Spin Cycle: Mark Csordos on Entrepreneurship, Mental Health, and Laundromats

Mark Csordos: 00:00:00

I got sick one final time while I was working for somebody else.

Mark Csordos: 00:00:03

I went to the hospital with depression and I said, you know what, I'm

Mark Csordos: 00:00:08

tired of working for other people that, that don't use me correctly,

Mark Csordos: 00:00:12

that don't really care about me.

Mark Csordos: 00:00:14

I said, maybe it's time to, we're in a different financial position.

Mark Csordos: 00:00:19

Maybe it's time to pull out that laundromat idea again.

Mark Csordos: 00:00:22

Um, uh,

Tim Winders: 00:00:34

How do you rebound from financial ruins and personal challenges

Tim Winders: 00:00:37

to rediscover entrepreneurial success and fulfillment today on seat,

Tim Winders: 00:00:42

go create the leadership journey.

Tim Winders: 00:00:43

We're joined by Mark Sordos,

Tim Winders: 00:00:45

A seasoned entrepreneur who founded CNS mystery shoppers Inc, and later reinvented

Tim Winders: 00:00:50

himself in the laundromat industry after facing bankruptcy and severe depression,

Tim Winders: 00:00:55

Mark, a Rutgers university alum and author of business lessons for entrepreneurs

Tim Winders: 00:01:01

shares his remarkable journey of resilience from gaining early recognition

Tim Winders: 00:01:05

in the New York times to overcoming personal and professional setbacks.

Tim Winders: 00:01:09

Glad to have you here, Mark.

Tim Winders: 00:01:11

And, one of the things I want to do is just to to dive in and get

Tim Winders: 00:01:13

our juices flowing is, we have just met, we connected on LinkedIn and

Tim Winders: 00:01:18

I've loved what you were doing.

Tim Winders: 00:01:19

I said, this would be a great guy.

Tim Winders: 00:01:20

I'd love to talk to him for an hour.

Tim Winders: 00:01:22

So I reached out to you and you graciously said yes, but,

Tim Winders: 00:01:26

let's pretend or not pretend.

Tim Winders: 00:01:28

We just met and we're not around your business or we're not at a.

Tim Winders: 00:01:32

Chamber or something like that.

Tim Winders: 00:01:35

And I say, Mark, what do you do?

Tim Winders: 00:01:37

What's your answer?

Tim Winders: 00:01:38

When people ask you that question,

Mark Csordos: 00:01:40

I help people get into and understand the laundromat industry,

Tim Winders: 00:01:45

period.

Mark Csordos: 00:01:47

period.

Tim Winders: 00:01:48

of the more succinct and clear responses

Tim Winders: 00:01:51

that I've had in a long time.

Tim Winders: 00:01:54

And, so I'm going to ask one laundromat question, then I'm going

Tim Winders: 00:01:58

to go backwards a little bit to see how we've arrived at this, but.

Tim Winders: 00:02:02

Why is the laundromat business something that people should consider?

Mark Csordos: 00:02:09

Because it's a great, steady, solid business

Mark Csordos: 00:02:12

that's actually still growing.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:14

The first laundromat came about, I think, in like 1934.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:19

So it's well established.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:20

Everybody knows what a laundromat is.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:22

But it's actually in a growth period, believe it or not.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:26

Thank you very much.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:26

Because with wash and fold and pickup and delivery, everybody is now a customer.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:33

another reason the laundromats are great is because it's good, steady income.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:38

revenues are very predictable, profits are very predictable.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:43

In good times and bad, people still have to wash their clothes.

Mark Csordos: 00:02:47

So they still need to, they still need a laundromat.

Tim Winders: 00:02:50

So I told you this before we clicked record, but because

Tim Winders: 00:02:54

we're, we're in RV world, I just want everyone to know I'm the laundry guy.

Tim Winders: 00:03:00

My wife hasn't done it in years.

Tim Winders: 00:03:03

And we, I don't, I don't think it would really be considered a laundromat that

Tim Winders: 00:03:07

they have in most of these RV resorts, but they're set up similar, they even have

Tim Winders: 00:03:13

the, they either had the app recorders it's, it's that type situation, but.

Tim Winders: 00:03:18

I was three days ago in a hard core laundromat here in Rapid City, South

Tim Winders: 00:03:23

Dakota, because I have three or four rugs here on the floor in the RV.

Tim Winders: 00:03:27

Not many machines can do that.

Tim Winders: 00:03:28

So I went in and found one of these 50 or 60 pound machines, loaded

Tim Winders: 00:03:33

the thing up and let her rip.

Tim Winders: 00:03:35

And it did a great job, man.

Tim Winders: 00:03:36

I, my wife says, you like going to laundromats, don't you?

Tim Winders: 00:03:39

I go, actually, I really do.

Tim Winders: 00:03:42

maybe I should consider getting one or something like that.

Tim Winders: 00:03:45

But before we, we're going to talk, we're going to go in deep with laundromat.

Tim Winders: 00:03:49

I just read your, cause you've written the laundromat Bible.

Tim Winders: 00:03:53

I want people to know that we've got some biblical, stories that we're

Tim Winders: 00:03:56

going to be telling here from the laundromat Bible in a little while, but.

Tim Winders: 00:04:00

I want to back up a little bit.

Tim Winders: 00:04:02

One of the things we love here is just talking about people's journeys and

Tim Winders: 00:04:06

how they come to be where they are.

Tim Winders: 00:04:08

And none of us I think arrive at success, just like bam.

Tim Winders: 00:04:14

And your story seems to be kind of an up and down type story.

Tim Winders: 00:04:19

did you grow up in the Jersey area or where are you from growing up?

Mark Csordos: 00:04:24

born and raised in New Jersey.

Tim Winders: 00:04:27

Born and raised in New Jersey.

Tim Winders: 00:04:28

And what kind of upgrading upbringing, just give a little bit, I know you ended

Tim Winders: 00:04:31

up with Rutgers and we're going to pick up some stuff there, but just give a

Tim Winders: 00:04:35

little bit of, mark the early years.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:39

younger brother and sister.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:41

my mom stayed home until we were old enough.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:44

my dad worked at Budweiser.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:47

they had a plant, they still do have a plant in New Jersey.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:50

So that was your typical middle class upbringing.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:54

nothing said any of us were going to be entrepreneurs.

Mark Csordos: 00:04:58

I'm the only one who wound up being one out of the three of us.

Mark Csordos: 00:05:03

I went to Rutgers, the home state university, out of there.

Mark Csordos: 00:05:07

I started my first business, so I didn't graduate in a nice, compact four years.

Mark Csordos: 00:05:14

I graduated probably about, I don't know, five and a half, six years.

Mark Csordos: 00:05:18

and then I started my business, C& S Mystery Shoppers.

Mark Csordos: 00:05:22

And I did that for four years and, started off slow, but once we picked up

Mark Csordos: 00:05:27

steam, it really, hit the ground running.

Tim Winders: 00:05:30

So what was it that sort of provoked you coming out of, cause.

Tim Winders: 00:05:34

Coming out of college, most people's path is go through the interview

Tim Winders: 00:05:39

process, check what's out there, not necessarily start a business.

Tim Winders: 00:05:44

I say that I started a business while I was in college, sold it, not really

Tim Winders: 00:05:50

sold it, gave it to somebody else almost, and then worked corporate

Tim Winders: 00:05:54

and then got back into business.

Tim Winders: 00:05:56

But why was there something that was going on that you decided not to go through

Tim Winders: 00:06:01

the interview process or to get a job?

Mark Csordos: 00:06:04

Pacific Tea Company.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:05

People might know it as that.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:07

It's now out of business.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:09

But for a while, it was one of the biggest, companies in the country and

Mark Csordos: 00:06:13

also one of the biggest grocery chains.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:15

And I lived, literally on the other side of the fence.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:18

We used to hit our wiffle balls and stuff into the parking lot.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:22

So I had worked there, for about eight years in high school and

Mark Csordos: 00:06:25

college, part time in high school and then full time in college.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:30

And I realized, wow, this is not really a great place to work and I don't want

Mark Csordos: 00:06:35

to work here, but I did come, I came across an idea with the mystery shopping.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:41

I read about it in an article and I was like, wow, you know,

Mark Csordos: 00:06:45

is a billion dollar company.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:47

We could use this, but I've never even heard of it before this article.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:52

So it stood to reason to me that other companies.

Mark Csordos: 00:06:56

Could use it also and that's when I said, you know what forget the amp

Mark Csordos: 00:07:01

Let me let me see if I can start this mystery shopping company, and My

Mark Csordos: 00:07:05

girlfriend at the time later my wife And my best friend were basically as

Mark Csordos: 00:07:11

naive as I was, I said, Hey, I'm going to start this mystery shopping company.

Mark Csordos: 00:07:14

And they're like, okay, yeah, it sounds great.

Mark Csordos: 00:07:16

And like none of us knew anything, but it worked.

Tim Winders: 00:07:21

So tell for people that don't know, tell them what mystery shopping is.

Tim Winders: 00:07:28

Cause I think that's a cool business too.

Tim Winders: 00:07:31

And I also think we'll talk later when we go on the line, I think it helps.

Tim Winders: 00:07:35

It helps you later in your business that you open later,

Tim Winders: 00:07:38

but mystery shopping, what is it?

Mark Csordos: 00:07:42

So our very first client was Pizza Hut.

Mark Csordos: 00:07:44

And this is back when Pizza Hut used to be bigger and better than it is today.

Mark Csordos: 00:07:50

today it's just takeout, but I believe it or not.

Mark Csordos: 00:07:54

For younger people listening, there used to be a time when

Mark Csordos: 00:07:57

you went to Pizza Hut and you actually had to wait to get seated.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:00

So it was a big deal.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:01

So our, the gentleman owned 18 restaurants, and we would go in there

Mark Csordos: 00:08:06

based on preset criteria to see how quickly we got seated, how quickly

Mark Csordos: 00:08:11

the waitress came over, how long it took the food to come out, how was

Mark Csordos: 00:08:15

the food, did they suggest things, salad bar, breadsticks, to upsell

Mark Csordos: 00:08:20

the order, were the tables getting bussed, was, how was the temperature,

Mark Csordos: 00:08:24

the music, were the bathrooms clean?

Mark Csordos: 00:08:26

All of this would go into a report, both of the raw score and comments.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:31

So the owner had an objective idea of what it was like to be

Mark Csordos: 00:08:35

a customer in his restaurant.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:37

Because obviously when the owner goes in, everybody knows and they

Mark Csordos: 00:08:41

treat the person differently.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:43

When the mystery shopper comes in, They're just a regular couple on

Mark Csordos: 00:08:48

a Saturday night having dinner.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:50

So over the course of a year we did I think like 254 shops

Mark Csordos: 00:08:55

for this pizza hut owner.

Mark Csordos: 00:08:57

So he could see individual restaurants and he could also see individual

Mark Csordos: 00:09:01

trends within, his 18 stores.

Mark Csordos: 00:09:04

Like, You know what, we do a great job at the bathrooms, but we don't

Mark Csordos: 00:09:08

do enough, suggesting salad bar, breadsticks, that's leaving money on

Mark Csordos: 00:09:13

the table, that's a training issue.

Mark Csordos: 00:09:16

And then over time, we did obvious places, we worked with a couple of supermarkets,

Mark Csordos: 00:09:21

like Manhattan Bagel, restaurants, and we also did unusual places.

Mark Csordos: 00:09:26

We mystery shopped the New, the New Jersey Lottery.

Mark Csordos: 00:09:29

And, the New York Waterway were two of the more unusual ones we did.

Tim Winders: 00:09:36

I think it's gotta, I think it's gotta take a certain level

Tim Winders: 00:09:39

of self awareness as an owner or an executive team if it's a bigger operation

Tim Winders: 00:09:46

to say, we need to bring someone else from the outside in to be a customer.

Tim Winders: 00:09:54

Did you notice anything in common about the people that contracted with you?

Tim Winders: 00:10:00

Any commonalities there?

Mark Csordos: 00:10:03

Usually it was the smaller companies that were harder to get.

Mark Csordos: 00:10:06

The bigger companies were pretty easy.

Mark Csordos: 00:10:09

once, like if you're a supermarket and you have, millions of dollars

Mark Csordos: 00:10:13

in sales, hundreds, maybe if not thousands of employees,

Mark Csordos: 00:10:17

there's, A lot of moving pieces.

Mark Csordos: 00:10:20

When you own one restaurant, you might feel, nah, I'm here a lot.

Mark Csordos: 00:10:25

Everything is good.

Mark Csordos: 00:10:27

That doesn't necessarily, that's not necessarily true, but it was a little

Mark Csordos: 00:10:31

harder to convince the mom and pops that, mystery shopping was a good idea

Mark Csordos: 00:10:37

as opposed to the larger businesses.

Tim Winders: 00:10:39

All right.

Tim Winders: 00:10:40

so we look at the people that would contract with you, but what did you

Tim Winders: 00:10:44

learn about business in general?

Tim Winders: 00:10:48

Or I guess some point you wrote business lessons for entrepreneurs.

Tim Winders: 00:10:51

I don't know if it was during that time or later, but what are some takeaways

Tim Winders: 00:10:56

that you still use today that you learned during that season of your life?

Mark Csordos: 00:11:01

One is patience.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:03

When you start a business, it's going to take longer than

Mark Csordos: 00:11:07

you want for it to take off.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:10

and it might seem like times on paper that things happen quickly, but

Mark Csordos: 00:11:16

during real life when you're living through it, it can seem like, forever.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:21

So I think patience was one of the big things that I learned.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:26

Also, be very careful of working with family.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:30

A lot of times, When you have a small business, it's natural that you ask a

Mark Csordos: 00:11:37

friend, a family member to help out.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:41

What I learned was, would you actually, if they weren't your,

Mark Csordos: 00:11:46

if they weren't related to you.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:48

Would you still hire them, and if the answer is no just because they're

Mark Csordos: 00:11:53

working for free don't don't use them, because that was a mistake now.

Mark Csordos: 00:11:59

I'm married 28 years So we survived the mystery shopping But we did struggle a

Mark Csordos: 00:12:05

lot because my wife is a little younger than I am and she wasn't prepared

Mark Csordos: 00:12:10

For it to take off the way it did, we had, we were in the New York Times and

Mark Csordos: 00:12:15

Vogue and, you have these companies, we went from me making the cold calls to

Mark Csordos: 00:12:21

people reading about us and calling us.

Mark Csordos: 00:12:25

And then, it became a lot and she wasn't prepared for it.

Mark Csordos: 00:12:30

And to me, it didn't seem that difficult, but for her, In her early

Mark Csordos: 00:12:35

20s it was and I would always tell her look you're not getting fired.

Mark Csordos: 00:12:39

You're only getting promoted So you better figure this out.

Mark Csordos: 00:12:42

And now today it's, we work together a lot better, but back then it was

Tim Winders: 00:12:47

it sounds like that was a pretty sweet statement that you made.

Tim Winders: 00:12:49

hey, honey, come on, buck up and get tough here.

Mark Csordos: 00:12:55

I, yeah, I was probably, my wife still thinks I'm type A.

Mark Csordos: 00:12:59

I was probably like A plus back then.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:02

So I don't know if I necessarily had the, I could have probably massaged

Mark Csordos: 00:13:06

it, said it better back then.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:08

I would handle it differently

Tim Winders: 00:13:11

that goes back to the first thing you mentioned, patience, instead

Tim Winders: 00:13:13

of, maybe snapping immediately or saying something like, let me catch my breath

Tim Winders: 00:13:17

here and think about this before I.

Tim Winders: 00:13:19

Before I respond.

Tim Winders: 00:13:21

so that, that business sounds like at least for a while.

Tim Winders: 00:13:25

Was very profitable, very lucrative.

Tim Winders: 00:13:28

can you give me any info on what, people still do that, right?

Tim Winders: 00:13:31

That's, that is still an industry out there.

Tim Winders: 00:13:34

Haven't seen it in a while though, myself.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:39

I'm sure it's still out there.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:40

my, when my wife became pregnant with our first child I said, you know what?

Mark Csordos: 00:13:45

Maybe this is a sign to move on and do other things.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:49

I wasn't married to mystery shopping.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:52

I just stumbled into it.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:54

You I quit the A& P.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:55

I burned my bridges so I couldn't go back.

Mark Csordos: 00:13:59

And I was like, okay, you know what?

Mark Csordos: 00:14:02

We did it.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:03

I showed I could do it.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:04

There are other things I want to do in life.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:07

Um, this will get my wife out of the business.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:10

And we'll move on.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:12

I'll go on to, act number two.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:14

Unfortunately, act number two was a little harder than, the mystery shopping was.

Tim Winders: 00:14:21

at what point, when did you write the book?

Tim Winders: 00:14:24

And I didn't read that book.

Tim Winders: 00:14:25

I wasn't able to get that book, but the, business lessons for

Tim Winders: 00:14:28

entrepreneurs, when'd you write that?

Mark Csordos: 00:14:31

I wrote it right after the sale of the

Mark Csordos: 00:14:33

business, while my wife was pregnant.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:35

And basically what happened, I, I just started writing

Mark Csordos: 00:14:38

down the lessons I learned.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:40

And these are the things that I wish I had known before I

Mark Csordos: 00:14:44

started the mystery shopping.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:46

And the more I wrote, because, she was pregnant, we had plenty,

Mark Csordos: 00:14:49

I had plenty of time to write.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:52

It just started to take the form of a book.

Mark Csordos: 00:14:55

And again, being naive and coming right off the success of the mystery

Mark Csordos: 00:14:59

shopping, I was like, yeah, I can write a book, I can be a published author.

Mark Csordos: 00:15:04

And I mean, it did happen, but again, that also took longer than expected.

Mark Csordos: 00:15:10

But it did eventually happen.

Tim Winders: 00:15:12

so what year was that book?

Tim Winders: 00:15:13

When did that come out?

Mark Csordos: 00:15:15

Probably, I guess the early 90s.

Tim Winders: 00:15:18

wow.

Tim Winders: 00:15:18

Okay.

Tim Winders: 00:15:19

So that's been a while back.

Tim Winders: 00:15:21

90s or a

Mark Csordos: 00:15:21

No,

Mark Csordos: 00:15:22

early

Tim Winders: 00:15:24

I was going to say, wait, I didn't think you were that old, man.

Tim Winders: 00:15:26

That's you're not older than me, man.

Tim Winders: 00:15:27

It's okay, it seemed.

Mark Csordos: 00:15:29

I'm 53.

Mark Csordos: 00:15:30

It

Tim Winders: 00:15:30

seems like a long time ago though, doesn't it?

Tim Winders: 00:15:33

so early.

Tim Winders: 00:15:34

if someone were to pick that book up today, would you feel confident that

Tim Winders: 00:15:40

most of what's in there still applies, or would you feel like there needs to be

Tim Winders: 00:15:46

some pretty healthy adjustments based on 20 years later, almost in your experience?

Mark Csordos: 00:15:53

I think most of it applies.

Mark Csordos: 00:15:55

if I had to, add or edit some, maybe some of the technology has changed, but I don't

Mark Csordos: 00:16:00

think the people haven't changed, the way that, I would deal with people, you

Mark Csordos: 00:16:05

know, working with family, the patients, I really think most of the lessons I

Mark Csordos: 00:16:10

learned They're I feel like universal.

Mark Csordos: 00:16:13

They're the same ones that you know, I try to teach my kids and

Mark Csordos: 00:16:16

Yeah, I would teach anybody that was trying to get into entrepreneurship.

Tim Winders: 00:16:20

And what's interesting is if we go back to that time,

Tim Winders: 00:16:24

because I had to do this recently on a project I was working on,

Tim Winders: 00:16:27

it was the internet was extremely young from a business standpoint.

Tim Winders: 00:16:35

And social media didn't exist,

Mark Csordos: 00:16:40

Yeah, we'd have to add a chapter on that.

Mark Csordos: 00:16:42

But most of it I would feel

Tim Winders: 00:16:44

And I guess Google wasn't even a thing either.

Tim Winders: 00:16:48

So anyway, that's cool.

Tim Winders: 00:16:50

All right.

Tim Winders: 00:16:50

so now I, I think we're at a kind of a pivotal time from what I read at the very

Tim Winders: 00:16:55

beginning of your laundromat Bible book that you did you go out and get a job?

Tim Winders: 00:17:00

Is that what you did at that stage?

Mark Csordos: 00:17:04

I tried to start doing public speaking.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:08

And I had a little success, not a lot.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:11

But, it takes, again, it takes a while to get started.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:14

And then 9 11 happened.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:18

So all of like company, nobody knew what was going on.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:22

So a lot of companies, they didn't spend any extra money.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:25

So the training and all that kind of stuff, it.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:29

They shut down the budgets, and since I was a beginner anyway,

Mark Csordos: 00:17:33

there was nothing for me.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:36

yeah, I'd say I spent the next 20 years just in a career wilderness.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:42

I, we wound up having two more kids, I'm still happily married, personally

Mark Csordos: 00:17:47

my life was good, personal life.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:49

But as far as the career, you know, I'm not, I didn't really used to mention it,

Mark Csordos: 00:17:54

but I think it's important to share now.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:57

With people, I do suffer from depression.

Mark Csordos: 00:17:59

I still take medication for it.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:01

I've had several, major bouts of depression, in my life.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:06

And that also hurt, subsequent business ideas that I've had because I'd be

Mark Csordos: 00:18:11

going along and then, I have this bout of depression and then everything would

Mark Csordos: 00:18:16

just stop in its tracks and that's really not, when you're a solopreneur.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:24

You're basically, you're done.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:26

so I've also worked, I've worked for a couple of companies that also,

Mark Csordos: 00:18:30

uh, as a low level manager, and they were all they were honest jobs, but

Mark Csordos: 00:18:38

to me, kind of like dead end jobs.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:40

they weren't gonna go anywhere.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:42

two or three of the companies wound up going bankrupt anyway.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:44

I hope, hopefully that's not a reflection on me, like I'm bad luck or something.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:49

You But yeah, so I spent, a good, I don't know, 18, 19 years just

Mark Csordos: 00:18:54

like Struggling really, i'm not proud of it, but it happened.

Mark Csordos: 00:18:59

we also went through bankruptcy um after I was working for a company that

Mark Csordos: 00:19:05

later went bankrupt, but I got let go during the The great recession and I

Mark Csordos: 00:19:10

was actually fired I wasn't let go but I felt like they used an excuse to get

Mark Csordos: 00:19:14

rid of me You And I don't totally blame them in the sense, I remember walking

Mark Csordos: 00:19:19

around there around Christmas time.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:22

And I was like, wow, if I wasn't here, they wouldn't even know it.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:25

And then, not long after that, I got fired.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:29

yeah, so we faced bankruptcy.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:32

we faced foreclosure.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:34

I still, dealt with the, depression.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:37

it was rough.

Mark Csordos: 00:19:39

right now we're in a, we're in a good place, you know, and my wife, uh, You

Mark Csordos: 00:19:44

know, every now and then, she, I mean, we don't have a, we have a nice house,

Mark Csordos: 00:19:47

we don't have a mansion or anything like that, we have a nice house, And she's

Mark Csordos: 00:19:51

just like, you know, from where we've come, to where we are now, sometimes

Mark Csordos: 00:19:55

she just wants to cry, because this is, her house, and, we After a long time

Mark Csordos: 00:20:02

out of the wilderness, so that's why I don't mind talking about the depression

Mark Csordos: 00:20:06

because I want other people to know and I write about it occasionally

Mark Csordos: 00:20:10

not a lot on LinkedIn, there is life afterwards and you can deal with it.

Mark Csordos: 00:20:17

I wrote a post recently about Brad Delp.

Mark Csordos: 00:20:20

if the listeners don't know him, he's the lead singer of Boston.

Mark Csordos: 00:20:24

You know, so if you've ever rocked out to More Than a Feeling, or,

Mark Csordos: 00:20:27

Amanda, who I named my daughter after, he committed suicide.

Mark Csordos: 00:20:32

and you look at somebody who had, the ultimate in talent,

Mark Csordos: 00:20:36

was in one of the greatest bands ever, I'm sure he had money.

Mark Csordos: 00:20:41

But those things don't really matter.

Mark Csordos: 00:20:43

he had an illness and, but I want people to know that there is a

Mark Csordos: 00:20:47

light at the end of the tunnel, it's not always close, but it's

Tim Winders: 00:20:51

Is, would you say And I'm, pardon, this might be an ignorant question

Tim Winders: 00:20:57

related to that, but would you say it's cured, it's better, medication is helping

Tim Winders: 00:21:04

it, the fact that your business is doing well is a good thing, what, where would

Tim Winders: 00:21:09

you say you're at now with depression?

Mark Csordos: 00:21:14

I would say it's managed, I made a deal with my wife.

Mark Csordos: 00:21:20

That if we bought the laundromat because one of the things Mental health care

Mark Csordos: 00:21:26

in america is sketchy, it's sometimes difficult to get good help there was

Mark Csordos: 00:21:32

a point where you know, I went to one place and I basically just had rotating

Mark Csordos: 00:21:35

doctors and they didn't know me And at a certain point I was just like they

Mark Csordos: 00:21:41

just keep giving me the same thing I don't even know if it's working anymore.

Mark Csordos: 00:21:45

The original person I met is long gone You know, so I stopped

Mark Csordos: 00:21:49

taking any kind of medication.

Mark Csordos: 00:21:52

I had a relapse.

Mark Csordos: 00:21:53

So the deal that I made with my wife was, you if she let me, and she bought into

Mark Csordos: 00:22:00

it, the laundromat, I went through all the numbers and explained why this will be

Mark Csordos: 00:22:05

different than previous times, that I stay on the medication and that I agree to.

Mark Csordos: 00:22:12

go to occasional therapy and see a doctor, you so I don't have to go once

Mark Csordos: 00:22:17

a week, but as long as, like every three months, you just check in with

Mark Csordos: 00:22:21

somebody, you don't backslide, she'll support the, the next business idea.

Mark Csordos: 00:22:27

So that's where we are now.

Tim Winders: 00:22:29

So again, this may be another, ignorant question, but going

Tim Winders: 00:22:34

back during, you mentioned, I think, 18 years that were quite the struggle where

Tim Winders: 00:22:39

you were dealing with that and definitely ups and downs, probably financially and

Tim Winders: 00:22:44

just, Hate to have this awesome club, but yeah, we've gone through bankruptcy.

Tim Winders: 00:22:50

Yes.

Tim Winders: 00:22:50

We've had a home foreclosed homeless for a number.

Tim Winders: 00:22:53

I'm still homeless truthfully.

Tim Winders: 00:22:55

but more by choice now, my wife and I talk about where would we want to live?

Tim Winders: 00:22:59

We go, let's just keep roaming around, we'll just be nomads or.

Tim Winders: 00:23:03

I wish it was more like a pirate, but she doesn't like that terminology.

Tim Winders: 00:23:07

But, I've noticed with myself and I've been entrepreneur business owner since

Tim Winders: 00:23:12

mid eighties that, and I've never gone and gotten diagnosed with anything, so

Tim Winders: 00:23:17

I don't know, but like things are going great, man, and I'm in a pretty good mood.

Tim Winders: 00:23:23

Things are tough, not much in the bank account.

Tim Winders: 00:23:25

I'm still putting a smile on my face, things are turning on the inside.

Tim Winders: 00:23:29

we're about to have to tell our kids, that are right at in getting out of

Tim Winders: 00:23:33

high school, by the way, there's going, there's not going to be a home anymore.

Tim Winders: 00:23:37

And.

Tim Winders: 00:23:38

And I guess my question for you, and again, if it's related or not, you

Tim Winders: 00:23:43

definitely correct me, but did you notice any correlation and or causation

Tim Winders: 00:23:50

with the ups and downs of finances, Your situation business, because

Tim Winders: 00:23:56

entrepreneurship is already hard enough.

Tim Winders: 00:24:00

If all of a sudden now you don't layer that also there's, the

Tim Winders: 00:24:03

depression that's factored in.

Tim Winders: 00:24:05

So talk, whatever you want to take from what I said or correct me.

Tim Winders: 00:24:08

I'm okay with that.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:10

it does run in families and, fortunately as I'm not aware of

Mark Csordos: 00:24:16

my brother or sister having an issue with it, but yeah, so both my parents

Mark Csordos: 00:24:21

had it and they had it, pretty rough.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:24

And that's the thing with depression.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:26

There's not necessarily a correlation.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:29

there are, situational depressions that people can get into, like

Mark Csordos: 00:24:33

with a divorce, that type of thing.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:36

I've been hitting on all cylinders sometimes, and I'm still depressed.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:41

It's just, it's like a chemical imbalance.

Mark Csordos: 00:24:44

that's why you take the medication and that's why I agreed to, keep

Mark Csordos: 00:24:51

seeing the therapist and the doctor so that it can be managed, and like one

Mark Csordos: 00:24:56

of the things that I've told people because, you don't brag about having

Mark Csordos: 00:25:01

depression, you usually don't tell people, if you had high blood pressure

Mark Csordos: 00:25:05

and you were taking medication, You wouldn't think twice about sharing that.

Mark Csordos: 00:25:09

There's no shame in that.

Mark Csordos: 00:25:10

you have it, you take medication, the other person's not going

Mark Csordos: 00:25:14

to think anything about it.

Mark Csordos: 00:25:15

So it's the same with depression.

Mark Csordos: 00:25:18

I take my medication, uh, and I manage it and I still have some bad days, but,

Mark Csordos: 00:25:24

for the most part, you I have my goals and I just keep plugging away at them.

Tim Winders: 00:25:30

Yeah.

Tim Winders: 00:25:30

the, good thing about.

Tim Winders: 00:25:32

The way social media is.

Tim Winders: 00:25:34

And I think this may have been something that attracted me to you over on LinkedIn

Tim Winders: 00:25:38

is that it's okay for men of certain ages to show some vulnerability now where

Tim Winders: 00:25:46

years ago it was definitely not okay.

Tim Winders: 00:25:51

And, I just played pickleball this morning with a guy that, younger guy that a

Tim Winders: 00:25:56

year ago, his wife suddenly passed away.

Tim Winders: 00:26:00

And I'm just trying to check in and say, Hey, how are you doing?

Tim Winders: 00:26:03

And we had a very, it wasn't a very deep conversation, but And I do want

Tim Winders: 00:26:07

to say that just from what I've seen with the way you do on LinkedIn,

Tim Winders: 00:26:11

I think is extremely healthy.

Tim Winders: 00:26:13

The way you're sharing about your business and teaching and coaching and educating

Tim Winders: 00:26:18

people there, but also being human about.

Tim Winders: 00:26:21

the human behind it.

Tim Winders: 00:26:23

So that's probably why you and I are talking here, because those are

Tim Winders: 00:26:26

the kind of stories that we like to, to link in so at some point over

Tim Winders: 00:26:32

the last handful of years, cause you haven't been in the laundromat

Tim Winders: 00:26:34

business long, but at some point.

Tim Winders: 00:26:38

That started either appealing to you or it fell in your lap or it was an accident or

Tim Winders: 00:26:42

something I know in the book you go into a little bit more But let's start going into

Tim Winders: 00:26:45

the laundromat because I want to spend our time together really Kind of picking

Tim Winders: 00:26:48

that apart over the last few minutes So give me that story that kind of led up

Tim Winders: 00:26:53

to you saying I want to own a laundromat

Mark Csordos: 00:26:57

I had read some books and, my wife liked the idea also.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:01

So I got sick one final time while I was working for somebody else.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:05

I went to the hospital with depression and I said, you know what, I'm

Mark Csordos: 00:27:09

tired of working for other people that, that don't use me correctly,

Mark Csordos: 00:27:14

that don't really care about me.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:15

I said, maybe it's time to, we're in a different financial position.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:20

Maybe it's time to pull out that laundromat idea again.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:23

So I spent, I think like 10 weeks out on disability and I just poured into

Mark Csordos: 00:27:28

everything laundromats, videos, articles, anything I could get my hands on.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:34

And, I took action.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:36

That's the biggest thing.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:37

I took action.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:39

I sent out letters to laundromat owners in my area.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:43

They were I just, did a Google search around where I live.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:49

I said, the very simple letter, saying that I would look into buy a laundromat,

Mark Csordos: 00:27:54

if you're interested in selling or if you know somebody, here's my phone number.

Mark Csordos: 00:27:59

That's it.

Mark Csordos: 00:28:00

And I got three responses.

Mark Csordos: 00:28:01

One wanted too much money.

Mark Csordos: 00:28:04

One couldn't pull the trigger.

Mark Csordos: 00:28:05

And the one is.

Mark Csordos: 00:28:09

So probably a few months after being hospitalized, I was

Mark Csordos: 00:28:13

the owner of a laundromat.

Tim Winders: 00:28:16

so I want to, I think this is a good time to talk about the process

Tim Winders: 00:28:21

of knowing if something's valuable.

Tim Winders: 00:28:25

And let me do this maybe before we even do that.

Tim Winders: 00:28:30

I put laundromats in the, in this category that are great.

Tim Winders: 00:28:39

Cash businesses that are not sexy at all.

Tim Winders: 00:28:44

And probably a lot of people, their ego wouldn't allow them to even consider it.

Tim Winders: 00:28:51

is that fair?

Tim Winders: 00:28:53

Or how would you respond if I brought that up?

Mark Csordos: 00:28:58

Yeah, I understand.

Mark Csordos: 00:28:59

they're becoming more popular with the internet, and there's a lie out there that

Mark Csordos: 00:29:04

they're passive income, which they're not.

Mark Csordos: 00:29:07

But yes, I do agree with the unsexy business.

Mark Csordos: 00:29:11

most people, if, you if you wanna be on CNBC, be a tech entrepreneur,

Mark Csordos: 00:29:17

but owning a laundromat, owning a landscaping company, owning a

Mark Csordos: 00:29:21

roofing business, they're not sexy.

Mark Csordos: 00:29:24

I don't think anybody ever grows up and says, that's what I'm gonna do.

Mark Csordos: 00:29:27

unless your dad or mom already owned one.

Mark Csordos: 00:29:30

Uh, but you know what?

Mark Csordos: 00:29:31

They're great businesses and they make money.

Mark Csordos: 00:29:35

So they, I think they are sometimes overlooked.

Tim Winders: 00:29:38

And listen, it's one of these things where, if you

Tim Winders: 00:29:41

really evaluate what is needed.

Tim Winders: 00:29:45

by culture and society.

Tim Winders: 00:29:48

People are, let's hope this keeps occurring.

Tim Winders: 00:29:51

People are always going to wear clothes

Tim Winders: 00:29:54

and with me,

Mark Csordos: 00:29:55

I guess it depends what you look

Tim Winders: 00:29:57

yeah, there could be some situations we don't

Tim Winders: 00:29:59

want to go down that path.

Tim Winders: 00:29:59

Let's don't do that, Mark.

Tim Winders: 00:30:01

And, and there, and those clothes are going to get dirty and

Tim Winders: 00:30:03

they're going to need washed.

Tim Winders: 00:30:04

And, some people say, people are probably going to have their own washing machine.

Tim Winders: 00:30:08

I don't.

Tim Winders: 00:30:09

And you know what?

Tim Winders: 00:30:10

I've got 400 people around me here that don't, maybe a couple

Tim Winders: 00:30:14

of them have, something in their rigs or something like that.

Tim Winders: 00:30:16

But, later this week, I've got three laundry apps on my phone,

Tim Winders: 00:30:22

three of the laundry apps.

Tim Winders: 00:30:23

So there's tech involved and I get emails from them and they market to me on it.

Tim Winders: 00:30:27

And so I'll go up and, put my clothes in and go to that.

Tim Winders: 00:30:30

I think it is.

Tim Winders: 00:30:32

And so I've got a buddy of mine who's in the self storage business.

Tim Winders: 00:30:37

And then I've got someone who is looking at the car wash

Tim Winders: 00:30:40

business, automatic car wash.

Tim Winders: 00:30:42

And I don't want to say I put all of these in the same category,

Tim Winders: 00:30:46

but sort of in the same category.

Tim Winders: 00:30:50

Businesses that a lot of people, like you said, that want to be on CNBC, they're

Tim Winders: 00:30:55

thinking, I need to start a new app and do this or do that, or, something.

Tim Winders: 00:31:00

May not be Thinking about those businesses, but those are great

Tim Winders: 00:31:04

businesses that people need.

Tim Winders: 00:31:07

so you evaluated the laundromat business talk before we go into it, talk about,

Tim Winders: 00:31:13

I think you said you, you got all this in the book, but 35, 000 laundromats

Tim Winders: 00:31:19

in the U S is that number still good?

Mark Csordos: 00:31:21

There's roughly 35, 000 laundromats in the country, and as

Mark Csordos: 00:31:26

an industry, roughly 6 to 7 billion dollars in sales for those 35, 000.

Tim Winders: 00:31:34

So someone's going huh, but so of that how many of those would be

Tim Winders: 00:31:39

would they be owner operator types and how many are there franchises are there

Tim Winders: 00:31:43

like any big dogs In the industry because I don't see that and I travel a good bit

Mark Csordos: 00:31:49

Most of the industry, I would say, it's funny, I looked this stat

Mark Csordos: 00:31:53

up for somebody recently, and I think it was 80% of laundromats are either owned

Mark Csordos: 00:32:00

by Laundromat owners either own one or two locations So 80 of it right there

Mark Csordos: 00:32:07

and then you have a couple of percentage That own maybe three a couple that own

Mark Csordos: 00:32:12

four or five and then you have a couple

Mark Csordos: 00:32:17

I think the biggest one I can think of is this it's a family

Mark Csordos: 00:32:21

they've had it for like generation I think they own like a hundred.

Mark Csordos: 00:32:25

So there's nothing out there that would be considered like a Walmart of laundry mats.

Mark Csordos: 00:32:32

most of them, it's the mom and pop in your town.

Tim Winders: 00:32:36

Why do you, is there a reason for that?

Tim Winders: 00:32:38

Because one of the things that some people, when they look at business,

Tim Winders: 00:32:43

they want to think, how do I scale?

Tim Winders: 00:32:45

How do I grow?

Tim Winders: 00:32:47

How do I do it?

Tim Winders: 00:32:47

Is that just not the makeup?

Tim Winders: 00:32:50

Or what's the hindrance, if there is one, on why there's

Tim Winders: 00:32:53

not a Walmart in the industry?

Tim Winders: 00:32:57

In your opinion,

Mark Csordos: 00:32:58

I think because of technology, laundry mats

Mark Csordos: 00:33:02

are catching up on technology.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:04

And so you go back to even like pre COVID, you didn't have a POS system.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:12

Unless you created your own POS system, and so now there's companies

Mark Csordos: 00:33:18

out there like sense curbside and they, you can have a POS system.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:23

So now you can scale, you can have two, three, four, 10 locations.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:28

They're all running on the same, just like target.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:30

They're all running on the same POS system.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:33

They're all charging the same prices before that, when you, before, like before

Mark Csordos: 00:33:38

COVID, if you did pickup and delivery.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:42

Or you did wash and fold.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:44

You're literally writing it down in a notebook like this.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:50

Just think about this, it's 2020 and people are keeping their

Mark Csordos: 00:33:54

records in a spiral notebook.

Mark Csordos: 00:33:57

Now there are still a lot of laundromats that do that, but there are, like

Mark Csordos: 00:34:01

mine doesn't, I have a POS system.

Mark Csordos: 00:34:04

So the POS is allowing you, and another problem I think was the inability of

Mark Csordos: 00:34:10

these machines to take credit cards.

Mark Csordos: 00:34:13

I mean imagine if you had a Walmart of laundromats and everything was quarters.

Mark Csordos: 00:34:19

how many man hours would it take you to do all these quarters?

Mark Csordos: 00:34:24

You know now they have you know, the newer machines have it like built in

Mark Csordos: 00:34:28

but there's also things that you can do to adapt the machine so that they

Mark Csordos: 00:34:33

can be hybrid They could take you know, the coins like they always did or they

Mark Csordos: 00:34:37

could take, a debit or a credit card.

Mark Csordos: 00:34:40

So those two things, or you could just have no coins at all.

Mark Csordos: 00:34:45

Now, most laundromats still have coins of some kind, whether it's hybrid

Mark Csordos: 00:34:50

or a hundred percent, but you could make it where you have a card system.

Mark Csordos: 00:34:55

where people put money on the card and then it go, so then

Mark Csordos: 00:34:58

you have no coins at all.

Mark Csordos: 00:35:00

So now it's more attractive to, now you can start scaling it because I

Mark Csordos: 00:35:06

don't have to worry about quarters.

Mark Csordos: 00:35:08

I don't have to worry about you spilling a coffee on our, basically

Mark Csordos: 00:35:12

our whole POS system, I always joke, you're like one Starbucks spill

Mark Csordos: 00:35:16

away from losing all your records.

Mark Csordos: 00:35:20

so those are the two reasons I think you don't see.

Mark Csordos: 00:35:23

Yeah.

Mark Csordos: 00:35:23

Like, a huge company in the laundromat

Tim Winders: 00:35:27

because one of the things I'm jump over to self storage, we've

Tim Winders: 00:35:30

had this conversation is that for years, self storage was mom and pop.

Tim Winders: 00:35:36

Some I had, but I have noticed massive, now that's in many ways,

Tim Winders: 00:35:41

that's a real estate business.

Tim Winders: 00:35:42

it's just, you have renters and tenants and I've got background

Tim Winders: 00:35:46

in real estate, but I have noticed massive consolidation and large

Tim Winders: 00:35:51

companies buying up all over the place.

Tim Winders: 00:35:54

and I guess it's interesting that you brought that up.

Tim Winders: 00:35:56

It is probably they can integrate that point of sale right into

Tim Winders: 00:36:00

theirs and just keep moving along.

Tim Winders: 00:36:04

do you see a future where.

Tim Winders: 00:36:07

Somebody big one of these, especially because, did I read this right?

Tim Winders: 00:36:12

That margins and laundromats are in the 20 to 30 percent range where restaurants

Tim Winders: 00:36:17

are like, 10 to 12 to 15 and all mean with margins like that, aren't they going

Tim Winders: 00:36:22

to be appealing for a fund that is just looking for return on investment or no?

Tim Winders: 00:36:28

what am I missing here?

Mark Csordos: 00:36:30

venture capital comes in, they have a tendency to, to ruin

Mark Csordos: 00:36:36

what made some of these businesses special, So you lose that mom and pop

Mark Csordos: 00:36:40

feel, you lose that sense of community.

Mark Csordos: 00:36:43

But yes, I could see it, it happening.

Mark Csordos: 00:36:47

I hope it doesn't.

Mark Csordos: 00:36:49

I would rather it happen organically, through some of the good owners that are

Mark Csordos: 00:36:53

already in there rather than, somebody with a spreadsheet, in New York somewhere.

Mark Csordos: 00:36:58

And it's hey, you know what, if we bought all these laundry mats up,

Mark Csordos: 00:37:02

we put the same coat of paint on each one, put the same name, boom.

Mark Csordos: 00:37:08

You would take away some of what made them special, some of these stores, then

Mark Csordos: 00:37:12

they'd just be like any other business.

Tim Winders: 00:37:16

so the other day, I'll, I'm going to go back to three days ago.

Tim Winders: 00:37:19

I had these rugs.

Tim Winders: 00:37:21

I'm in Rapid City, a city that I've never gone to a laundromat.

Tim Winders: 00:37:26

outside of this RV resort that we like to stay in, which I don't, I

Tim Winders: 00:37:30

think that's related to what you do, but I think that's different.

Tim Winders: 00:37:32

It's probably just a profit center for the resort, but it's probably run pseudo,

Tim Winders: 00:37:37

they don't have an attendant or anything.

Tim Winders: 00:37:39

And all of them are run with these apps now, by the way, the thing that annoys

Tim Winders: 00:37:44

me is when I go to a different resort and I have to download a different app.

Tim Winders: 00:37:48

So now I've got.

Tim Winders: 00:37:48

Three laundry apps on my phone.

Tim Winders: 00:37:52

And some of them are better than others, by the way.

Tim Winders: 00:37:55

But, I'm curious, I went in and I did a search and the, this

Tim Winders: 00:38:00

is exactly the way I did it.

Tim Winders: 00:38:01

I did a Google search and I looked at the ratings.

Tim Winders: 00:38:06

And the fortunate thing one was one that was rated pretty good was the closest

Tim Winders: 00:38:11

one to me and I'm going, perfect.

Tim Winders: 00:38:12

there's nothing that's far here in rapid city.

Tim Winders: 00:38:14

Anyway, it's a town of 70, 80, 000 people is that the discovery for most

Tim Winders: 00:38:20

people search ratings go, or what else happens that people find laundromats?

Mark Csordos: 00:38:28

a lot of people, and that's why ratings are so important, and customer

Mark Csordos: 00:38:33

service is so important because if I happen to be in the laundromat, and I see

Mark Csordos: 00:38:37

somebody who hasn't been with us before, I'll ask them, how did you find us?

Mark Csordos: 00:38:43

And a lot of people say I googled and you had good reviews.

Mark Csordos: 00:38:47

I was like, okay, great.

Mark Csordos: 00:38:48

Thank you.

Mark Csordos: 00:38:48

so for a lot of people, and especially the younger you get,

Mark Csordos: 00:38:54

the more you count on reviews.

Mark Csordos: 00:38:58

I don't have the, I, I did a paper on that.

Mark Csordos: 00:39:01

I don't remember the statistics off top of my head, it was

Mark Csordos: 00:39:04

something like my daughter's 24.

Mark Csordos: 00:39:06

So whatever, I, Gen Y, I guess she is.

Mark Csordos: 00:39:10

They trust online reviews more than they trust personal reviews, you know

Mark Csordos: 00:39:15

So I could tell her something and she'll believe a stranger online So yes,

Mark Csordos: 00:39:20

they're hugely important, but I also try to do, be a part of the community

Mark Csordos: 00:39:25

And do a lot of gorilla marketing.

Mark Csordos: 00:39:27

You

Tim Winders: 00:39:31

I actually enjoyed the whole book, The Laundromat Bible.

Tim Winders: 00:39:34

My wife would say, what are you reading?

Tim Winders: 00:39:35

I said, I'm reading the Bible.

Tim Winders: 00:39:36

She said, The Laundromat Bible.

Tim Winders: 00:39:39

And I think there's a chapter here where you go through 21 or something

Tim Winders: 00:39:43

like that marketing chapters.

Tim Winders: 00:39:46

Tools methods or something like that.

Tim Winders: 00:39:48

And I enjoyed it cause I'm sitting here reading it.

Tim Winders: 00:39:50

I'm going, Oh, okay.

Tim Winders: 00:39:51

We actually did that.

Tim Winders: 00:39:52

Our real estate company, we went around and knocked on doors.

Tim Winders: 00:39:55

we put up a, door hangers.

Tim Winders: 00:39:57

to me, those are gorilla base level.

Tim Winders: 00:40:02

and I think a lot of businesses just miss those totally.

Tim Winders: 00:40:05

I think that's valuable for a lot of businesses to know.

Tim Winders: 00:40:10

principles.

Tim Winders: 00:40:11

Would you agree?

Tim Winders: 00:40:11

What do you want to talk about?

Tim Winders: 00:40:12

Just other things related to marketing before we move on?

Mark Csordos: 00:40:16

know, everybody thinks technology now, and they still forget,

Mark Csordos: 00:40:20

at least with laundromats, and really a lot of local businesses, like if I owned

Mark Csordos: 00:40:24

a yogurt shop, I'd do the same thing.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:27

I don't have to conquer all of New Jersey.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:30

I just have to get a couple of miles around my store.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:33

That's all I need to do.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:35

So connect with the local school, connect with the Chamber of Commerce, do the door

Mark Csordos: 00:40:39

hangers, go to sit, go to civic events.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:43

they have a Matawan day every year and, you take the kids and you walk

Mark Csordos: 00:40:47

up and down the street and there's face painting and those, you know,

Mark Csordos: 00:40:50

nice cars and those types of things.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:52

And people put out tables, they promote their business.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:56

a lot of people don't realize, we're here.

Mark Csordos: 00:40:58

they drive past you a thousand times, didn't even realize, Oh, you guys

Mark Csordos: 00:41:03

will wash it and fold it for us.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:04

I love that.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:05

I hate doing laundry.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:07

So yes, I think with tech, everything, everything in 2024 is, Instagram and

Mark Csordos: 00:41:11

Facebook and, and you can get just as many customers by being in the

Mark Csordos: 00:41:16

supermarket and waiting in line and saying, excuse me, you like doing laundry?

Mark Csordos: 00:41:21

I got a 75 percent chance that they don't.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:24

and I'll be like, yeah, I own the laundromat right down the street.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:27

We do pick up and delivery.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:28

Here's my card.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:31

I got good.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:31

I have just as much of a chance getting the customer out of that as

Mark Csordos: 00:41:35

I do, posting on Instagram again.

Mark Csordos: 00:41:37

I just think that people forget about

Tim Winders: 00:41:39

and one of the things that I like about it, that probably

Tim Winders: 00:41:43

some people struggle with is that it is truly a local business.

Tim Winders: 00:41:48

I wasn't going to drive two hours with my rugs.

Tim Winders: 00:41:52

To go get them washed on, a few days ago, I was looking for something fairly close.

Tim Winders: 00:41:57

I was looking for something that was rated well, wanted it to be clean when I

Tim Winders: 00:42:01

went in and wanted the machines to work.

Tim Winders: 00:42:03

And I wanted to get the crud off these rugs that we have

Tim Winders: 00:42:06

down in our, our RV here.

Tim Winders: 00:42:08

And, man, it did pretty well.

Tim Winders: 00:42:10

I do want to say this though.

Tim Winders: 00:42:12

It wasn't because I was in the middle of reading your book

Tim Winders: 00:42:14

when I went in there, it wasn't.

Tim Winders: 00:42:18

As clean as I would have liked for it to have been when I went in and had a

Tim Winders: 00:42:23

little bit of age and datedness to it is how critical is that in a business?

Tim Winders: 00:42:30

That cleaning stuff is what they purport to do.

Mark Csordos: 00:42:34

I think businesses and laundromat owners don't realize

Mark Csordos: 00:42:38

is that, if you have a clean place.

Mark Csordos: 00:42:42

Place a lot of the other amenities, like I have a very small laundromat.

Mark Csordos: 00:42:48

It's only 1500 square feet.

Mark Csordos: 00:42:51

So I'm pretty much, I stick with the basics.

Mark Csordos: 00:42:53

I, you know, I have washers, dryers, I clean your clothes,

Mark Csordos: 00:42:57

we have a snack machine.

Mark Csordos: 00:42:58

We have a vending machine for like soaps, but anything else, your massage

Mark Csordos: 00:43:03

chairs, your video games, your.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:06

Your coffee bar.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:08

I don't have room for this.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:09

Okay.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:10

And most people will forgive me if I keep it clean and I keep it friendly

Mark Csordos: 00:43:16

because that's all they really want.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:18

They just want a nice place to have to, if they have to go do this every single

Mark Csordos: 00:43:23

week, they want a nice place to do it.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:25

So they want it clean and they want it friendly.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:29

And that's what I always tell people.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:31

when you're hiring for jobs like attendants, or even at

Mark Csordos: 00:43:34

restaurants, anything like that.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:37

Just hire friendly.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:38

You can teach everything else.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:41

Okay, if I can't teach you to run a register, we both have bigger problems.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:47

Okay, I can't teach you to be friendly though.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:50

I can't teach you to want to help people, and So I'm looking for friendly.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:55

Because it makes such a huge difference.

Mark Csordos: 00:43:58

Because you're also with these people for a lot longer than

Mark Csordos: 00:44:01

you are in almost any business.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:03

You if you're a cashier at a supermarket, yeah, that interaction's important,

Mark Csordos: 00:44:07

but it doesn't last that long.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:09

You could be in the laundromat for an hour.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:12

Hour and a half, especially if you decide to fold everything there.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:16

wouldn't it be nice, if the attendant was friendly, you had a

Mark Csordos: 00:44:18

conversation, we have many people like, Hey, I'm running to the store.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:23

Do you want a coffee?

Mark Csordos: 00:44:23

Do you want this?

Mark Csordos: 00:44:24

Do you want that?

Mark Csordos: 00:44:25

how many other customers at other businesses will be, Hey, I'm going out.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:29

Do you want something?

Mark Csordos: 00:44:29

I'll bring it back for you.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:32

You know, so friendly is like paramount.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:34

Clean as Paramount.

Mark Csordos: 00:44:36

Everything else is extra.

Tim Winders: 00:44:38

my wife says, why do you enjoy going?

Tim Winders: 00:44:40

first of all, like getting our clothes clean, but secondly it depending on

Tim Winders: 00:44:45

if there's a sitting area, if I've got my computer or laptop, if I'm reading

Tim Winders: 00:44:49

something, it's like an hour and a half, depending on how fast the machines are.

Tim Winders: 00:44:53

I love good, fast machines, by the way.

Tim Winders: 00:44:55

it's like alone time.

Tim Winders: 00:44:57

It's quiet time or whatever.

Tim Winders: 00:44:58

Yeah.

Tim Winders: 00:44:59

I actually just love meeting people and talking to people.

Tim Winders: 00:45:02

One thing I didn't like about this one is, they had one TV going and what

Tim Winders: 00:45:07

they had on the TV mark was they had this true crime thing going on, where,

Tim Winders: 00:45:12

some guy disappeared and all that.

Tim Winders: 00:45:13

I'm guessing there's a mood you can set with what you pop on the TV screen too.

Tim Winders: 00:45:18

Right.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:19

like, when I go to the doctor.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:21

They usually have the most boring thing on.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:24

like the House Hunters.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:26

Nobody's gonna get upset at that.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:27

The Cooking Channel.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:29

if you come into us, and I tell them, you guys, you can change the channel.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:35

But it's always like American Pickers.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:37

So it's, or put on Seinfeld and stuff like that, but yes, I agree, especially

Mark Csordos: 00:45:43

when you get like in that political realm, you don't really need, just

Mark Csordos: 00:45:46

stay, just put Seinfeld on everybody like Seinfeld, or if there's a bunch

Mark Csordos: 00:45:51

of kids put on, cartoons or something.

Mark Csordos: 00:45:54

Yeah, just keep it very innocuous.

Tim Winders: 00:45:56

A couple of the quick things here before we wrap up is that I spent

Tim Winders: 00:46:00

some time in the early two thousands with a guy named Dan Kennedy, great marketing

Tim Winders: 00:46:04

guy, guerrilla marketing, did a lot of cool things and he used to always,

Mark Csordos: 00:46:09

I, I have his book.

Tim Winders: 00:46:10

yeah, no, no BS marketing and stuff like that.

Mark Csordos: 00:46:15

I

Tim Winders: 00:46:15

So I was in his masterminds and one of the things that he would

Tim Winders: 00:46:19

always just hammer home to us, because we were starting to coach real estate

Tim Winders: 00:46:24

investors and things like that.

Tim Winders: 00:46:26

He goes, yeah, you could coach people.

Tim Winders: 00:46:28

And he said, you could give people training.

Tim Winders: 00:46:30

You could, give people access to things.

Tim Winders: 00:46:32

He says, but really the ultimate is when you get into the done for you.

Tim Winders: 00:46:37

type business.

Tim Winders: 00:46:39

And as I was reading, the Bible, the laundromat Bible, I was fascinated because

Tim Winders: 00:46:44

I probably knew this existed, but I don't know that I truly understood the

Tim Winders: 00:46:50

value and probably margins and how well it can help you scale a store to start

Tim Winders: 00:46:57

adding in what I call the done for you.

Tim Winders: 00:47:00

Stuff, I guess y'all call it wash and fold and the pickup

Tim Winders: 00:47:03

and delivery and all of that.

Tim Winders: 00:47:05

And I don't know if that's newer, if it's always been around, but I

Tim Winders: 00:47:09

can see that is going to be huge moving forward is probably big now.

Tim Winders: 00:47:14

So talk a little bit about that and how powerful that is in your industry.

Mark Csordos: 00:47:19

it's huge.

Mark Csordos: 00:47:20

And it started when people had attendance.

Mark Csordos: 00:47:26

They wanted something for the attendant to do there's always so much cleaning

Mark Csordos: 00:47:30

you can do and handing out quarters So they figured if I do a little

Mark Csordos: 00:47:34

folding Washing and folding that'll least pay for the attendant and then

Mark Csordos: 00:47:39

what people realize is that a lot of people hate doing laundry and the

Mark Csordos: 00:47:44

washing and the folding part of it.

Mark Csordos: 00:47:46

So it really just became like the service unto itself.

Mark Csordos: 00:47:51

And then with COVID, a lot of people have become taught or accustomed

Mark Csordos: 00:47:57

to having things delivered.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:00

you want Walgreens?

Mark Csordos: 00:48:02

Okay, they'll, Uber, somebody will come and they'll pick

Mark Csordos: 00:48:05

it up and deliver it to you.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:06

You want Burger King?

Mark Csordos: 00:48:07

It'll cost you 10, but your 13 combo, they'll deliver it to you.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:13

a lot of people are catching on.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:14

You can do the same thing with laundry.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:16

and you don't have to do it.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:17

All you have to do is, you go on the website, you fill it out, just

Mark Csordos: 00:48:20

like any other thing, and then you leave your laundry, you can leave it

Mark Csordos: 00:48:25

in garbage bags by your front door.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:28

We'll come, we'll pick it up.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:29

And then the next day it comes back all nice, neat and folded.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:33

All you have to do is put it away.

Mark Csordos: 00:48:36

I'm sure there are people that would like us to put it away too,

Mark Csordos: 00:48:38

but we're not at that point yet.

Tim Winders: 00:48:41

And this.

Tim Winders: 00:48:43

do you look at it as that's the future expanding that, especially

Tim Winders: 00:48:48

an operator like you, where you've got limited space, what would be

Tim Winders: 00:48:52

a, what would be your growth plan?

Tim Winders: 00:48:54

Would it be in areas like that?

Mark Csordos: 00:48:57

No matter how much technology we get,

Mark Csordos: 00:48:59

we never have enough time.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:00

so you look at my family, now my youngest one is 18, but when they

Mark Csordos: 00:49:06

were smaller, I had two in softball, one in Little League, my wife

Mark Csordos: 00:49:11

worked, I worked, we have two dogs.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:15

Come.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:15

That's a lot of laundry, come Saturday and honestly, my wife's

Mark Csordos: 00:49:20

not gonna hear this probably.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:21

she does most of the laundry.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:23

Okay?

Mark Csordos: 00:49:23

You do it on your side and I was thinking, oh, your wife must love you for that.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:27

I don't do much laundry.

Mark Csordos: 00:49:29

Okay, I'm not really a big folder either But just think how much time you spend

Mark Csordos: 00:49:34

on a weekend with three kids and you know two with you know Ah, we had a

Mark Csordos: 00:49:39

lady the other day you talk about, the convenience and if you she brought in

Mark Csordos: 00:49:45

two She has six kids Okay, she brought in 230 pounds of clothes for us to wash

Mark Csordos: 00:49:53

and fold seven garbage bags of clothes That's like a 300 something dollar order.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:01

Cause she's like, I don't want to deal with it.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:03

And it's at this point, you can't deal with it.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:05

This would literally be like 20 loads of laundry.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:08

so yes, it, and there's a lot of people too.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:11

it's just that convenience.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:12

it's that treat for them.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:14

I'm not a coffee drinker, but a lot of people, you know what,

Mark Csordos: 00:50:17

every day they go to Starbucks and they know it's overpriced,

Mark Csordos: 00:50:19

but that's their treat to them.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:21

So a lot of people, especially single people, they're like, you know what,

Mark Csordos: 00:50:25

I don't have a lot of expenses.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:27

You guys do my laundry for me, you have seniors that can't get around that.

Mark Csordos: 00:50:32

they might have a washer and a dryer, but they can't move that well We we pick it up

Mark Csordos: 00:50:36

for them, you know, so really the world's It's open any anybody that doesn't like

Mark Csordos: 00:50:43

doing laundry we can help you so that opens up your customer base To everyone.

Tim Winders: 00:50:48

Is there anything you noticed from demographics?

Tim Winders: 00:50:50

You mentioned your 24 year old daughter.

Tim Winders: 00:50:52

We've got a 30 year old, 33 year old, children.

Tim Winders: 00:50:57

do you notice anything about the age of people?

Tim Winders: 00:51:00

I guess it.

Tim Winders: 00:51:01

I guess it matters who's around you, but is there anything that's exciting

Tim Winders: 00:51:06

that you see, Oh yeah, younger people are really using us or and we only see

Tim Winders: 00:51:11

mature, I call them old people coming in.

Tim Winders: 00:51:14

Anything like that, that you're able to observe?

Tim Winders: 00:51:16

Cause I know you also do things with the bigger, the laundromat

Tim Winders: 00:51:19

association, but what are some of the trends that y'all are seeing there?

Mark Csordos: 00:51:26

I think it's easier to reach the younger people with the

Mark Csordos: 00:51:31

delivery delivery Because there's so much more use of technology.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:35

a lot of seniors would probably do it if they even knew that it

Mark Csordos: 00:51:40

existed or where to look for it.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:44

so I think with younger people and they're used to like the whole gig economy, like

Mark Csordos: 00:51:49

I'm not going to move from my couch.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:50

My whole life is going to come to me.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:53

My medicine is going to come to me.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:54

My food's going to come to me.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:55

My laundry is going to come to me.

Mark Csordos: 00:51:58

So they're much, they're much more comfortable with going on

Mark Csordos: 00:52:02

the website, downloading an app.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:05

It's just, it's second nature to them.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:07

I think, once, once you start, I shaved, but I'd have gray too.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:12

if I hadn't shaved the other day.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:14

And, for us, it was like, Oh, not another app.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:17

I don't want to go on another website.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:19

But for the younger generation, I mean, that's just what they do.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:23

So they're used to it.

Mark Csordos: 00:52:25

So I think going forward, um, it'll just keep growing and growing.

Tim Winders: 00:52:31

So one thing, Mark, I'm watching my time here, but

Tim Winders: 00:52:36

I definitely recommend someone get the laundromat Bible.

Tim Winders: 00:52:40

I'm looking at my Kindle over here where I've got it loaded, went through

Tim Winders: 00:52:43

my highlights just a second ago, make sure I wasn't forgetting anything.

Tim Winders: 00:52:46

definitely.

Tim Winders: 00:52:47

I feel like you wrote that book for someone who might be thinking about

Tim Winders: 00:52:52

possibly doing something in this industry, but just verbally, if someone's Interest

Tim Winders: 00:53:00

is peaked or they're curious or whatever.

Tim Winders: 00:53:03

What would you tell them right now?

Tim Winders: 00:53:06

Just like maybe speak to the person that's like going, yeah,

Tim Winders: 00:53:08

I might be interested in this.

Tim Winders: 00:53:10

What would you tell them?

Mark Csordos: 00:53:12

Are you interested because you heard that it's great passive income

Mark Csordos: 00:53:18

from somebody on YouTube because if it is you're in for a surprise If you

Mark Csordos: 00:53:24

really are into it the best place to go obviously they could contact me but the

Mark Csordos: 00:53:29

best place to go for free information really is the coin laundry association.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:34

I'm a member of it.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:36

You don't have to be a member of it.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:38

They have a lot of free information.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:40

And if you're serious about putting out six figures, maybe

Mark Csordos: 00:53:43

seven figures for a laundromat, join the coin laundry association.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:48

It's a couple hundred dollars.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:49

They have a lot that they offer to members for free.

Mark Csordos: 00:53:52

free, a ton of white papers, a lot of videos on basically every subject

Mark Csordos: 00:53:58

that you could possibly imagine.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:00

They also have a free magazine, it's called Planet Laundry, and I'm

Mark Csordos: 00:54:05

actually in it just about every month.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:07

No, seriously, I, I write, I'll either write an article or, I'll

Mark Csordos: 00:54:13

get quoted on one of the topics.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:15

you'll get me for free, but the magazine's for free too.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:18

and it comes out every month.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:20

So that's the, that's one of the best places.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:23

And they're not They're unbiased really, because they're not like if you

Mark Csordos: 00:54:28

go to a distributor or somebody that sells Like dryers or washing machines.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:36

obviously they have an economic Benefit, you know if you buy these and so they're

Mark Csordos: 00:54:42

kind their information can be somewhat slanted toward the rosier You know, the

Mark Csordos: 00:54:48

Coin Laundry Association, of course they would like you to be a member, but they

Mark Csordos: 00:54:54

give you more just unbiased information.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:58

And they're really good people too.

Mark Csordos: 00:54:59

I know

Tim Winders: 00:55:00

Yeah, very good.

Tim Winders: 00:55:01

Also tell us now where people can connect with you.

Tim Winders: 00:55:06

I know you're pretty active on LinkedIn, but, tell them if there's a place to find

Tim Winders: 00:55:10

the book and I think you've got a personal website to go and give us all that

Tim Winders: 00:55:14

we'll include it in the notes, but tell us all of that right now, anything you

Tim Winders: 00:55:17

want to share or, promote with anybody.

Mark Csordos: 00:55:21

they can email me.

Mark Csordos: 00:55:22

It's marksordos at gmail dot com.

Mark Csordos: 00:55:25

And you'll have to look in the links how to spell my last name,

Mark Csordos: 00:55:29

because I got a silent C in there.

Mark Csordos: 00:55:31

And also my website is marksordos dot com.

Mark Csordos: 00:55:34

So I just try to keep it really simple and I'm happy to connect

Mark Csordos: 00:55:38

with anybody on LinkedIn.

Mark Csordos: 00:55:39

I post pretty much like seven days a week, a lot about laundry, some

Mark Csordos: 00:55:44

about entrepreneurship and on the weekends, I usually just have some fun.

Tim Winders: 00:55:49

Very good.

Tim Winders: 00:55:50

We'll make sure we include all that down in the notes.

Tim Winders: 00:55:53

great conversation.

Tim Winders: 00:55:54

I've enjoyed this, Mark.

Tim Winders: 00:55:55

We are Seek, Go, Create, those three words.

Tim Winders: 00:55:58

And just as my last question, I'm going to allow you to pick one of those that maybe

Tim Winders: 00:56:03

means more, or I don't know, Seek, Go, or Create, and why, which one do you choose?

Mark Csordos: 00:56:12

I would say go because that implies, that's action.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:16

you have, you know, a lot of people, and it's not just with laundry

Mark Csordos: 00:56:20

mats, it's about anything in life.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:22

You know, I've written books and people ask me about it.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:25

and they don't ever take any action.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:27

They want to write a book and then they never write anything.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:29

So to me, the go would be the action.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:32

if you're serious about owning a laundromat or any business, you have to

Mark Csordos: 00:56:38

take some action, go do your homework, do your research, talk to other business

Mark Csordos: 00:56:43

owners that would be non competing.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:46

Usually if they're non competing, they're very, they're very happy to talk to you.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:51

You they'll give, there'll be a wealth of information, but you have to take action.

Mark Csordos: 00:56:55

You can't always be a bystander saying someday, so I'm going to go and

Tim Winders: 00:56:59

Excellent.

Tim Winders: 00:57:00

Great choice.

Tim Winders: 00:57:01

Mark Sordos.

Tim Winders: 00:57:02

Thank you for joining us on Seat Go Create.

Tim Winders: 00:57:05

I appreciate you sharing.

Tim Winders: 00:57:07

I appreciate you being vulnerable and sharing a story.

Tim Winders: 00:57:10

I actually believe all the laundromat stuff is really cool, but I think just

Tim Winders: 00:57:14

the background on the depression and all is very helpful and very helpful.

Tim Winders: 00:57:18

Probably we need as a society to talk about that more.

Tim Winders: 00:57:21

So I appreciate you doing that.

Tim Winders: 00:57:23

Thanks for listening in for those listening.

Tim Winders: 00:57:25

We have new episodes on YouTube and on all the podcast platforms every Monday,

Tim Winders: 00:57:31

make sure you're subscribing or following whatever it is on the platform you choose.

Tim Winders: 00:57:35

And until next time, continue being all that you were created to be.