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Barrett Betts got into laundry on a whim. His mother, who had long wanted a coin-operated business, sent him home to do his homework, and he came back with a plan for a laundromat. Ten years later, Betts is the principle manager for The Laundry Co, a three-store operation in rural West Tennessee, and he built every store from the ground up on land his family owns.He served as his own general contractor, won one parcel in an online auction and persuaded a bank to sell a vacant lot beside one of his rental properties. His newest store opened a few months before this conversation, and customers there have asked whether it is a franchise.Betts and host Matt DeWolf trace how the business grew from a coin-only store that opened in spring 2016 into a hybrid operation with card systems and wash-dry-fold service. Betts walks through why his first two stores carried their town names, what changed his mind after talking with peers at CLA events, and how he keeps the stores looking new by stocking spare parts and making his rounds twice a week. He also looks ahead to pickup and delivery, commercial accounts and more stores down the road, and closes with the golden-rule advice he calls the best lesson he can offer the industry.
