Around the Industry

ABC Conference Explores the Power of Diversification

Live Accelerator meeting examined action vs. reaction with real-world examples

SEATTLE — America’s Best Cleaners (ABC) recently hosted its first Live Accelerator meeting in 2022 to provide a forum for its members to interact, compare notes and share ideas.

Held in Seattle in May, the event’s theme was “Diversification?” ABC’s stated goal for the event was to share ideas and experiences about how to continue to move away from simply reacting to events.

“The question wasn’t if you should diversify,” ABC Executive Director Chris White says, “but to what degree diversification best fits the owner’s goals, the market needs and the ability to build successful new businesses or service offerings that will provide sustainability in the mid and long term.”

To make the most of this in-person opportunity, the organization offered affiliates a real-life example of a business that has thrived from adding additional business channels. Attendees toured Helena’s Cleaner’s new stateof-the-art facility designed by ABC’s Chris White and Ed D’Elicio. The company welcomed its fellow affiliates and provided a glimpse of the new space designed to maximize the business services they offer.

During the meeting, ABC affiliates Mary Mills of Sir Galloway Cleaners, Robert Strong of Country Club Cleaners, and Dianne Lee of The Press DC also offered their insights on diversification. They also shared how they were able to expand their business plans to offer different services and achieve success during the pandemic.

“It’s easy to talk in hypotheticals, but the power comes from learning directly from your peers to understand their analysis, development and implementation and execution of their ideas,” White says.

Hot-Topic Trio: Customer Experiences, Trade Shows, and Increasing Profitability

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Tuchman Group Holds In-Person Gathering, Tour

California meeting offered insights for drycleaning colleagues

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Taking advantage of the ability to gather in person again, members of the Tuchman Advisory Group (T.A.G.) recently toured a member’s drycleaning plant, exchanging ideas and networking with their peers.

T.A.G. members met at Judi’s Cleaners in Sacramento, California, on May 4-6 and toured the company’s main plant. Ben and Mary Combs, owners of Judi’s Cleaners, hosted the event.

“It was wonderful to get all these talented operators to see and comment on our operations,” says the company’s president, Ben Combs.

This examination of the facility and its processes is one of the major benefits of these visits, says Ellen Tuchman Rothmann, president of T.A.G. She believes that having people from different perspectives examine the host’s business can be an invaluable tool when it comes to improving service and streamlining efficiencies.

“They walk through the business, making comments and suggesting where things could be changed,” she says. “It’s looking at every part of every department with a fresh pair of eyes.”

Sales Manager David Lee and Head of Product Josh Nye of SMRT Systems were also guest speakers.

Rothmann believes that sharing information, seeing how other businesses operate and interacting with colleagues is what T.A.G. is all about.

“I want our members to be able to go back to their companies and say, ‘Here’s what I’ve learned. Here’s what we’re going to institute,’” she says. “Even if everyone takes back just one idea to their company to improve their business, that’s a success.”

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door for an hour and having to drive or fly somewhere.”

PUTTING YOUR BEST NETWORKING FOOT

FORWARD

Whether in-person or virtually, Scalco believes that, to get the most out of networking opportunities, you’ve got to go all-in when it comes to participation. “You have to be willing to give, not just take,” she says. “You can’t go on there and just ask questions and then sit back.” Also, to receive the full power of networking, you have to be ready for the truth — even if it might be difficult to hear. “You need a bit of a thick skin,” Scalco says, “because if you ask a question, you’d have to be prepared for the answer — and it might not be the answer you want.

You must be able to say, ‘OK, I appreciate your honest feedback, and I want to know your honest feedback because that’s the only way it’s going to help me.’” In the spirit of full participation, Blake believes that members shouldn’t be afraid to show their mistakes to their group. Rather than being embarrassed, those are the moments that might provide some of the most valuable ways to help fellow cleaners. “You’ve got to be able to offer your opinions and experiences,” he says. “And sometimes it’s not the good experiences — sometimes it’s being willing to share the pain you’ve endured with something that you tried that didn’t work. ‘I put in this piece of equipment, and I had nothing but troubles with it,’ or, ‘If you’re going to go down this road, make sure you take a look at this and see how this works.’ You’re sharing your bad experience so people don’t have to relive the mistakes that you made.”

SNAPSHOTS FROM A NETWORKING FORUM

During a recent meeting of DLI’s peer-to-peer forum, several cleaners offered their opinions about the networking opportunity and what it has meant to them.

“After COVID, when these peer Zoom-to-Zoom meetings began, this was the highest level of networking we’ve ever done,” says Maria Kamperides, owner of

Boston-based Columbus Cleaners. “From our perspective, for our size, we had never had this opportunity to meet so many people from all over the country and Canada. I feel the wealth of information that we’ve gained is priceless for us.”

“I don’t think I could have survived a pandemic without these Tuesday calls,” says Ellie Tarnutzer, owner of Lake Mills Cleaners & Dyers in Lake Mills, Wisconsin. “They’ve been a real godsend.”

“Not only have these calls helped us all survive the pandemic,” Kamperides says, “but they have raised the level of our operations. I think we’re all looking to improve — to change and adapt to the new ideas we’ve picked up over the past two-plus years.”

“Networking allows us to learn more and more about all the problems that are going on throughout the industry, and share the information with each other and get solutions,” says Sidney Chelsky, executive director of the Canadian Fabricare Association. “So, we’re all benefiting from it as a result. There are some tremendous new ideas that I’ve picked up that I’m able to share with our members for their benefit and for them to improve their businesses.”

“I think local networking is so powerful because it gives you a chance to expose yourself to practices and people outside of the industry,” says Norman Way, vice president of Puritan Cleaners in Richmond, Virginia. “It’s amazing when you realize people are dealing with similar problems in a different area, and you hear solutions from a different standpoint. Joe Cocker said it best: ‘I get by with a little help from my friends.’ So, the more friends we have, the more we can get help. It also gives us the opportunity to give back and help others.”

“This was such a blessing to me,” says Rusty Smith, president and CEO of Forenta, a manufacturer of drycleaning finishing equipment based in Morristown, Tennessee. “How often can I get an incredible cross-section across North America of what’s going on in the actual drycleaning store? Before this type of networking, I would have to make phone call after phone call, email after email, and visit after visit to get information that I get here every week. I’ve learned so much about the industry that would have taken hours, weeks, months, years to accumulate.”

Many of the dry cleaners who didn’t survive the past couple of years were those who were determined to go it alone, says Bob Singer, co-owner of the Southern California-based Flair Cleaners.

“They just stood out there like an island and thought they had all the answers,” he says. “People who know how to network, and are willing to network, generally are survivors, and they’ll continue to grow. The industry wound up getting better as a result of the pandemic, and those of us who network will continue to get better and better.”