I still remember our first customer. It was our second day open. I had been standing behind the counter at 285 Grand St in Williamsburg from open to close, watching people walk past with laundry bags and feeling a little defeated every time they didn't come in. When someone finally walked through the door, I was genuinely filled with joy. Not even relief to be honest, just happiness. Someone chose us. That feeling is what this whole thing is built on.
Launderette New York started as a simple but stubborn belief: laundromats don't have to feel like a chore. They can be well-designed, well-run community spaces where the experience actually matches the service. What we didn't fully anticipate was everything that comes between having a good idea and actually opening the doors.
Building the Space from Scratch
We signed our lease in July 2024 and spent the next six months building everything out. About 3,000 square feet with twelve foot ceilings. A true blank canvas.
When construction costs started climbing, Ireland and I decided to take on as much of the interior as we could ourselves. Ireland built out the vision on Canva and Pinterest, our friend Liron helped bring in a designer and pull together a rendering, and another friend, Lucie, helped us source furniture that fit the look within budget.
Then we painted the entire space. Every wall, every corner, floor to ceiling. About a month of ladders, late nights, and being completely covered in paint.
It wasn't just us. My mom Lisa, my sister Talia, and our friends Estelle, Nico, and Alex all showed up and helped. It turned into this chaotic, exhausting, but honestly really beautiful stretch where the people closest to us helped build the place from nothing.
Then came the setbacks. Two major floods during build-out, one of them sewage backing up the night before an event. We were down there all night with wet vacs. I'll spare you the details but I will say: if you ever want to really stress-test your commitment to a business idea, spend a few hours doing that and see if you still want to show up the next morning. Around the same time, our van tires got slashed and the bathroom clogged three times in our first week. At a certain point you just have to laugh.
And then the HVAC. We assumed it was new, it wasn't. That's been an ongoing project ever since. If there's one takeaway, it's to always have your own people inspect things before you sign.
Looking back, that stretch is what made the space feel like ours. Not just designed, but truly built.
Opening Day in Williamsburg
We hadn't had much time to market before opening, we were too deep in finishing the space, so those first few days were quiet. I'd stand near the front and watch people with laundry bags walk past on Grand St. Every one that didn't come in stung a little.
We were running 50% off everything for the first month, so when customers did start coming in and saw the pricing, word spread fast. People would pop their heads in, look around like 'what is this place', and then come back with their friends. The neighborhood started finding us. But that first week was nerve-racking in a way that's hard to describe. We had taken on real debt to build this, and you genuinely don't know if it's going to work until you're standing in it, hoping it does. The first three or four months were the most exhausting period of our lives. We had no life outside of Launderette. I didn't really mind, we were building something - but I want to be honest about what that actually looks like, because a lot of people romanticize early-stage entrepreneurship without acknowledging how isolating and relentless it is.
What Fifteen Months Running a Laundromat in Brooklyn Taught Us
We're about fifteen months into operations now. Here's what I'd tell someone starting from scratch.
Laundromats are habitual, not impulsive. People don't walk around thinking about where to do their laundry, they already have a laundromat. Becoming someone's laundromat takes time, and you need to plan your cash runway accordingly. Everything costs more and takes longer than you projected. That's not being pessimistic, it's just true. If you're building from scratch, confirm your gas line capacity before you sign anything, getting state approval to increase gas levels can drag out for six months to over a year, all while you're paying rent on an empty space.
Your team is everything. The people you hire in the first year shape the entire culture of your business. Don't rush it and don't compromise on fit. Learn to pivot immediately, if you're too fixed on the original plan, you'll miss the actual opportunities that present themselves. Some of our best decisions came from watching what customers actually wanted and chasing that, not what we assumed they'd want. And market before you open, good businesses have customers before they start operations. We were so heads-down in the build-out that we barely marketed, and if we could do one thing differently, it would be building the audience six months before opening day when we first signed the lease.
The first year is the toughest. Filled with uncertainty, doubt, and cash burn. That's not a warning to stop you, it's a reminder to be prepared so it doesn't catch you off guard. Many times you feel alone and defeated, and it takes a genuinely strong-minded person or team to push through it. What I've come to understand is that an entrepreneur is fundamentally a problem solver. The problems and failures in the beginning are what mold both the company and you as an owner. You need them to grow. It's all part of the process.
Why We're Glad We Did It
Here's the thing about a laundromat: it's a recurring service business. People come back every week. You get to actually know your community in a way most businesses don't. We've met so many people in Williamsburg through our laundromat, regulars who come in on Sunday mornings, commercial clients we've built real relationships with, people who found us during that first month of 50% off and have been coming back ever since.
That first customer who walked through the door, I don't know their name, but I remember exactly how it felt when they came in.
It was worth the sewage.
Launderette New York is a full-service laundromat at 285 Grand St, Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Drop-off, pickup and delivery, self-service, and commercial laundry. Find us at launderettenyc.com or @launderettenyc.