Top 5 Ways to Increase Revenue in Your Laundromat

Practical, proven ways to grow what your store earns — without buying more machines

Most laundromats leave money on the table — not because they're doing anything wrong, but because they're only capturing a fraction of what their location and customers could be worth. The good news is that growing revenue rarely requires a big investment in new machines or more square footage. Usually it comes down to adding services your customers already want and running the business a little smarter.

Here are five of the most reliable ways to increase revenue in your laundromat, starting with the ones that pay off fastest.

1. Add (or Grow) Wash and Fold Service

Self-service wash earns you quarters. Wash and fold earns you margins. For the same machines and roughly the same utilities, you're charging for a service — your time and convenience — and customers are happy to pay for it.

If you don't offer wash and fold yet, it's often the single highest-impact addition you can make. If you already do, the opportunity is to formalize and grow it: clear per-pound pricing, consistent turnaround times, and a system that keeps every order organized so quality stays high as volume climbs. Busy professionals, parents, and renters without in-unit laundry are a steady, repeat customer base — and they're far less price-sensitive than self-service users.

2. Offer Pickup and Delivery

The biggest limit on a laundromat's revenue is its four walls. Pickup and delivery removes that limit by letting you serve customers who would never walk through your door — people across town, people without cars, people who simply don't have time.

You don't need to build a delivery fleet to do this. An online ordering system that lets customers schedule pickups and deliveries — paired with a delivery partner to handle the driving — turns your store into a service that reaches the whole neighborhood. This is one of the fastest-growing segments in the industry, and the stores that offer it are capturing customers their competitors can't.

3. Sell Merchandise at the Counter

Your customers are already standing at your counter, often with time to spare. That's a retail opportunity most laundromats ignore. Detergent, fabric softener, dryer sheets, laundry bags, stain removers, snacks, and drinks are all easy, high-margin add-ons that customers will happily grab when it's convenient.

The key is making checkout effortless — your POS should let you ring up merchandise alongside laundry in the same transaction, by cash or card. Even a modest shelf of well-chosen products can add a meaningful slice of revenue on top of every visit, with very little extra effort on your part.

4. Turn First-Time Customers Into Regulars

It costs far more to attract a new customer than to keep an existing one, yet most laundromats put all their energy into the front door and none into the return visit. The stores that grow fastest are the ones that bring customers back again and again.

Simple retention tactics work: order alerts that text customers the moment their laundry is ready, a smooth online reordering experience, and consistent, reliable service that earns trust. When customers know exactly when their order is done and can reorder in a few taps, they stop shopping around. Loyalty is built on convenience and consistency — and both are easier to deliver when your system does the remembering for you.

5. Use Your Numbers to Price and Plan Smarter

You can't grow what you can't see. Many owners price by habit and staff by guesswork, which leaves money on the table on both ends. The stores that maximize revenue treat their data as a tool.

When you can see your busiest days and hours, your highest-volume services, and your revenue trends week over week, you can make decisions that compound: raise wash and fold pricing where demand supports it, staff up for your real rush instead of a guessed one, and double down on the services that actually drive profit. A POS with clear reporting turns the numbers you're already generating into your most valuable growth tool.

Start With the Quickest Wins

You don't have to do all five at once. Pick the one that fits your store best — for many owners, that's growing wash and fold or adding pickup and delivery — and build from there. Each of these layers onto the next, and together they can transform what your laundromat earns from the same footprint you have today.

The easier part is having one system that supports all of it. LaunderPay brings wash and fold management, online ordering with delivery, merchandise sales, customer alerts, and reporting together in one platform — built for laundromats, on any device, for one flat monthly price. See how it works — schedule a free demo →