When businesses compare in-house laundry to a commercial service, staffing is the cost that tips the math, and it runs well past an hourly wage.
Start With the People Doing Your Laundry
If your business washes its own towels, linens, or shop rags, someone on your payroll does that work. Most owners size up in-house laundry by its machines, detergent, and utility bill, which leaves out the expense every employer already watches closely: labor. A fair comparison with a commercial laundry service starts there.
An Hourly Wage Is Only the Starting Point
The rate you pay a laundry attendant covers only part of what that employee costs you. Each person on the crew also brings:
- Payroll taxes. The employer share of Social Security and Medicare, plus federal and state unemployment taxes, on every paycheck.
- Insurance. Workers’ compensation coverage for a job built around hot machines, wet floors, and heavy carts.
- Benefits and paid time off. Any health coverage, sick days, or vacation you offer, plus covering the work while that person is out.
- Training. Paid hours for every new hire to learn sorting, chemicals, and machine settings.
- Oversight. A supervisor’s time to schedule the crew, check the work, and approve hours, usually at a higher wage.
Stack those on top of the hourly rate, and a laundry employee costs far more than the number on the timesheet.
Staffing a Laundry Room Is a Job of Its Own
Laundry positions can take time to fill, and each time an employee moves on, you start over with job postings, interviews, and training.
Reliability adds another layer. When someone calls out, clean towels and linens don’t appear on their own. A manager covers the shift, you pull someone off the front line, or your business runs short.
Even with a dependable crew, someone still builds schedules, approves time off, and checks quality. That time comes out of a manager’s day and away from your customers.
The Rest of the In-House Bill
Labor leads the list, but in-house laundry also carries equipment purchases and repairs, water, energy, detergent, and floor space you already pay rent on. Machines that can’t reach the right temperatures shorten the life of your linens, and a breakdown on your busiest weekend sends someone on an emergency laundromat run.
Amy’s Laundry Takes Staffing Off Your Plate
Partnering with Amy’s Laundry removes the laundry crew from your operation entirely. You won’t hire laundry staff, build their schedules, train replacements, or cover call-outs. We pick up, wash, dry, fold, and return your items, so your employees stay focused on the work customers pay for.
We price commercial work by weight, and you choose drop-off or pickup. Instead of carrying a crew’s wages, taxes, and benefits year-round, plus the equipment they use, you pay for the laundry you send. We specialize in customer-owned goods for restaurants, hotels, B&Bs, salons and spas, auto repair and detail shops, assisted living facilities, gyms, and more across Westminster, Carroll County, and Baltimore County.
When In-House Still Makes Sense
An honest commercial laundry company will tell you the answer isn’t automatic. Handling laundry yourself can be the right call when:
- Your volume is small enough to fit into existing staff downtime, with no added hours or hires
- You already own reliable equipment that’s fully paid off
- You need same-hour turnaround that no pickup schedule can match
If none of those describe your operation, the math usually points the other way.
Run Your Own Numbers First
Track one normal week: staff hours on laundry, pounds washed, supply spend, and loads run. Price those hours at full cost, with taxes, benefits, and supervision included. Bring those numbers to us, and we’ll tell you honestly whether a professional laundry service would save you money.
Call (410) 848-1616 and ask for Amy, or schedule a pickup and try it for a week. You can also read more about the industries we serve on our commercial services page.
