Clean Laundry. Clean Planet. Clean Slates.
Our triple-bottom line.
Clean Laundry
As a for-profit social enterprise, we make our impact possible by providing commercial laundry services to hotels and other businesses. We firmly believe that our mission and our business reinforce each other, with our investments in people and sustainbility making us a more efficient, reliable, trustworthy provider for our clients.
In the marketplace, we differentiate ourselves by focusing on customers that are poorly served by industrial laundries, especially hotels under 400 rooms and local businesses of all sizes.
Clean Planet
We’re bike cargo pioneers, working to prove that two (and three)-wheeled vehicles can be commercially-viable alternatives to trucks for urban freight — since 2010, we’ve hauled millions of pounds of laundry on bikes. As we enter a new phase of our growth serving hotels, we’ve invested both in conventional transportation and custom designed Truck Trikes for local hotel deliveries.
Beyond transportation, we’ve invested in leading edge technologies to conserve water and energy inside our plants.
Clean Slates
We are inspired by a group of non-profit social enterprises, like Greyston Bakery (Yonkers), RecycleForce (Indianapolis) and Homeboy Industries (LA) that create second chances for people overcoming incarceration, homelessness, and other significant barriers to employment, which is a critical factor in combating recidivism and mass incarceration.
We set out to create opportunities for similar job seekers, but using a for-profit business as the vehicle. Our aspiration is both to create hundreds of second chance jobs ourselves, and impact how the whole private sector thinks about where to seek talent.
A Brief History
Founded in 2010
We were founded using a single bike and trailer for deliveries and a now-closed laundromat in West Philadelphia. We got our first customers by sending out an email to the neighborhood list and offering pickup and delivery service to local homes and businesses.
Proving It's Possible in Philly
Pretty quickly, we moved into new digs with highly efficient equipment and became a regular presence on the streets of Philadelphia. We began servicing fitness businesses, salons, gyms, bed and breakfasts, restaurants, and of course hundreds of homes. We literally hauled millions of pounds of laundry by bike through summer, winter, and everything in between.
Expanding the Vision:
Washington, DC
In 2013 and 2014, we took on outside investment for the first time to scale outside of Philadelphia, entering Washington DC after our management team literally biked there from Philadelphia. We also began serving larger and larger clients, like the US Veteran’s Administration, the University of Pennsylvania, and others.
May 2015
Forbes, Philly Startup Hires Marginalized Staff and Delivers 300 Pounds of Laundry on Bikes
– Successfully
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December 2014
MSNBC, Cleaning Up with Investors after Bootstrapping a Business
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October 2014
Fast Company, Why You Should be Outsourcing Your Laundry by Bike
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June 2014
Washington Post ,There’s a New Laundry Sheriff in Town
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May 2014
NPR, Doing The Laundry for Social Good
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Building Scale
Later on, we began building the capacity to keep on servicing larger clients, like full service hotels and others who measured their laundry by the ton instead of by the pound. We added ironing equipment to our facilities and sought out new additions to our management team. At the same time, in order to focus, we finally said goodbye to our home delivery business.
September 2022
CNN Business, Employers Need Workers. That’s Good News for These People.
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September 2022
Philadelphia Inquirer, Clean Slate can Give Pennsylvanians a Second Chance
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May 2017
Sustainable Purchasing Leadership Council, Leadership Award Winner (Co-winner with University of Pennsylvania)
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August 2016
SustainPHL Awards, Winner
-Impact Business Leader
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April 2016
Momentum Magazine, Cyclepreneurs
– Wash Cycle Laundry
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December 2015
Grid Magazine, Wash Cycle’s CEO Takes His Entrepreneurship National
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Next Step: Boston
In 2018, we opened our largest plant to date in the Boston area, dedicated to serving hotels, airlines, and other businesses throughout the Greater Boston area.
Our Team
Jasmin Soriano
Inventory Manager
Judit Cepeda
Production Manager
Yesenia Mejia
Production Supervisor
Yaniris Vasquez
Assistant General Manager
John Lowrey
General Manager, Boston
Fredy Hincapie
Director of Social Impact
Joao Brandao
Production Manager
Tristin Hauptman
Business & Impact Analyst