coin laundries

[washerboy]

I read the tread about the person who was gripping about the expense of washing in the facility laundry. PeterH's is response reminded me why I broke down and bought a washer and dryer. I was washing at a local laundry mat...this lady comes in with three 30 gallon trash cans...I sat and watched her pack the three cans into two top loaders...she then proceeded to pour something out of a gallon bottle that looked like dish soap...she fed her 4 quaters in the machines and was out the door....I dont exactly know what kind of washing action she got..but the machines were screaming so loud you could hear them outside. I was finishing folding when she came back...she pulled out all kinds of stuff..shoes...reusable lunch bags..a rug..jeans..towels. I decided at that moment I was going to spend the money and buy a washer and dryer...lord only knows what type of gross mess she had in there..or how many other people do the same...and I was washing in the same machines. PeterH must be a saint...if I owned a coin laundry and caught someone abusing my equipment..I'd probably end up in jail.

 

[peterh770]

Thank you!

Coin laundry fact of life #1:
People overload toploaders and underload frontloaders.

 

[laundryshark]

Exactly!

Just like what I told a neighbor who griped about her clothes not coming out clean in our coin operated top loaders: I reminded her not to overload those machines, and she would have cleaner clothes in the first place.--Laundry Shark

 

[mulls]

laundromat stories

Peter,I bet you have some incredible stories about the abuse the machines take-share a couple?
Tom

 

[peterh770]

It's funny. At first, I was really vigilant about what people could and could not do in my store. That got old REAL QUICK!!!

Customer intervention #1: Confusion
They walk in the door, blink and head for the 55# washers with their dollar store basket of clothes. "Sweetie, save yourself $3.25 and use the doubleloaders."
OR
They stare endlessly at the instructions on the front of the washer, completely unable to understand how a machine works.

Customer intervention #2: Kids don't belong in laundry cart.

Customer intervention #3: You really don't need an entire box/bottle/bag of detergent in the washers. But if you want to use a complete 32 ounce bottle of softener, knock yourself out.

Customer intervention #4: They shake out their king size comforter before stuffing it into a toploader. This one completely baffles me. If your comforter doesn't fit in your home washer, why do you think it fits in my toploaders?

Customer intervention #5: You really don't need 99 minutes of drying time. If you do, I will reselect your temperature to "low" after you leave.

Customer intervention #6: You can put more in the frontloader. Really. It's true. You can fill the drum all the way up. I'm not lying. Yes, your clothes will come clean. I know your stuff is "really, really dirty", but look, you can save yourself $3.25 if you take your stuff from the 55# washer to a doubleloader.

 

[vintagesearch]

"ditto"

i know those, how can i put it nicely...dummies! I used to go to the laundromat when our whirly died, once i was drying some sheets and two dryers down a woman was drying a featherbed on "high" heat for 70 minutes (i didn't know that at the time) as i walked away after setting the dryer she comes and pulls the featherbed out and it was on fire the whole thing! the alarm goes off the sprinklers start wetting all of us and after the dummy runs out! me and 5 other customers ended up washing everything all over again (at the laundromats expense)because the water from the sprinklers got in the dryers leaving strange black stains. The laundromat attendent told us the "that damn bitch dried a feather bed in the dryer on high heat for 70 minutes and i told her not to!" and because of dummies like her we bought our GE washer and I have never returned not till a year later to dry some linens (had no choice). I HATE LAUNDROMATS! I haven't washed or dried a load there since!

 

[pulsator]

Whenever I go to the laundromat, I have never seen someone try and do something so stupid! Worst case scenario, someone will be using their foot to cram that last sock into a Milnor! (Which of course has no problem with that!) Then again, most of the poeple I encounter at the laundromat are elderly and often times they forgot their glasses and just can't figure out how to start the machines. I kinda find it rewarding to go to the laundromat as I always end up helping someone who doesn't know what to do or can't reach the buttons on the dryers! I also have very fond memories of the laundromat, when I was a kid, my dad would take me every Sunday to wash my blankies in a Wascomat. I will always treasure the smell of the detergent, fabric softener, bleach, and a little bit of smokiness in the laundromat!

 

[JerseyMike]

My favorite laundromat, which unfortunately didn't last long :-(, was a combination laundromat and cafe -- it even had a liquior license. Talk about a great way to get the wash done! Unfortunately, it had very erratic hours (I think that it was a second career for the people who owned it), so I gave up going there after finding it closed on more then one occasion. Still, it was a great idea. It's discussed in the following article from the New York Times.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=travel&res=9B04E7D8123EF933A05755C0A9649C8B63

 

[exploder3211]

I have gone into a few laundries in my days..I have seen people do everything mentioned above (i saved the one lady the fire issue by walking over and hitting the "air" setting on the dryer when she turned around to yell at her kids, she never noticed!).. Have also seen a couple at a 24 hour laundry in asheville doing the horizontal tango on a table in the back of the laundry..They where well hidden behind the high end #55 washers, so no one could see them, but when you rounded the corner.. They thought no one would be comming in to wash cloths at 2 am!!! Alot of people in asheville who frequent laundries usualy do tons of laundry and so they bring in two trash cans and fill the back of there ghetto wagon to the max and wash everything they own in 3 quarters of the laundry.. Ughhh.. But its still fun...

 

[toggleswitch]

~I decided at that moment I was going to spend the money and buy a washer and dryer.

I had the same epiphany, once.

Still, nothing beats watching a turd-world immigrant put her wash in a machine, live roaches and all. Well at least this explained the dose or "Raid" (insecticide) she had sprayed in there moments before loading it.

I SO KID YOU NOT!

 

[maytagbear]

Fun?

Until the law was passed last November, it was legal in Ohio to smoke in a coin-op laundry. Nothing fun about clothes and household linen smelling WORSE after washing.

Kent, being a college town, has several coin-op laundries, and they range from clean, nice ones with full time attendants, to nasty, dirty, unattended, unsafe ones.

I am glad that I have hookups in this apartment. The nearest coin-op is one of the nasty ones.

The only time I use a coin-op is when I have to wash my comforter, and I always use a front loader for it.

Lawrence/Maytagbear

 

[scott55405]

I'm fortunate to live close to 3 laundromats, all of which are fairly decent. I pretty much only go though if I'm doing a comforter or something, because we have two sets here. We have enough of a mix of people with different schedules and patterns that we don't have a lot of people trying to wash all at once.

I tend to go to the one that has a parking lot, since the other two have only on-street parking. They're all walking distance, but I don't want to tug a lot of stuff walking. I'd get a cart of some kind and go to the closest one if I needed to do all my wash there.

 

[westytoploader]

There are two 24-hour non-attended laundromats (or more aptly dubbed "washaterias") here. Neither is particularly stellar, however, one is fairly well-maintained and seems to get less overloading-mamacita traffic than the other which makes it slightly better, although the downside is that it has Dexter double-loaders which (when they're working) don't seem to handle my stuffed comforter well, so I just take it to the other one which has Huebsch triple-loaders.

The top-loaders in both are mainly DD Whirlpools, but about 2 years ago, the "better" one also had quite a few vintage Maytag top-loaders on one side, which I used and posted pictures of, in addition to a short video clip I have on YouTube. I haven't been back in a while, but the last time I was there (which was a little over a year ago), most of them had been replaced with new touch-control Orbitals. Only a handful were left, and I should probably go back to see if any are still around of if it's all modern.

I've witnessed some pretty extreme overloading as well on the one I normally go to when I wash my comforter. The top-loaders are loaded pretty full on some occasions, but with the triple-loaders, it's perpetual. There are some people who cram 2-3 trash bags full of NASTY clothes which probably haven't been washed in 2 weeks at the minimum in the machine, with an inadequate (to me at least; I see no suds whatsoever) amount of detergent. I know you can load a front-loader full and the load will come out clean, but this is stuffing. And yes, they cram it in with their feet as well. What's worse is that they add all of the detergent to the pre-wash chamber in the dispenser, and NOT the wash chamber like they should. Very annoying. One of the reasons I set it on "Hot" and add detergent/booster to BOTH sections...who knows, I'm probably sanitizing the machine as well. I also make it a habit to open the doors on all of the triple-loaders, to air them out.

As for prices, I don't really pay attention to the top-loaders as I don't use them, but I believe it's $1.50 at both locations, although it could have been raised to $2.00 recently. The Huebsch triple-loaders are $3.75, and the one functional Wascomat is $3.50. At the other location, the Dexter double-loaders were $2.75 the last time I was there, although it's probably increased over the last year. Seeing as how I don't have to wash my comforter that often (when I change my sheets every week, I just put it in the dryer on high heat for 10 minutes, with the dryer balls thrown in; I try to wash it at least every 3 weeks or every month), I'm not complaining.

Austin

 

[accapp]

What really turned me off to public laundries was a sign in our local one as a kid: "No Horse Laundry" I guess dog, cat or pig laundry was Okay.