Are you thinking about adding a payment system to your laundromat? You may worry that this will be an investment without a return, or wonder how your customers will respond to the change. It’s important to be able to make an educated decision that is best for your business. Let’s take a look at the top three reasons to add a laundry card system to your store.

A Payment System can Increase the Revenue of your Laundromat

1.Build Float

When a customer loads money onto a loyalty account, it encourages them to return to your store. Float is the amount of money added to accounts, but not yet spent. As customers add more value to their cards, the ‘float’ of your business increases and contributes to a rise in your overall revenue.

2.Ability to Sell Upgrades

By offering your customers the ability to upgrade their cycles, you can offset expenses, by charging more for things like hot water and extra rinses. Upgrades like these can result in an overall increase in revenue.

3.Time of Day Pricing

With a payment system, you can charge different prices at different times of the day, or different days of the week. This allows you to offer specials during slow times to attract business and raise prices during busy periods to maximize profits.

4.Marketing Tools

With marketing programs available through a card system, you can entice new business and reach new sales goals. Loyalty Points, Bonus Packages, Free Dry Programs and Group Discounts are all loyalty programs that can be used to attract new customers, as well as incentivize existing customers to return to your store.

 A Payment System Makes Managing your Laundromat Easier

1.Simplify Employee Management

Having a payment system gives you the opportunity to remotely manage your employees. You can edit and monitor one-time and ongoing employee work schedules for multiple locations and allow employees to clock in and out for their shifts using the system.

2.Remote Monitoring of Your Laundromat

When you can’t physically be at your store, you can always access your laundromat from any remote location. You can configure vend prices and specials, run reports, configure alerts, and monitor the status of the system and equipment from your laptop or smartphone.

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 A Payment System Will Save You Time and Money

1.Make the Most of Your Time

Collecting coins from each machine in your facility is a time-consuming business and your time as an owner is valuable. As vend prices rise and stores get bigger, the physical task and limitations of accepting coins become greater, making eliminating the need for coins with a payment system a popular choice.

2.Take Control of Your Revenue

If you are paying another company to collect coins for you, that’s money out of your pocket, combined with the uncertainty of how much is actually being collected. With a card system, you can see real-time profits and sales information for each machine, allowing you to take control of your revenue.

3.Decrease Security Risks

Collecting coins and carrying around bags of money can compromise the safety of you and your employees. Your machines are more open to vandalism and theft, that can leave you with costly damage plus the loss of revenue until those machines are repaired. With a card system, you can minimize or eliminate these risks.

If you’re ready to increase your revenue, simplify store management and save time and money, the next step is finding out what payment system is right for your store.

Contact us today and let our experts help you find the best system solution that fits both the needs of you and your customer!

Today’s laundromat customers prefer to use their smartphone for purchases and have come to expect to be able to pay for goods and services via mobile device. Mobile-pay is a great option for laundry purchases because it is fast, secure, easy and convenient. However, if you’re using a mobile-pay only system, you could be missing out on the benefits of a complete card payment system. CCI’s complete card systems allow you to accept mobile payments, credit/debit payments and can even work with existing coin laundry machines. In addition to accepting payments, CCI FasCard and LaundryCard systems offer benefits that will take your laundry business to the next level. Here are five reasons to consider investing in a complete card system over a mobile-pay only system.

1) Increase in ‘Float’ and Loyalty

With a CCI system, customers can add value to a loyalty account and have the choice to purchase a flat amount or preconfigured value packages (i.e. Buy $10, Get $11). With loyalty accounts, not only will customers be encouraged to pay you in advance, you now have them obligated for that amount of money in service! The more they add, the more loyal they will be to your business.

2) Loyalty to Your Laundromat, not a Payment Company

CCI’s FasCard system has an app that acts as a loyalty card. Customers who use the app will no longer need to own a physical card but can instead use the app in the same way. They can take advantage of any of the loyalty programs you offer, and the app will keep track of it all. If they forget their loyalty card one day, they can use the app, because the functionality between the app and physical cards is interchangeable. For some mobile-pay only systems, if customers add money to their account, they may be able to use that at several different laundromats, therefore their loyalty is to the mobile-pay company and not your specific laundromat. With CCI’s system app, the customer’s float is your money and can only be used at your business, so their loyalty stays with your laundromats.

3) Marketing Tools for the Laundry Industry

CCI FasCard and LaundryCard systems offer advanced marketing and loyalty programs. Loyalty programs include Loyalty Points, Bonus Packages, Free Dry, Group Discounts and more. Utilizing the integrated marketing programs will help you attract new business and encourage loyalty with your current customer base. Mobile-pay only companies make a one size fits all product that doesn’t take into consideration the marketing and management that goes into a laundromat business. CCI was born from over 40 years of experience in the vended laundry industry and designs all products with both the operator and end user in mind.

4) Remotely Running Your Laundromat

Managing your laundromat with a CCI system is simple and can be performed from any web browser at any time. You can remotely control, view and configure your laundromat in real-time. Run profit reports, see usage statistics and sales data for each machine and change vend prices all from your smartphone, tablet or computer!

5) Hands Off Employee Management

Managers can create, edit and monitor one-time and ongoing employee work schedules in a FasCard or LaundryCard system. Your employees can use the system to view upcoming work schedules as well as clock in and out for shifts. Our task scheduler ensures employees are reminded of what they are supposed to do and lets you run reports on what tasks are not getting done.

CCI’s solutions give store owners additional tools to increase success in one integrated system. If you’re a laundromat owner or investor looking to set your business apart from the competition, contact us today to learn more about our payment solutions and how investing in the right technology can benefit your laundromat business!

What is “float” and why does it matter?

The unused value or funds left on a self-service laundry “loyalty card” is what those in the laundry industry refer to as “float.” Float is a widespread topic in the laundry industry, which comprises laundromat owners, absentee proprietors, and multi-housing managers.

It is a prevalent topic in laundromats and multi-housing facilities across the country—and on many popular online forums such as PlanetLaundry and CoinWash—because it is one of the chief monetary draws of utilizing a digital card payment system over traditional coin-slot machines.

Can any digital laundry card system accrue float?

Although float is a widely discussed topic among laundromat owners and industry insiders, owners are not always able to reap the benefits of float. With some digital laundry payment systems, there is no ability to add value onto an additional proprietary card that is only usable at their locations. In fact, most laundry payment systems only allow a customer to simply pay for vends using a credit or debit card.

It is only with more sophisticated digital laundry payment systems that float is even a possibility. With these advanced systems, laundromat owners are able to issue what are called “loyalty cards,” which entitle their customers to incentive programs such as big bill bonuses (prepay $20, receive $22 in vend credit; prepay $100, receive $110 in credit), points, and group discounts, with more options and customizations depending on whether the owner chooses to permit clients the option to accept cash and card or credit/debit cards alone. Laundromat owners can even issue “digital” loyalty cards with the help of tools like the FasCard app, which expands the loyalty card’s ability to increase float.

Digital laundry payment system providers also offer premier options for customers with secure touchscreen automated payment kiosks, which dispense loyalty cards, redeem discounts and earned point rewards, and add value to cards—all without an in-store attendant necessary. Plus, owners gain features like live bill count and email notifications.

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Loyalty cards and reloadable gift cards

The process of how float accrues with digital laundry payment cards is comparable that of reloadable gift cards. For instance, in both cases, an amount is prepaid and that amount must be spent using that particular card at locations provided in the terms of its use.

Many major banks and credit card companies, such as VISA, American Express, and MasterCard, and retailers like Amazon, Target, Apple, and Best Buy have incubated this proprietary pre-pay concept, encouraged its rise, and slowly solidified the popularity surrounding personal rechargeable gift cards, in no small part due to the unclaimed money left on these cards.

According to a 2011 report by Brian Riley, analyst for the financial consulting firm, TowerGroup estimated that a reeling $41 billion of gift card funds have gone unredeemed from 2005 to 2011. This figure was so astonishing, The Wall Street Journal picked it as its “Number of the Week” for the end of 2011.

How does float work and can it pay off the investment price of a digital card payment system?

Let’s say a laundromat has a group of customers that each buy a single loyalty card and pre-pay for the laundromat’s services with a large bill. In this scenario—after six months or so—most of those customers eventually leave various amounts of value—for some it’s .75¢ and others it’s $1.50—on each card.

If they never use the remainder of the value on their cards, this means quite a bit of “extra” on-going profit for the laundromat. Even if the float on a single card is equal to a nickel or a dime, every cent is rolled up into a continuous whole. In fact, many digital card laundromat owners report accruing upwards of $1,500 in float each month.

This is especially the case when vend prices are increased incrementally in amounts lower than 25¢. As with many other contentious issues, however, float brings with it differing opinions and on its value, use, and its capacity to be transferred from one store owner to another.

Why is float left on laundry loyalty cards?

There are plenty of reasons for customers not redeeming the value present on their cards, either through card loss, misuse, or by neglecting to bring their old card in with them when they come in to add value to it—and the actual rate of this happening is high.

Benefits of float:

• Research has shown that people spend more money when using a debit or credit card, allowing for a higher overall profit margin.
• Loyalty cards are prepaid and customers are encouraged by bonus programs that are set up to incentivize adding value onto the card in larger dollar amounts, and if that cardholder chooses to patronize a different store, the information gained by a loyalty card allows you to continue to market special offers, deals, and promotions to that loyalty card holder.
• Float can be used if a laundromat owner decides to sell their store, allowing for a more attractive selling point via a higher number of customers—or the float could even be factored into the store’s equity as a bonus.

“‘Float’ alone over time has paid for the entire CCI system.”

If you would like to learn more about Card Concepts Inc.’s (CCI’s) premier digital card payment system, LaundryCard, and how easily the investment costs can be recouped by the float accrued by the system, download our free case study, Bowen Laundromats. In this case study, Bill Bowen explains what it’s like to have a LaundryCard system after utilizing another card system and the major differences between the two.

Card Concepts Inc. is the leading provider of digital laundry payment systems, with completely cashless, card-only systems, including LaundryCard, and the card-and-cash hybrid laundry payment system, FasCard. To learn more about both systems, contact CCI at +1(866) 860-1660.