’t look it’s nothing really to

look at but

you know look at all there’s a ton of

apartment buildings around

the area he’s like look at the area you

know it can be

really great and i was like yeah this

makes a ton of sense

and uh so we ended up

kind of springing on that one and buying

it we bought it

all cash and then finance equipment

um which was another kind of ordeal in

and of itself and i think i’ve mentioned

this in other

episodes but i’ll give a quick little

rundown of it because i

ended up saving me 40 grand i was just

going with the equipment

manufacturer that the the broker was a

distributor for them

and they at the last like a week before

installation they decided to change

terms on me and uh so i was like well

i’m gonna go talk to some other people

then i didn’t talk to anybody else

beforehand didn’t even

cross my mind um and you know for most

people you guys are smarter than that

and smarter than me but

i was just not that smart um and so i

went and talked to some others and just

basically just handed them the quote

sheet and said hey can you beat this

and and what kind of terms can i get and

i did that a few times and and the price

ended up being

you know 40 grand less and i got 100

financing on that equipment and that’s

so i always tell people hey even if you

know who you’re going to go with

go get some other quotes too because you

know you might be able to

skim a little off the top and i would

actually say that that’s actually huge

advice

and the truth is is even myself i did

the exact same thing when i

i ended up honestly as you know from my

podcast i built my first laundry i

became a

i’ve gotta wash them and i bought it

directly electrolux i like to look very

directly from laundrolux because

they didn’t have distribution in the

town but originally i’d gone to one

guy and he he basically said yeah like i

help you find a location i help you do

all this stuff

and i was like oh wow i had no idea that

there would be someone that would

help me do all this stuff and i didn’t

realize

that all distributors basically do the

exact same thing

i just thought that oh man i’m so lucky

to find a guy that’s actually going to

help me from trail to grave but like you

he he took massive advantage and he

and i probably admitted that i didn’t

look at anybody else

and what really actually spurred me was

was

that my banker was like i feel like

these numbers are too high we’ve done a

laundromat like two years ago and

it wasn’t even close to this so my

banker actually flagged it

and he’s like i think you really need to

go get some other equipment

and that’s when i googled all the stuff

and then i mean that you know john

wilson and all that different stuff but

but the truth is like i really think

that’s a massive point and you should

definitely i’m so glad you brought that

and really that’s awesome for the

viewers to know because

i didn’t know that the guy i was dealing

with was such a shady

person just a horrible individual

because like he came off as generally

wanting to help me but

he was really trying to take advantage

and i think that’s excellent advice i

mean even if you really do like the guy

i think that anybody looking to do a

laundromat should just at least meet

even if you like the first guy you meet

you should definitely go

and meet other distributors yeah so

you got your you got your equipment

coming you got your quotes and

everything else so so what happens from

there then so

now you’re you’re retooling the laundry

mat yeah so well first of all thanks for

sharing that because that makes me feel

a little bit less bad

about myself yeah so

but but it makes me feel bad about

myself but it also makes me feel a

little bit sad for

our industry because there are and and i

say this all the time right if you work

with the best people

you’re going to become one of the best

right and so

you know i think it’s huge advice for

you whether it’s a broker distributor

whoever you’re working with even your

employees

you know if you want to if you want to

be one of the best you got to work with

the best so

go meet multiple and find out who the

best is so um anyways okay

so some people lie yeah and especially

when they’re incarcerated

yeah especially when their income’s tied

up in it right and i say that all the

time too like broker distributor

the advice they give you is yeah

probably to help you but it also

benefits them if you buy the laundromat

you buy the equipment so and not saying

that that’s

a bad thing necessarily but that’s where

the trust and verify comes in and that’s

where having

other voices speaking into that becomes

very important

because as a transition uh you know the

broker who sold me the laundromat

he sold me a bill of goods and you know

the pro forma started

super high like four or five turns a day

is where it

started and it went up from there and

this little laundromat i mean it’s a

little 1500

square foot laundry mat 1600 something

like that

um it was never going to do what that

broker told me it was going to do

it never has done what that broker told

it was going do um so uh yeah so it was

gonna retool so open the doors well

actually got the keys i remember the

first day getting the keys

right and they hand me there was like a

you know a bucket of keys that they gave

me and i

to this day i have this like little

dough bucket that’s full of keys that i

don’t know what most of them go to and

have never touched them but

and then i have a bag of keys that i

have to dig through all the time

looking for stuff got the keys my wife

and i took a little

a picture of us holding the keys up like

we bought a laundromat

um and then we’re like oh man like now

what

right we don’t know what to do and so we

kind of like hung out for a little bit

that day

and then we’re like i guess we don’t

really need to be here

i don’t i don’t know and it was weird

like leaving that first day

leaving the laundromat it was all open

and

you know not knowing what we were

getting into

so the next day i came back

and the first thing i saw i was greeted

by my the very day after we bought it

i walked into the laundromat and there

was a woman standing in there completely

naked

washing all of her clothes and i was

like what did i

get myself into like what is happening

right now

um yeah that’s happened to every

laundromat guy i had a girl she at least

kept her

raw and panties on but she did she

stripped down

and washed the clothes that she was

wearing and was just sitting in the

water man

like i said but she wasn’t naked but

maybe that’s a maybe every longer

vampire

i don’t know man i don’t know so

yeah so but that was kind of um

i mean it was it was comical and i was

like what is happening

but that was kind of like just a little

glimpse into what i was in for um

so we were putting in all new equipment

but what i didn’t realize is

you know retooling a store rehabbing a

store

is way easier than retooling the

reputation

of a store and the previous owner had

just let this thing go

not just the equipment like the older

equipment and stuff and i think this is

important to know

and and a little bit you know we’ll get

into what you were referring to earlier

but

you know you got to figure out how to

retool

the image of the store in the community

and and just putting in new machines is

not going to do it

and what i found is you know because

this owner had let and

can i i just want to take a quick second

to caveat this and say

this is not a my experience is not a

typical experience

i don’t and i’ve talked to a lot of

owners now and and people have had

you know rough goes into this and and

almost all of us have dealt with issues

with customers or homeless or vandal

like we’ve we all deal with these issues

but some of the issues that i

had to deal with early on are not

typical so i don’t want to scare anybody

with this and it’s not like this anymore

at that laundromat

but but you know we went to work

rehabbing and retooling the store by

putting new equipment in we redid the

floors we redid the folding tables we

took all the wood

paneling off we painted all that stuff

looked like a completely new place put

lighting in all that

but the

one of the things so the broker sold me

unrealistic turns per day for you know

highly competitive market

that i was in um but the thing that i

was actually

more upset about was the broker sold me

a dangerous

store this is a dangerous location and

um you know i would come in and find

needles

all over the place um a gang had

basically come in

and made it their turf um and i didn’t

really realize that so i mean i was

literally in a

turf war uh with a gang for a little

while

um and it

it was it was like it was not safe and

it was

i remember going to the laundromat early

and i would sit in my car for like an

hour like trying to work up the nerve to

go inside because i didn’t know what i

was going to encounter

you know when i walked inside whether

the place would be just

trashed or there was somebody in there

that i was going to have a confrontation

with

uh and it was and i’m not like a

confrontational oh i wasn’t like a

confrontational

person at the time and i’ve grown a lot

thicker skin

um i guess thanks to the laundromat um

but uh yeah i mean but there was

there were a lot of verbal

confrontations

but that also you know some a couple of

them had turned physical

and uh you know that’s that’s a scary

situation you don’t buy you don’t buy an

investment or a business

to get into a physical altercation you

know you just right you don’t

and so um it was it was hard and on top

of all that

we were losing a ton of money every

month

when we were expected to be making money

every month

and it was just it was exhausting

and difficult and uh

and emotionally draining and financially

draining

uh it was it was rough man it was real

rough

no and i just feel like it’s really

important to share that because i mean

i i know you probably talked a lot of

people that don’t have experience with

it but

i actually remember being on the cla and

i remember i

came over who it was but there was a

gallon talked about you know and she

didn’t feel safe and she overheard some

people’s

on our camera saying they were going to

harm her and she didn’t want to go back

to the store

and and the truth is is like i mean i

have a laundromat

that there’s been people shot and killed

by the pawn shop next to me

and at a tobacco and liquor shop next to

and there used to be a theater an old

rundown theater that there’d also been

somebody shot right before i actually

moved in

to this building so i just

think it’s important people know and

i’ve had physical confrontations in

there

and things have gotten out of hand and i

and and i don’t want to say that all

wonderments are like that because i

literally have one i used to have two i

mean on your podcast i talked

about when i owned in council bluffs

iowa where people would break in and

people would watch him do it and like

that was another horrible area with just

people just completely out of their mind

on drugs and like i said you walk in

there wake someone up and then you start

swinging at you

so i my only point was with that is

i’ve been listening to your podcast now

a lot more since i did it

and i get something out of every single

one of them

i just thought that when you share that

with me i think that’s some things

that’s overlooked right i mean if

i have stores under military areas that

are so safe i mean it’s so crazy i mean

i wouldn’t

worry about my kids playing and being

there at two in the morning

but i have i’ve had two locations where

i wouldn’t take my kids out for the dog

it was dark i’ll go there after dark but

i wouldn’t have my kids go there

and unfortunately we do have gangs

around some of these areas

that’s the only reason i was even saying

that i just think that some people

only you know what you’re capable of

right like i don’t

mind altercation obviously you’ve been

trained

to deal with altercation but if you’re

someone that doesn’t know how to

i wouldn’t want someone to buy a store

and be afraid to go there

and like you said too i think it does

change you because i’ve never been

afraid of confrontation but i never

really got physical with people

i’m now way more prone to get physical

with people than i’ve ever been

just because these situations do arise

in some of these areas

and it’s not and i want people to i

think to your point what you’re trying

to let people know is

no one’s going down there looking for an

altercation sometimes the people you’re

facing

have in their mind that there’s going to

be an altercation it’s not your choice

to make

you just have to defend yourself but you

didn’t get aggressive with them

they’re getting aggressive with you yeah

yeah and yeah and i i just want to

stress one more time like this

this is very location dependent right

this is not this does not have to be

your experience with laundromats and i

wouldn’t wish that on anybody and in

fact

this location now you know you know i’m

just gonna say it man now that i’ve

cleaned out these gangs with my bare

hands and my

you know my straight muscle and

you know no but seriously now that now

that that has been taken care of

i mean i bring my kids there and that’s

it’s not

it’s not this was a long time ago now

too this is you know seven or

so years ago um but you know

and i will say too that a lot of these

neighborhoods not all of them but a lot

of these neighborhoods

the majority of the people are great you

know and it’s just a small group of

people

that make not just the experience bad

at the laundromat but the neighborhood

too it brings the whole neighborhood

down

right and so they’re harvesting all

right and the neighborhood actually

usually thinks

so we don’t allow i mean obviously at l

street we throw people out we get the

police involved when necessary

and the community appreciates that that

we actually care enough

to because like they like you said they

bring their children they live there

and i shouldn’t have actually even said

like my wife doesn’t like me to bring my

kids on i do take my kids down there but

i actually have that one ebbs and flows

it’s like you said like

if we don’t watch it they start kind of

moving in and then we gotta really track

the whip and make sure that they’re not

hanging out coming in there

and then it returns back to the status

quo but it seems like every

i want to say like every 18 months like

it seems like the waters are tested at

that store again like that

when we laid the force down and tell

them we’re not dealing with it it goes

away

but i feel like it is about 12 to 18

months they start trying to creep back

and if you let them they’ll come you

gotta be pretty firm

yeah and and i think to i think part of

that is because

people are locked up and they don’t get

the memo that there’s a new sheriff in

town and so when they get out they go

right back to

and i do think that there’s you know

something to that but you know all this

to say like

if you’re buying in a rougher

neighborhood you just need to be aware

of this like this there there will be

some conflict hopefully it won’t

ever be physical you know confrontation

but they’re

if you’re buying a rougher neighborhood

you’re going to experience some conflict

um so you know thinking ahead of time

how you want to deal with that whether

that’s maybe hiring security to be there

you know making sure you have camera

system there and checking the cameras

before you come

you know to the mat and if something’s

going down like i would call the cops

all the time for everything and

my main reason wasn’t necessarily to

have the cops come take care of the

issue

my main reason was to train the police

that this is a trouble spot so you need

be around a little bit more and they

would they’d come

and they’d walk the you know walk the

laundromat

a couple times a day they’d drive

through the parking lot and it and it

really helped

right and it didn’t just help business

and it didn’t really just help

me help the community right because the

people who were coming to their laundry

or who

like these moms or these ladies it’s all

your great don’t

feel safe when some of that stuff’s

going down

in in the laundry mat so when you come

and clean it up

you know it it was hard but it’s a good

feeling now like looking back at it even

though

you know the business isn’t what i

thought it was going to be even still

i feel pretty good about that business

and we’ll get to this a little bit later

but i’m actually thinking about

selling it for some reasons and i’ll

talk about that a little bit later

but i’m having a really hard time

selling it because

i just put so much into it and i feel

like so good

about where it was to where it is now

and

and i’ve made some great friends in that

community you know people who i’ve

gotten to know

and i enjoy talking to when i when i see

him there and

i just i like it you know i think you

said it perfectly earlier when you said

and it’s a fact i mean it’s a fact even

with my my bad location

it is a very very small amount of people

that are causing troubles like like you

said i’ve always said i think it’s i

don’t know i changed a little bit on my

stats but 95 percent of the people i

encounter on a day-to-day basis

are wonderful hard-working great people

that i’m glad to know it’s just the five

percent that

they want to wreck everything but so

that story is doing tremendous so it

sounds like it sounds like you turned it

around and

now you’re maybe thinking about doing

something with it but

but um yeah is that is that your only

you’ve got

you’ve got another i’ve got another one

so kind of even in the midst of

like the financial debacle of that store

you know because i mean early on we’re

losing like 1500

sometimes more than that a month uh

when we were expecting we went into it

expecting to be making

money and that’s just like a punch in

the gut you know it’s like holy cow

you know and that’s what the broker told

me right and and i i basically had to

rely on that broker

to give me all the information because i

didn’t really know anybody else in the

industry

and didn’t really know where to turn to

find somebody

um and all of this you know is

is part of my story of why i’m doing

laundromat resource while i’m doing the

podcasts why i do the youtube videos why

we have a little blog why we’re building

the forums i just

i want to make sure that there’s a free

flow of information

for people who already own businesses

you know in this industry and who want

to get in this industry

um and that not just a free flow of

information but that there is an

interconnected network there’s people to

turn to

there’s places to go when you have

questions you know

when there’s stuff that comes up in your

laundromat or when you’re trying to

figure out

you know whether you should buy a

laundromat or how to buy a laundromat

any of that stuff

i just want to make sure that there’s

information and

a network to tap into to make sure

you know you’re successful when you get

in the business and

you continue to be successful you know

moving forward too so

do you know what the average the average

turn for day is it like 3.2 or

it’s like 3.2 or 3.5 right that’s yeah

somewhere average

yeah somewhere in that range right there

so for the viewers out there you should

always start your performer i actually

started one and a half turns

i go one and a half two two and a half

three three and a half four four and a

half five

and and that’s usually i mean like i

said it’s funny because like some people

just do like

whole numbers but i’m like i’d put as

many data points as i can get on there

like i’ll throw it out there

so i’m like in the sky seven turns a day

yeah right

i’m gonna be rich but it’s still fun to

look at that number even though it’s

probably

not realistic but yeah i will say some

people are doing turns like

seven plus you know but i would i always

tell people hey

if you can run your turns per day at

like maybe two and a half sometimes

three but like two and a half

and you feel okay about the returns

you’re getting at like two and a half

turns per day

then you’re probably okay to move

forward if

you need like four turns a day to

you know be okay you might want to have

second thoughts because yeah i mean four

turns a day is totally doable

in in most locations i just wouldn’t

want to count on that

you know you’re having to do better than

that um that’s that’s

excellent advice i mean that right there

i think is you’re right i mean

i actually think that that’s probably

the best advice i heard

you should probably shoot for two and a

half you can make it on two and a half

you’re probably safe yeah it should be

so then

you got all this going on you might be

selling a laundromat you’re running

a successful podcast and it is

successful i know it’s growing

so what what are your future goals like

you were kind of talking

there might be some changes i had huh

yeah so

well real quick uh before we get there

because i did buy another one

in the middle of all i started saying

that and i got distracted but in the

middle of all that i bought

another one i found and i wanted to

bring this one up because

um yeah i get asked about this all the

time but this was a

um and i so i tell i tell you guys those

of you guys who’ve had i’ve

you know i’m doing like 15 to 20

coaching calls a day which is insanity

right now

a week i mean um but i’ve been telling

so many people lately like you gotta go

make you know meet these brokers because

by and large unless you’re finding your

own deals

and you’re out there hustling these are

the people who are

bringing you the deals and you’ve got to

get on their email list you got to be in

there

you know top of mind when you’re buying

because i met this broker built this

relationship

and he brought me a a deal where it was

you know real estate and laundromat in

l.a

and it was a seller finance deal and

that wouldn’t have happened without uh

you know without that relationship with

that broker so

um you gotta you gotta be out there you

gotta be you can’t just passively look

websites only if you wanna get

some of the best opportunities um so so

i did buy that second one it was kind of

like a

hey we paid a lot in money and emotional

turmoil

in lessons that we learned on this first

one so why not try to

you know our options are cut our losses

and

try something different or say you know

what we paid for these lessons so let’s

put them to good use

and so we decided to do that um

and so we we have two locations now so i

just wanted to put that out there it was

a seller finance deal it was brought

from a broker

um you know it was not was not listed at

that time

um and again i don’t think that was a

home run deal necessarily

but you know it’s tough to get real

estate you know with a laundromat here

in l.a especially right now so

well something you said i think is just

great too is that you you mentioned

that you just threw it out there right

don’t just look at websites and that’s

something that i

i really try to do myself is i just tell

people what i’m looking for like i just

vocalized it to lots of people broad

swaths

i’m in the laundromat business i’m

trying to expand and it’s funny because

you’ll meet these people

that you’ll all of a sudden like six

months later like hey you’re looking for

laundromats right

like i know a guy that might be selling

you’re like really i mean i’ve had

tons of people connect me with other

people in the laundromat business

just by being open to it and asking just

asking questions or telling people what

i’m looking for

so i would say to the viewers don’t be

afraid to just

get lots of pads throw down lots of

footwork like spread it out there right

you never know who’s going to get you

get you into something or who’s

cousins with somebody our aunt got a

laundromat i mean

maybe they’re getting ready to retire

then you can’t be there before the

brokers that’s the stuff you want

that’s what you’re in before the broker

yeah

so we talked on your thing and i totally

randomly talked about me but

i am buying the laundromat like i told

you there’s two that i would buy

you know i just made a deal for it like

last week

and like i said there’s three years i’ve

been talking to these guys

and they told me no for three years and

just last week

one down and hopefully the next one will

be coming soon when to go

all right but that’s like proof proof

you know it’s like

uh i don’t know i i tell people it’s

it’s so funny because i i talk to people

all the time right and they want to just

you know while they’re watching tv at

night and and do this like totally do

this there’s nothing wrong with this

it just can’t only be this if you want

the best deals out there you know they

want to watch tv and

browse the internet and they want

something to fall on their lap and

it could happen that way but

you know you don’t want it you’re not

likely and you don’t want to count on

that right it’s like

you could win the lottery but if that’s

your main wealth building goal

you’re you’re probably not going to be

wealthy right like

a little bit of a long shot yeah so you

need to make some other plans

in order to you know grow

and yeah and get the deals

and get the deals actually out of my

laundromat so yeah

i know that’s funny i don’t know you

know for those of you listening on the

on the podcast he’s got his uh like

security system

you know behind him so i can spy on his

laundry man while he’s

well he’s i just opened this two days so

this is gonna i was telling jordan

before that this this will be an

office for me like one of my offices but

right now i was actually showing them

like i only have this wall right now

because this is the only wall that

doesn’t have just junk and pals tools

and

everything that used installed a lot of

work going on over there

so this is the staged wall yeah

uh all right so you asked about like

goals going forward

uh yeah i i got i have a lot of goals so

i’ll

i’ll tell you a little bit about my

laundromat goals and

and maybe some of the laundromat

resource goals kind of going forward too

because i’m i’m just you know not to

make fun of myself but i am pumped about

about what is coming up for this year

uh i just love that i know well i it’s

funny i

i had a coaching call yesterday and

somebody was like i’m pumped to be

talking to you and i’m like you

punk it’s funny

uh yeah so i mean laundromat wise so i

did i

i mentioned that i might be selling uh

one

may possibly both of my laundry bets but

probably at least one this year

um but for a couple of good reasons

number one

is i mean first of all i love

what what’s happening with laundromat

resource right now it’s

uh been a ton of fun for me

uh making the podcast doing youtube

videos working on

you know the website there’s some huge

well what i consider huge projects

coming up

uh with laundromat resource that i’m

like super excited about and i want to

just continue to help

you know this industry grow and get

better

and you know elevate this industry i

think there’s

a lot of cool cool things happening

with a lot of these top-notch owners

which by the way i would not necessarily

consider myself a top-notch

owner like i think that i’ve learned a

lot of really great lessons but

you know just through talking to people

on the podcast and stuff i’ve learned a

ton

myself and um

yeah so uh

i’m so i’m excited about a lot of that

stuff but uh the

um it’s taking off right did i talk to

you like a couple weeks ago and more and

more people are starting to

to know about the hasn’t it been taken

off or no am i wrong

you talking about the podcast yeah the

podcast yeah oh yeah i mean

uh yeah this is already you know we’re

we’re a few days from the end of january

when we’re recording this

and you know this is already

significantly the biggest month

of the podcast here we’re coming up on

20 000 downloads uh yeah i mean it’s a

laundromat podcast like the 20

000 downloads is like i don’t know in

eight or nine months or whatever it’s

crazy for me well that and i told you

i’ve been doing a lot of the podcast too

and and

i i i actually i mean i feel like i

really know a lot about the laundry

industry but like i said i get something

every time i listen to one and like you

said i’ve been here

like sleeping here like i mean actually

the install was easy but this is the

first time i ever installed a cci

stuff and i mean i have done and redone

it’s all working right now knocking wood

yeah right now but so i’ve had a lot of

time just connecting the same wires a

thousand times the machines

just repetitive stuff so i’ve been

listening to the podcast and and they’re

great like i said i mean

i i think i’ve gotten probably 20 of

them now so i mean

i i love that you’re doing this and like

i said i i didn’t know i would get

anything from him but i absolutely do

and and like i said that’s why i

actually even

you put that thing on facebook i do

really believe people want to know your

story i mean i’m very fascinated that

you put this together and you’re doing

this just

you’re just doing it to help people i

mean it makes sense because you i didn’t

realize that you had

a pastoral background but i mean it’s

just in your blood and it’s in your

nature to help people that’s awesome

yeah i love it i love it

yeah that’s so funny because i really

didn’t realize that i said that all the

time

until you started saying today

that’s awesome that’s awesome it is

great i just love it

i do like that it’s positive too because

so many things now like people want to

put negative stuff

on and like i said yours are always

upbeat it’s always a positive thing

like it’s always very supportive and i

feel like you really do root for people

and like i said that’s

it’s great i mean it’s like it’s like a

thing that you’re not going to listen to

a longer podcast and feel bad about your

day

right you’re not going to get like

slumped down it’s like it’s happy it’s

nice

unless you hear my story and you’re

depressed because you’re like oh man

i mean i just thought and i know we did

a little bit of dark side with that but

i think that’s important just for the

fact that

every business has its its trials and

tribulations and and

and i just and i do think that that

that probably doesn’t get brought up

enough but

i don’t like let’s say that the roles

were reversed and i was not

running the longer message my wife was i

think that my wife would really struggle

to run a location like my south omaha

location

i think and i think that it’s possible

too that people would like

try to like catch her leaving and jumper

or get money or i don’t know i mean i

just feel like

there’s a lot of people i’ve watched a

lot of people doing like these drifts

inside the laundromat they work in teams

right

like you’re dealing with one person but

there’s usually two people somewhere

i mean they do like these con artists

they work in teams and people don’t

realize that

they think that they’re only dealing

with the person in front of them but

they’re not so it’s like slight of hand

stuff

so i mean that’s all i was that’s the

only reason i wanted to focus on that a

little bit because i just feel like that

doesn’t get brought up enough that

location is extremely important on

building a laundromat and it’s success

but location also has a little bit to do

with what

you are willing to do yourself i can put

up with on a daily basis

yeah because not every location is going

to have

the warm fuzzies all the time right yeah

okay hold on my podcast so let’s get

back to you sorry yeah

the future so what’s the future with

laundromats so

getting back to that is you know i

probably will sell

one here pretty soon maybe both this

year i’m not sure but

a couple reasons so i’m loving a lot of

my resource i want to devote more time

to laundromat resource i

because i just love it a lot but but the

other kind of bigger

reason is and i already kind of alluded

to this i

would not necessarily consider myself a

top operator

it’s just not my skill set or it’s just

not what i’m like super excited about

necessarily

but with that said one of the things

that i went out and did is

got together with a couple other guys

one of which who i would consider

a top operator and another one who’s

pretty

connected in in the industry and we

uh basically put together a group to go

out to try to go after some bigger

deals with some real estate and some

bigger laundromats um so whether that’s

finding

you know strip center or whatever that’s

you know up for sale that we can

you know that maybe has a laundromat in

it that we can kind of you know

retool and get running uh you know

top-notch and bring in some more income

and maybe even increase the rent

thereby increasing the value of that

property then we can kind of decide what

we’re doing with the laundromat keeping

or selling it or whatever um or

finding you know strip center for sale

that would be a good location for a

laundromat and putting one in

um and i think right now especially

laundromats

having a laundromat in your real estate

strip center especially right now is

super valuable and i think

one of the things that came out with

covid is that hey laundromats

by and large stayed open the entire time

and

kept paying rent even if it was a

reduced rate for a little bit

kept paying rent kept serving the

community and that’s super valuable for

real estate um so having real estate

with a laundromat in it

especially one that’s being run you know

well is

super valuable both for the laundromat

and for

the real estate so we’re going out

trying to find some some deals

um and we’re partnering with investors

to go out and get some bigger stuff

and we’re getting really excited about

that um

and you know if anybody out there is

interested in kind of checking out what

we’re doing

uh diligentcapitalinvestments.com feel

free to

check that out and i’ll put a link i

mean i’ll have the host

put a link i’ll get right on that

yeah right yeah i’m gonna get my

assistant trying to help me maybe i’ll

call dusty

yeah right i’m a sound guy

uh yeah but i mean i’m just i’m really

excited about that

uh just because i’m i’m ready to be

doing some bigger stuff and i’m

i love uh despite kind of my entrance

into the business i really do believe in

my wife’s original vision

you know which is you know laundromats

can bring in

a great income and you don’t always have

to be at your laundromat

um you know in order for it to be making

money so

um i i love that and i think it’s a

great wealth building i

i’ve talked about um the wealth what i

call the wealth tripod

which is you know cash flow equity and

tax advantages and i think

laundromats especially when you partner

them with real estate hit all three of

those

incredibly well and can really

accelerate your wealth

um so whether that’s you know through

investing

yourself in those um or you know through

a group

like we’re putting together could could

be awesome

so i actually think that’s extremely

fascinating and

so so you guys would purchase the land

and

put a laundromat possibly in there and

you would manage the laundromat or you

would try to

to sell to somebody else to manage and

then just increase the value

and reflect the rents uh both i mean i

think it’ll depend it’ll be a deal by

deal basis basically so what we’ll do is

we’ll

you know we’ll go out and find deals we

have a pretty big network um

we’ll probably well i don’t know i mean

we’ll probably start here in southern

california but

you know figuring out the management

piece you know like i said i’m i’m

partnering with

you know somebody who i think would be

uh considered a top operator and so

you know figuring out that management

piece one of the things we’ve been

kicking around is maybe starting a

management

company in order to manage our

our assets and and you know have it

available for other people who maybe

want to be a little more passive in

their laundromats

to be able to utilize the company too so

but putting together a management

company

that has you know the systems in place

and as we build them out

you know we’ll we’ll put we’ll

incorporate systems in them to make them

you know easy to manage easy to track

you know easy to report

you know to investors those kinds of

things so some of them we may hold some

of them we may

hold for a period of time and then sell

some of them we may

flip because we just want the the real

estate

um i think it’ll be a deal by deal basis

so when we when we find deals we’ll

probably put a package together

and you know send that out to investors

see what the interest gauge the interest

in it i think there’s a lot of people

having success like in hotels or at

least pre-covered in storage units it

sounds like i

found that there’s several people do so

i mean i guess i don’t know why it

wouldn’t work for laundromats i mean

hotel has a lot more moving parts than

than a laundromat so actually that

that’s actually very fascinating

i don’t actually haven’t really heard of

many people i mean people are doing the

franchise thing but that’s not really

what this is

no yeah and this is more uh

yeah my guess i i don’t know the answer

to why more people aren’t doing it maybe

we’ll find out down the line but i don’t

think so like

i don’t know it all really makes sense

to me and and what i love about it is

the

um just the amount of value you can

create in the real estate

by having a laundromat operating at

its optimal performance like it it

really creates a lot of value for that

real estate to build a lot of equity

really fast

but i i would guess the reason it’s not

done more

is because of that management piece

and just fairly recently is when i would

say technology has caught up to a point

to where a lot of those management

questions can be

can be answered you know the reporting

accountability

is there now um you know with with

different card systems or payment

systems that have reporting

um you know even like things such as

like refunding customers you can do that

remotely now through technology

um you know so i i just think that

there’s a lot of

things in place now that make it doable

to have a management company for

laundromats and and so

you know acquiring you know 10 or a

dozen or 20 or 50 or whatever

laundromats i mean we know luke

williford who you know will eventually

own every laundromat in the world

i’m convinced you know he’s got i don’t

know how many

now i don’t know 80 or 40 i don’t know

yeah um he bought one today it might be

pretty i know

that’s what i’m saying he’s probably

buying a couple a day now i don’t know

he buy one he buys threes i feel like

nope yeah

he’ll own yours eventually too

i actually i mean i don’t know if the

the viewers would like this but

honestly to me i actually almost went to

kansas city

and because i thought that there was a

need down there for laundromats

and i literally backed out because

i mean it’s like i don’t know it was two

and a half hours three hours and i was

i didn’t want to have to be going there

a lot but i thought if i could get two

or three i could have a manager

so i mean obviously so i mean it’s

obvious the viewers that i am not a

person that you reached out to about

this investment thing but

i actually hope it does work because

like i said i personally even thought

about trying to just on my own not with

a group of people but

like i said i just i just didn’t want to

make myself miserable so i honestly wish

you luck and if you are successful with

you want to share any information with

some other people looking to do the same

yeah yeah i mean that’s kind of my mo

right like i’m not

i’m i’m here i think my my the way i

think about all this stuff is like dude

there’s

this is a big big country it’s a big big

world like we have

listeners all over right like i’ve had

vendors say hey

you know we just came on the podcast and

we got clients in

in italy and we got clients in australia

and we got you know like

it’s a big big world so there’s plenty

of room for everybody to be doing this

and if

other people are doing this already like

we’d love to learn too

you know what’s working but we feel like

we have a pretty solid plan

um you know going forward and we’re

pretty confident that it’s gonna be

uh like problem like profitable like

really

it’s great that it’s even good of the

box like i said i mean i feel like so

many people are going down this

franchise model

and i mean it’s just but

like i said this is a completely

different thing i’m just i mean this is

nice to see that you’re like not even

just going down like the me too group

right i mean this is a

innovative thing it’s cutting edge like

people have been trying to franchise

laundromats

i don’t know 15 years 60 years i have no

idea it’s been a ton of time

and i don’t know if anybody ever figured

out the secret to that but yeah i love

this this

is new it’s innovative i’ve never heard

of anybody doing this so

that is super exciting yeah

more about in the future yeah well i’ll

be keeping you posted

and uh again man if if anybody’s

interested go over to diligence capital

investing.com and you know there’ll be a

little form over there

um you know while we’re recording this

it’s not there yet

um but by the time this goes out it’ll

be it’ll be up there and

uh you know get on that email list at

least and you’ll be able to see

kind of what’s going on with it and and

check it out so that’s

that’s one of the things going on

there’s there’s so many things going on

uh some of the stuff i’m like dying to

just blurt out right now and we’re just

not quite

ready yet but another thing that i’m

really excited about actually is

i’m just a huge believer that we need

more voices in

this industry um you know sharing

information

and educating each other it’s a big part

away not only that i’m doing the podcast

but that i’m doing it the way that i’m

doing it

um and probably the big reason you’re

doing it the way you’re doing it you

know your podcast today right now

um is just to have other people’s

voices and experience and wisdom and

lessons

to be shared and i want to be doing more

of that so like we have

we have a forum that’s been starting to

pick up a lot of steam on laundromat

resource

again i’ll put a link down i mean peter

we’ll put a link down below

uh or in the description or the buy or

whatever uh

but um i i want to really just kind of

ramp that up i want to help

give voice to more owners who have

things to share and things to teach you

know whether that be

whatever format that might be and it

could be you know

you know written format in blog posts or

one of the things i’m really excited

about that i was planning on

launching last year but due to covid

stuff i

couldn’t get my act together but um i am

launching a publishing company for it’ll

start out being a

laundromat specific publishing company

and i’m looking to

not only publish some books myself but

also

to you know partner with other people

who have books inside them

that are going to help this industry so

that’s one thing that will be coming out

uh this year that i can share about and

i’m very excited about

um i think there’s not a ton of there

are there are some books out there and

we got an author coming on

uh in you know pretty soon here uh and

it’ll be cool to talk to you know him

about his book and his experience

but i think there just needs to be a lot

more books and i have i’ve been making a

list of books and putting names by them

one of the reasons why i keep saying

like hey get active in the forums

you know get you know reach out put like

you were saying earlier like put

yourself

out there because that’s you know

that’s where we’re looking for voices

for this industry

you know come write blog posts you know

make make videos when you’re

when you’re doing stuff and let’s share

those things because that’s where we’re

looking

when we’re looking for things like you

know who who can write the who

who’s the best one to write this book

for this industry

um that’s where that’s where we want to

be looking so um but

we’re looking to you know give more

voice to more people

in this industry and i think it’ll just

elevate

all of us rising tide raises all boats

yeah that’s right well i’m being

completely sincere like i actually think

that’s

what you just told me obviously we

talked before this i had no idea you’re

going to mention this and i actually am

excited

i truly no pain no jokes like i’m

actually excited to be a part of that

because i think that that could be

amazing

and in all honesty i mean if i can’t

find any more laundromats to build i’ll

probably be one of your investors i

really think that that is

that is awesome jordan i seriously think

that’s a way for people to get into

business

like a safety net and i i just

like initial thought on that i think

it’ll be truly successful and

i mean congratulations for thinking that

up and doing it like i said i love that

you actually do stuff right i mean

you probably consulted with some people

and you just took the steps you started

making the progress

and you jumped with it and i do there’s

no reason there shouldn’t be i mean

there’s other industries that do it why

isn’t this one ever done like you said

the technology’s there

you have a card system you can know

exactly what you could be in miami

florida

and someone in omaha nebraska you know

exactly went through your laundromat

that day

exactly yeah or like or like thomas who

thomas landenberger who’s in italy and

has his laundry mountain florida and he

can

he can track it all right like it

doesn’t matter where you are in the

world

and you’re going to want to just pull up

luke then find out what buildings are in

kansas city right now

yeah like right now like stop looking in

omaha yeah maybe i just go to canada

let’s just

let’s just end this interview right now

and get on it

no but thank you i appreciate you saying

that but sincerely and i mean i’m not

i mean that that is a tremendous idea

and like this is the why i’ve been

listening to these podcasts like i love

this

yeah well hold on real quick because i

want to say one other thing

none of this and and this goes back to a

point that you made

earlier like none of this happened

unless i had put myself

out there right and like just started

the podcast started making youtube

videos

and when you were saying like let people

know about what you’re looking for let

people know about what you’re doing well

i wasn’t necessarily looking for

looking for this but these opportunities

like the

like this um this diligence capital

investments group

these are people that i met through the

podcast like

you’ll know you’ll know at least one of

the guys from the podcast

i figured i think i probably do know one

yeah so

sure but i mean obviously you didn’t say

the name so i’m not going to yeah well

yeah and get go it’ll be on the website

i mean we’re we’re being transparent

about everything but i just

you know like i said it’s not rolled out

i get i get why

you’re still putting it together i mean

i get what you’re doing i mean

right you’re still working probably out

the fine finer details i get it

yep but but we’re right there and we’re

ready to go but all that to say like

that’s why i keep encouraging you like

hey get over on the forums

asking questions answering questions

helping people out start

you know put yourself out there and

opportunities

open up right if you have your eyes open

if you’re networking if you’re meeting

with people if you’re helping people

opportunities open up and you know i’m

just this is not necessarily about like

a pitch for like diligence capital

investments or anything this is like

an example of though i’m serious like

this is a good idea

thank you thank you but it’s also okay

everybody else

but also it’s it’s an example right like

put yourself out there and watch what

opportunities come up so you know

you know come come write some blog posts

and see like my

the laundromat resource.com right now is

getting tens of thousands of

page views every single month it grew a

hundred percent

in january 100 like 14 in january

from december and december was our

biggest month it’s going like

gangbusters right now

and when you start putting your voice

out there people are gonna see

your stuff they’re gonna be appreciative

of what you’re

uh what you’re putting out there you’re

gonna make a name for yourself in the

industry

just as someone who uh not only just

knows what they’re talking about but

somebody who wants to help other people

succeed and guess what

people like it when you want to help

them succeed right they wanna

they wanna do business with you they

wanna you know associate with you

and opportunities open up so i’m just

excited

i’m i’m pumped about this

and there’s some other stuff i’m like

trying to share

uh a couple other things but that’ll

come here in the near future

and uh i just look forward to that so

anyways that

that was a long answer to what it was a

great answer though some goals coming up

so i am so grateful to be a part of this

this could be like a

big big thing in 10 years and i am the

i am the podcast host that launched it

that’s right man

that’s right you are well that

transitions perfect to a little thing

that

i like to call down to business

yeah uh yeah may or may not i just you

know who knows man

but it’s a love hate relationship with

some of these

that’s right uh so one of them’s in

montebell i mentioned that i already

montebello on the border east la

the other one is in south central la you

know over

where all the 90s rappers were from the

west coast rappers

south central man in the hood right next

to compton

inglewood yeah i think you actually

answered my next question you so you

have two laundry ads and you own the

real estate on one

i own the real estate on one i have

another kind of investment

property also and through

diligence capital investments looking to

own some more so

there’s another little plug for it

you how many other things are you in

like you’re you’re like a true

entrepreneur like i would say a lot of

people

probably getting into this business are

you do you have other things that you’re

working on currently that you can talk

about or is it just mostly

what so those are those are the majority

i i guess those are my hard assets i

have the two laundromats a couple of

investment properties

um you know i legitimately launder my

resources

it’s a business and it’s an asset i do

some commercial

real estate as a as an agent broker and

um and also laundromat um i helped

sell laundry mats and in fact um you

know

one of the one of the things with like

diligent investments is like

i’m one of the things that we do

we’ve been doing with laundromat

resource that’s been really cool is that

we’re helping people find brokers and

you know now we’re at a point where it’s

like hey

we might buy your laundromat from you so

like if you’re looking to sell a

laundromat like

i don’t know throw it out there and if

it fits kind of what we’re looking for

we might buy it from you

but even if we don’t number one anywhere

in the u.s

anywhere and and um number one

if it doesn’t fit what we’re looking for

that’s like no time to those

podcasts so whether someone does want to

sell a laundromat they can reach out

yeah i’ll i’ll link it i link it every

week but i’ll link it i mean

i’ll have you link it uh your your your

people

um well guys

it’s nice to have a team over there man

it takes me forever to put all this

stuff together you got this huge

massive team i actually have a guy but

he’s in

he’s in car nebraska which is like four

hours away today and i was gonna have

intro to set me up

everybody always has mics and i don’t

know how the computer thing works

but he was actually gonna come to town

there’s gonna be in omaha yesterday i

was gonna have to set up something but

i mean everybody’s got the headphones

sometimes and i don’t i actually thought

the

audio on the phone was good but i don’t

know how the computer will be i’ve never

yeah it sounds good it sounds good uh i

was really trying to do this for real

but yeah i don’t know how to do it

without these people

it’s your first one and the important

thing is that you got out there and you

did it

and you’ll just get better along the way

you know so that’s the way again

actually way more nervous doing this

than when i was in your spot

oh man you’re doing awesome uh anyways

yeah so one of the things that we do too

is you know for people who are

interested in selling their laundry mats

no matter where

they are you know if they don’t fit our

criteria to buy

um we’ll help people find really good

brokers and i think you know based off

my experience

and the experience of a lot of my

coaching clients that i’ve

you know had it’s so important to have a

good broker that you’re working with to

get your

laundromat you know in tip-top shape in

order to sell

and also to get it sold quickly for a

good price

and so we help people you know

nationwide

find good brokers to work with kind of

no matter where you’re at so if you’re

looking to sell

you know it’s watermelon resource.com

sell and and we’ll help you

out there and i’ll have peter’s people

link it

in the description or the show notes so

so so how long have you actually even

been doing this like

not too long the podcast is relatively

uh so i started in in december of 2019

so as we’re talking right now it’s been

like a year and a month

and it’s i mean it’s just been blowing

me away for the lot of my resource stuff

um laundry mats i’ve owned for

like seven and five and a half years

um how long was it do you think before

like you really

felt good about because i think that’s

another thing that people always ask me

and i never know i’ve heard them

ramp up fast and then ramp up slow like

your first laundromat where you really

felt like

maybe i’m going to do another one of

these like how long was that

well i’m not smart man so it was

not very long

yeah i mean it was not very long and

again it kind of came down for me like

i paid a lot of money to learn these

lessons let’s put them to use um

but i was i think when we bought our

second one we were still losing money on

our first one

and i was like well maybe the second one

will kind of make up for the loss of the

first one

uh yeah well we hit a little bit of a

rocky patch early on on that one but

then eventually it kind of leveled out

so it was better did you say the names

on them

what’s that did you ever change the

names on the laundry or did you keep the

names of them you know what i did not

do i didn’t do a lot of the things that

i tell people to do now and the reason i

tell people to do them now is because i

realize now how important

it is and how much better it would have

been for me so you know having like a

solid website

having like a good brand and a good name

having like new signage

when you take over a store that just

lets people on the outside know

you know you can remodel the whole

inside of the store but if nobody on the

outside knows that you did it

and it’s going to be any different it’s

not really going to help you out all

that much

right you know so fixing stuff out on

the outside just to let people know like

hey we’re taking care of this

place i can’t remember who now and

apologize to whoever the guest was that

said this but one of the great things

somebody said

was every year do something to show your

customers

that you are reinvesting in your

business big or small whether it’s paint

or putting in new machines like it

doesn’t matter

but do something you know plant some

plants or something to show customers

you’re reinvesting i think that’s

awesome awesome advice um

i feel like i definitely listen to that

podcast too but i can’t think of this

either yeah somebody’s really really

smart and

probably like really good looking and

i’m just gonna make them feel good

because i forgot who it was

um but uh yeah but so i didn’t do

any of that stuff uh you know my my one

laundry mat didn’t even have a website

until

like a year ago you know and now we’re

building

you know our marketing company builds

websites constantly now

and for laundromat owners and other

businesses but laundromat owners in

particular

and we’re doing you know seo stuff but i

didn’t do any of that stuff for myself

early on i didn’t know

man i was because of your podcast i am

building websites so if i had anytime

laundry

like anything clinton i don’t know i

have a website right that i had

anytime laundry but not every laundromat

had a website and i didn’t even know

that was

a really important thing so i’ve

actually now

each warner mat is getting their own

website

are they all are they all the same brand

all ears so mine are all

anytime laundry now but when i would buy

a laundromat that i didn’t feel

you didn’t want it to be part of the

brain i purposely didn’t bring

all of them and i even remember i had an

employee that was actually my

manager at the time and i she didn’t

work for me she didn’t like being a

manager so she went back to lieutenant

but anyway

she had said that um she thought i

should call the council of western

any time laundry because she thought it

would help grow it grow the business

there and i was like

i just don’t want it yeah i don’t want

to be associated because

like i said that one was too small to

attend and all minor attended i couldn’t

justify attending it

so i didn’t that was my main reason i

didn’t want to call that i mean if i

could have

had enough revenue to attend it and to

try and grow it that way i would have

but it was just too small

but again like you said we all learn

from these mistakes like i love that you

you said that you learned from the

mistakes and i mean you jumped in you

just got to start pulling different

levers and see what works and what

doesn’t

i mean everybody that you say is an

expert or a veteran in this industry

i mean even people that think i’m a

veteran in this industry

i didn’t know it from day one i made

lots of mistakes

today and and i think that’s important

that people realize that i mean

nobody starts out just knocking homers

out of the park

every single decision they make and then

like we wouldn’t even talk about the

signage thing with mine

i screwed up the signs on my first one

don’t beat yourself up with it just

learn from your mistakes yep i think

it’s important

and and too like man i always want to

when i’m looking to partner with people

or invest with people or any of that

stuff i’m looking for people who made a

ton of mistakes

because the people who haven’t made

mistakes yet you don’t know how they’re

going to respond

in adversity when stuff goes bad you

don’t i mean

when somebody’s been through the ringer

and they’re still standing then you’re

like okay

you know like i can respect that and

you know let’s let’s do it you know but

when you haven’t gone through

something you just don’t know right

it’s a big unknown for me so so i talked

about the unintended tenant

do you run your laundromats attended or

do you run unattended

i have i have one of each so that

montebello one that was trouble

you probably guessed is unattended again

like yours

it’s just a little too small i think

that there’s

potential actually in that one it’s not

i think you probably could do some like

drop off service and and probably even

some pickup and delivery out of there if

if you wanted to but and in fact people

ask me this all the time because i had

talked about doing pick up and delivery

um and i have been doing a little bit

but i haven’t really made a big push on

that

and the reason was a lot of my resource

kind of just started taking off in a way

that i did not expect

and i started seeing some of these other

opportunities

that were out there and i started

weighing like if i’m going to do the

pickup and delivery i got to like go i

got to go all in

on the pickup and delivery right and if

i’m going to do laundromat experience

you do well you can’t do the towing

yeah and if i’m going to do a lot of my

resource i got to go all in

and i just was weighing my options back

and forth and i kept going back and

forth and i was like eventually i was

like you know what i really

love what’s happening with laundromat

resource and i love like doing this kind

of thing

uh you know with people like you and all

these other guests we’ve had and

i love doing you know teaching people

coaching call

all that stuff like i think i’m gonna go

all in with the laundromat resource

and so we do a little bit of pickup and

delivery but not very much

so that one i think that there is

actually more potential

in the city it’s in the direct

neighborhood is

a lower income neighborhood but around

it is

i think a pretty good area for pickup

and delivery so

there’s there’s room to grow there um

[Music]

but uh i forget what the question oh

it’s unattended yeah so it’s unattended

my other one

is attended uh full time so whenever

we’re open somebody’s there

i felt like when i was when we were

reversed like i did the same thing like

you go down these rabbit holes

[Music]

like where do we start what are we

talking about

i know well i try to shut my mouth

usually and then when i get talking man

it just

that’s what i’ve been trying to do i’m

like why am i keep talking like i’m

asking the questions i’m not a

contributor

yeah it’s hard so

you’re are you coining these you don’t

do card systems or do you do it

oh man i yeah no i have

coin like i said man i if i was to start

over

now from scratch like well for example

with diligence capital investments

but like what you know we’ll do a card

system because it just makes a lot more

sense

you know from a management perspective

obviously but also i love like what it

can do for customers like you can do a

lot of promotions

you can do you know just a lot of

loyalty stuff and you gather

you know you’re gathering data on your

customers but you’re also

you know gathering ways to communicate

with them through email marketing

through you know which we do like with

the marketing company now we do email

marketing and

retargeting ads and text message

marketing like all that stuff you have

that ability to do that when you have a

card system that’s really hard to do

that

with the coin system but the downside is

that

you know you got to buy those card

systems generally speaking

and you know they’re expensive and when

you buy your laundromat

horribly wrong from the get-go it it’s

hard to

you know hard to be able to pay that so

well i’m not gonna lie to you after

doing this cci thing with the quarter

coin and dollar coin

and just getting all that to work i

think i seriously am considering on this

next one going hard

yeah just because i mean i’m trying to

incorporate two technologies together

and like it even matters what dropped

here like i use ironic drop so like they

i’ve used different chords so

i’m actually on i might be jumping

aboard this card deal like i actually

i mean i mean it’s fascinating to say

that so you’re going to do that for sure

like if you do this investment thing

you’ve like already made the decision

worked hard

people uh i mean

listen i’m always open to you know what

makes sense for the specific situation

so i would never say

100 we would always do that but i think

we would definitely

lean towards that and a big part of the

reason is

you know transparency and accountability

is huge especially when you’re

partnering with people

and there’s money involved and probably

significant sums of money

you know you just want there to be a lot

of transparency and accountability and

so you want to be able to give hard

numbers

to investors and say here’s exactly

where the money’s coming from here’s

exactly where it’s going

and it’s just so much easier to do that

with a card system

so yeah yeah well i mean

like i said it makes sense and i’ve not

even noticed like

so i even mentioned some friends i have

in iowa like he literally is doing card

system right now he’s like his temple

honor man he said

he’s just contracting with points he’s

like for no other reason like i mean i

i think he’s just doing it because it’s

getting to be unmanageable with the

amount of coins in the store

and that’s probably why the wolfers came

up with their

i mean what i don’t know freedom by ips

i don’t think is that what this is

called

yeah yeah yeah so they came up with one

i mean their own because they probably

the same thing

just higher than the coin i think when

you get that mini 40 i mean

wow yeah that’s the name versus

in four isn’t tough yeah

i’m over it with two laundromats man

they’re not even like great laundromats

you know like jeez

so what have you been in your

laundromats at in california uh

yeah the best

yeah no you have been you know i just

i’m cracking up because you

have been listening to the podcast a lot

lately because you’re

you’re saying exactly it’s just funny um

yeah i don’t know how you you segway so

well and i’m like

no you do you’re killing it dude it’s

awesome how much do i contribute how

much do i ask where do i just

you know when you you know when you hear

yourself back and it’s just kind of

funny right like you’re kind of

i’m hearing myself back through you and

it’s just kind of funny uh that’s what

i’m laughing at

uh so right now my vend prices

are uh generally i think almost

generally speaking a quarter more than

the

poundage so like a 30 pound is like 325

oh wow 425 yeah so

is that would you how do you compare to

your competition out there at those

prices

higher end are you really yeah i don’t i

don’t

understand how people like

my competitors i don’t understand how

they can make a profit

i like i i don’t get it so i don’t know

but yeah i’m

and in fact like uh laundry like i know

some people like their whole family

works on laundry they do the fluff and

fold

is that why and how they’re doing it

with those prices you almost can’t have

stuff at those prices can you

what’s that i don’t know how you would

have staff with those prices

yeah i i don’t i mean i don’t know man

yeah i don’t know it’s it’s it’s tough

but it’s like super competitive right

there’s like

i don’t know how many laundry bats are

within a mile there’s probably

six or seven laundromats within a mile

radius like my south la one

it’s just super competitive and so

you know even like i’m all about like

and one of the big

takeaways for me from just doing this

podcast and listening to

who i would consider top operators which

again

you know i’m i’m trying to get better

but i would not put myself in that

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