howdo/brindley/1stjc/mark2nd
By DAVID BRINDLEY
Contributing Reporter
Like any of the hundreds of dry-cleaning stores in the area, Sterling Cleaners will take your dirty clothes off your hands and return them clean and pressed, ready to wear on the same day, if you need it.
But what happens in between? Are shirts combined with others when washed and, if so, how are they not mixed up? What are those tags that wind up on everyone’s clothes?
Barry Gershenson, president and co-owner of Sterling, recently took a reporter through the process starting from the time the customer drops off his or her clothes and they’re placed into those ubiquitous nylon bags (at Sterling, blue for laundry and red for dry cleaning).
“We operate on convenience,” explains Gershenson, who along with his brother Harvey has been running Sterling since 1962. “People’s lives are very busy, but they still have to look good.”
Sterling, which has two locations in West Los Angeles, took in $3 million in revenues last year, said Gershenson.
It costs $1.60 to $1.90 to get a shirt laundered at Sterling a markup of roughly 60 cents to 90 cents. All the laundry is done at the Overland store and dry cleaning is done at the Westwood store. A van shuttles orders between the two locations several times a day.
Once the separate laundry bags are collected for that day’s processing, they are then opened for tagging and sorting. Because Sterling cleans about 1,000 shirts a day, marking the individual shirts is crucial.
The shirts are processed in lots of 100. That’s why each shirt must be marked with a coded cloth tag that identifies the order.
Sterling uses cloth tags because they can withstand washing. When the shirt is next brought in, the old tag is removed and a new one is put on.
Once the shirts are tagged, they are separated by color and amount of starch requested. White shirts go into a large plastic bin and colored shirts go into another.
Gershenson says 90 percent of the orders are for light starch and hangers. The remaining 10 percent are processed with no starch to heavy starch. Shirts are also checked for stains that may need to be spot cleaned prior to washing.
At that point, groups of 100 shirts are loaded into commercial-sized washers that have a 50-pound capacity. It takes about 45 minutes to complete the wash and spin-dry cycle, including the addition of starch to the final rinse.
The shirts are then taken out damp from the washing machine, dumped back into the plastic bins and brought to the pressing area.
A group of four employees operate the three shirt-pressing stations, finishing up to 50 shirts per person per hour. The pressing machines operate on timed sequences.
Shirt sleeves are the first to be pressed as the damp sleeves are put over the padded arms of the first machine, resembling a giant vertical toaster.
Next, the collar and shirt cuffs are placed onto the curved padded surfaces of the second machine, which closes like a waffle iron. Finally, the body of the shirt is put on a third press with the top shirt button fastened and the shirt panels pulled taut over the padded convex body of the machine.
Once pressed, the shirt is then placed on a hanger and passed on to be inspected for any touch-ups or for spots or stains and for broken buttons.
Finally, once the shirts pass inspection, they are sent down the line to be reassembled with the other shirts in each individual order and then packaged for customer pickup, either in clear plastic garment bags, or folded and placed in boxes.
Hanging shirts are then placed on one of three motorized racks which can hold up to 800 orders each, with the location on the rack indicated on the customer invoice, and the orders are ready to be picked up.
