The Laundry Cafe, Philadelphia, One-of-a-Kind Laundromat

Success Story: Multi-mat owners Brian Holland, Tyrone Akins, & Ray Chamberlin of The Laundry Cafe traded their successful, full-time careers in Big Pharma, to enter the laundry industry. Each saw a need for laundries to do better, and provide a fundamental service to customers offering more than just wash-dry-fold. With that goal in mind, they set out to change the face of laundry.

First, that meant educating themselves on the business – they knew acquiring a new set of skills required joining the Coin Laundry Association to access specific laundry tools, visiting the annual Clean Show, attending seminars, contacting other laundry owners, and much more. 

With four laundromats currently open & operating in North Philadelphia, and a fifth near completion in West Philadelphia, Brian, Tyrone, & Ray understand that they must work hard each day to earn their customers business and respect. Metropolitan Laundry Machinery Sales, Inc. is proud to be the laundry partner for The Laundry Café.

“We were overwhelmingly impressed when meeting Howard and Marc Katzman of Metropolitan” said Brian Holland. “It was clear, they were the laundry distributor for us. Metropolitan is a family business built on years of honor, integrity, and service who offered us sage advice when launching our business. We then met with Larry Vladimir, Regional Sales Manager at Metropolitan, who was uncommonly accommodating and vested in our success”. Ray Chamberlain pointed out that “it was abundantly clear that Metropolitan isn’t just a distributor, but a partner in contributing to the success of our laundromats.

Brian, Tyrone, and Ray outfit each of their Laundry Cafe Laundromats with state-of-the-art Huebsch Commercial Laundry Equipment. They feel that the Huebsch brand fits perfectly within their franchise because of the consistent high-quality and reliable performance. Brian particularly likes that Huebsch starts out with an outstanding product, and is committed to continuous improvements.

“The performance of the Huebsch products hits all the features we were looking for in our washer-extractors and tumble-dryers. Features such as high extract speeds and water & energy saving components were super important to us. Our customers are able to wash & dry their clothing and linens in an efficient amount of time, so they can get on with their day”, Tyrone proudly stated. Each Laundry Café store offers superior products and services because they simply believe their customers deserve better. By creating a safe environment within their stores, complete with free Wi-Fi, a reading nook for kids to enjoy a quiet space all to themselves, electronic devices to play games, and other amenities while doing laundry, customers feel safe, welcome and return on a daily/weekly basis.

Source: Metropolitan Machinery – (866) 448-7132.