Operations · Maintenance
Laundromat Maintenance and Repair Ticketing with Sean Henderson
What happens to a broken machine between the moment an attendant notices it and the moment somebody fixes it, and why a sticky note is the weakest link in the chain.
- ●Sean Henderson built laundromat maintenance and repair ticketing into Wash-Dry-Fold POS so an attendant reports a broken machine from the screen they already know, not a separate app.
- ●The alternative to a ticket is a sticky note on the desk, a text at 9pm, or nobody telling the owner at all until revenue drops.
- ●Because attendants are already logged in and already know the interface, raising a ticket needs no extra computer literacy or extra training.
- ●Tickets create a written history per machine, which is what turns a run of small repairs into a defensible case for replacing the unit.
- ●The practical lesson: put the reporting tool where the work already happens, because a maintenance process nobody uses is the same as no process.
A machine goes down, an attendant flags it, and then the information has to survive the trip to whoever can fix it. In most stores that trip runs on a sticky note, a text message or nothing at all. Laundromat maintenance and repair ticketing replaces that with a ticket the attendant raises from the same screen they already use to ring up orders, so the office learns about a dead machine before a customer complains about it.
This article is based on an episode
Laundromat Maintenance and Repair Ticketing System
Laundromat Ownership · Episode 8 · with Sean Henderson, Wash-Dry-Fold POS
Why We Released the Original Laundromat Machine Repair Ticket System. How Much Has It Improved Since Its Launch on 9/24/2021?
The first version of the Wash Dry Fold POS repair ticket system shipped on September 24, 2021. At the time, no other laundromat point of sale system had a real maintenance tracker built into it. The handful of operators who tracked repairs at all were using paper binders, shared spreadsheets, or generic IT helpdesk software repurposed for laundry equipment. None of those tools knew what a 60-pound washer was, none of them tagged tickets with attendant PINs, and none of them stayed open on the counter computer that staff already used every shift.
What’s changed since launch is the depth, not the concept. The technician role, the in-service / out-of-service triage column, the integration with Speed Queen Insights that pulls equipment lists automatically, the misc/unlisted equipment category for one-off issues like a clogged toilet, the explainer text that prompts attendants to describe sights, sounds, and smells — none of those existed on day one. They were added because thousands of operators put the tool through real-world use and asked for them. That feedback loop is the whole reason the system has stayed ahead of the copycats that have shown up in the last couple of years.
🔑 Insider Key
A maintenance tool you build in three days will look identical to a mature one on the demo. The difference shows up in month four, when an attendant types “broken” into the description field and you realize there’s no minimum character requirement, no PIN tagging, and no way to triage by financial impact.
The Death of the Post-it Note: Solving the Communication Gap
Before Sean built the tracker, he was the operations and facilities manager across all three Liberty Laundry stores. He drove between locations every day, and the most reliable maintenance information he got was a post-it note on the counter. Sometimes the note said “no work good.” Sometimes it just said “broken.” Often it had no name on it, so even when he wanted to ask the attendant a follow-up question, he couldn’t tell whose handwriting it was.
Each store also kept a paper binder of repair history. The binder lived at the store, not at HQ, so when Sean had a hunch that the same washer had broken with the same symptom three months earlier, he had to drive thirty minutes across town to confirm it. By the time he got there, looked it up, and identified the part, half the day was gone — and the machine was still down.
The repair ticket system replaces all of that. An attendant flags a machine from the same point of sale terminal they ring up wash-dry-fold orders on. The form requires more characters than “broken” — there’s explainer text that says, in Sean’s words, “please describe any sights, sounds, and/or smells.” The submitter’s PIN gets stamped on the ticket automatically, so the facilities manager always knows who to ask for more detail. The whole repair history of that specific machine — every prior issue, every part ordered, every fix — is one click away from anywhere on the network. No driving. No binder hunting. No mystery handwriting.
That structured-input requirement is small, but it is the kind of design choice that only shows up after real attendants try to game the form. If you don’t force a minimum description, half your tickets will say “broken” and your facilities manager will spend his life on the phone asking what that means. Wash Dry Fold POS forces useful descriptions because we watched what happens when you don’t. The same principle drives the rest of our attendant-friendly software design — the tool only works if the people using it actually use it correctly.
Why Integrated Laundromat Management Software Wins
One of the most common questions Sean gets at trade shows is why the repair tracker isn’t a standalone product. The answer comes down to integrated laundromat management software versus a stack of disconnected apps, and it shows up in three places.
One login, not five. Your attendants are already in front of the Wash Dry Fold POS terminal. They already enter their PIN to ring up orders, run wash-dry-fold transactions, and clock in. When they need to flag a machine, they tap the repairs button, enter the same PIN they already know, and submit. There is no second username to remember, no second password to reset, no second piece of training to run during onboarding. Compare that to a standalone maintenance app: now your front-counter staff has a separate login on a separate device, and you’ve doubled the surface area of “I forgot how to do that.”
The equipment list already exists. Your washers and dryers are already configured in Wash Dry Fold POS — that’s how the system handles machine repair tracking and powers integrations like remote vend command and machine start. There is no second equipment database to maintain. When you replace a 30-pound washer with a 40-pound model, you update one record and both the POS and the repair tracker stay in sync.
Consistency reduces training time. The green save button is in the same place across every screen. The red cancel button is where it has always been. The repair form looks like the rest of the software because it is the rest of the software. That consistency means the time it takes to train an attendant on the maintenance tool is roughly zero — if they know how to use the rest of the POS, they know how to submit a repair ticket.
🔑 Insider Key
Every standalone tool you bolt onto your laundromat operation is a separate place an attendant has to remember to look. The right number of “places to check” is one. That’s the entire argument for integrated management software.
Triage and Urgency: Prioritizing Your Repairs
The first version of the repair ticket system did not have an in-service / out-of-service column. It had a single status field and a description, and that was enough — until Hope Dewlin, an operator running 30 stores in Florida, pointed out the gap. With that many machines on her ticket queue, the question wasn’t just “what’s broken.” The question was: what’s broken AND not running right now, on a Sunday, on the 80-pound washer that drives the most revenue per cycle in the building?
That feedback turned into the in-service vs. out-of-service toggle that now sits on every ticket. A squeaky dryer that still runs gets flagged, but it stays in the “still earning” bucket. A bulkhead leak that took an 80-pounder offline on the busiest day of the week jumps to the top of the technician’s list. The triage column makes the financial impact of the issue immediately legible — your facilities manager doesn’t have to open every ticket to figure out which one to drive to next.
That distinction matters more the bigger your operation gets. At one or two stores, you can mentally hold the priority list. At ten stores, you can’t. At thirty, like Hope’s operation, you need the software to do the triage for you. The toggle is a small UI element with a large operational payoff, and it’s the kind of feature that only emerges from real operators using the system at real scale.
Beyond Washers and Dryers: Tracking All Assets
People hear “machine repair tracker” and assume it only covers washers and dryers. The Wash Dry Fold POS version covers anything in the building that can break. From day one, Sean built the equipment configuration to handle:
- Washers and dryers — with model, serial, install date, and full repair history
- Vending machines — soap, snacks, drinks, and any other operator-owned vendors
- Bill changers and bill breakers — including the bill changer, which is one of the most common employee theft vectors in the store
- Sliding doors, soap dispensers, water heaters, boilers, and HVAC — anything you would otherwise track in a spreadsheet
- Miscellaneous / unlisted equipment — for one-off issues like a clogged toilet, a broken light fixture, or a parking lot pothole
The miscellaneous category is the one that surprises operators the most. You don’t have to pre-configure “toilet” as an asset in your equipment list. When the toilet clogs and an attendant flags it, they pick “unlisted / miscellaneous” and describe the issue in the same form they’d use for a washer. The ticket gets the same routing, the same email notifications, and the same closed-loop confirmation when it’s fixed.
Speed Queen Insights and Automatic Equipment Setup
If you run Speed Queen machines and have already configured them in Speed Queen Insights, you do not have to manually re-enter every washer and dryer into Wash Dry Fold POS. The Speed Queen integration uses the Alliance Insights API to pull the full equipment list — model, serial, capacity — directly into the POS. That list then becomes the foundation for repair tracking, machine start, remote vend command, and any other integration that needs to know what machines you have.
The same wizard-style import is the model for how we expand integrations with other manufacturers. If a manufacturer publishes an API for their equipment data, Wash Dry Fold POS can pull from it. We work with everyone — and the goal is for every store, regardless of brand, to spend zero hours typing model numbers into a configuration screen.
Data-Driven Maintenance: Preventing Overcharges
The repair history on a single machine is more than a maintenance log. It’s a paper trail you can hand to your distributor when they show up to charge you a trip fee for a problem they already diagnosed last quarter.
Before the tracker, the typical conversation went: distributor charges a $250 trip fee, looks at the washer, says it’s broken, and orders a part. Three months later, same machine, same symptom, same trip fee, same part order. You don’t catch the pattern because nobody is looking at it from far enough away. With repair history available on every ticket, your facilities manager opens the machine record and sees: drain valve, ordered August. Drain valve, ordered November. Drain valve, ordered February. That’s not a recurring repair — that’s a lemon, or a misdiagnosed root cause, or a warranty claim someone forgot to file.
The same data prevents redundant trip charges. When the distributor says “we need to come diagnose it,” you can say: we already know what’s wrong, here’s the ticket, here’s the symptom, here’s what you ordered last time, just bring the part. That’s the difference between paying for two service calls and paying for one. Across a year, on a multi-store operation, that’s a meaningful number.
Repair history also feeds capital decisions. When the same washer hits its third major repair in twelve months, the question stops being “fix or wait” and starts being “fix or replace.” Wash Dry Fold POS surfaces that data alongside everything else you’d want for a capex review — see the reporting feature for how operational data flows into business decisions across the platform.
🔑 Insider Key
A repair ticket system pays for itself the first time you catch a duplicate trip charge. Everything after that is upside.
The Technician Role: Mobile Access for Maintenance Staff
Your facilities manager is not your front-counter attendant. He needs to log into the software from his phone while he’s standing behind a 60-pound washer with a multimeter in his other hand. He needs to update ticket status, look up a model number, check the repair history, and close the loop with the owner — all without walking back to the POS terminal and elbowing the attendant out of the way.
That’s what the Technician role is for. It’s a permission level that gives mechanical staff their own login credentials — email and password, not a four-digit PIN — so they can authenticate from any device. Once they’re in, they can access exactly two pages: the equipment setup page and the repairs page. That’s it. They can’t see wash-dry-fold orders. They can’t see reporting. They can’t clock in attendants or run retail transactions.
The metaphor Sean uses for the permission system is worth keeping in mind:
- Admin / manager login credentials are the keys to the store itself — they unlock the front door
- Attendant PINs are signatures — they identify who did what once they’re already inside
- Technician login credentials are a key to the mechanical room only — full mobile access, but only to the parts of the building they need to be in
That separation is the reason a regular attendant doesn’t get a remote login. If everyone could log in from their phone, everyone could clock in from home, and you’d have no real way to confirm who was actually in the store. The PIN-only attendant model keeps clock-ins honest. The technician model keeps your maintenance guy productive on the road. Both serve the same goal: accountability for the people in your laundromat, structured by their actual role.
When a ticket status changes — opened, in progress, closed — the system fires an email to anyone subscribed to repair notifications. As an owner, you don’t have to be on the phone with your facilities manager to know what’s getting fixed. You see the email when the ticket opens, you see it again when it closes, and you carry on with the rest of your day.
Conclusion: Built by Operators, for Operators
Sean built the first version of the repair ticket system because he was the operator drowning in post-it notes. He didn’t sketch it out in a product meeting at a software company that had never run a laundromat. He sketched it out after driving thirty minutes to find out what “no work good” meant, and then again to look up a model number on the back of a machine in a crawl space, and then again to dig through a paper binder to confirm a hunch.
That origin story is also the moat. There are a handful of copycat repair trackers in the market now. Some of them look fine on a demo screen. None of them have four-plus years of feedback from thousands of operators baked into the product. The Technician role exists because facility managers asked for it. The in-service column exists because Hope Dewlin asked for it. The unlisted/miscellaneous category exists because operators kept submitting tickets for things that weren’t washers. Vibe coding can clone a feature list in three days; it cannot clone four years of operator feedback.
If you’re running a laundromat on post-it notes and a paper binder, the upgrade path is straightforward. The repair ticket system is a standard feature of Wash Dry Fold POS — it’s part of the same platform that handles point of sale, wash-dry-fold orders, attendant management, and machine integrations. You don’t bolt it on. You don’t pay extra for it. It’s there because every operator needs it, and we built it because one of us was an operator who needed it first.
Questions owners ask
What is a laundromat repair ticket system?
A laundromat repair ticket system is software that captures, routes, and tracks maintenance issues on every piece of equipment in your store. Attendants flag a problem from the point of sale, the ticket is tagged with their PIN, the facilities manager gets an email, and the full repair history of every washer, dryer, vending machine, and bill changer is preserved over time. It replaces post-it notes, paper binders, and generic helpdesk apps with a structured tool built specifically for laundromats.
Why should the repair tracker live inside the POS instead of being a separate app?
Because your attendants are already using the POS. A standalone maintenance app means a second login, a second piece of training, a second equipment database to maintain, and a second place an attendant has to remember to check. When the repair tracker lives inside Wash Dry Fold POS, attendants submit tickets from the same screen they already use, the equipment list is already configured, and tickets are auto-tagged with the attendant’s PIN. One login, one interface, zero extra training.
Can the repair tracker handle equipment beyond washers and dryers?
Yes. The Wash Dry Fold POS repair tracker covers vending machines, bill changers, sliding doors, soap dispensers, water heaters, HVAC, and anything else in the building you want to track. There is also a miscellaneous / unlisted category for one-off issues like a clogged toilet or a parking lot pothole, so you do not have to pre-configure every possible asset. Every ticket — regardless of asset type — flows through the same routing, notifications, and history view.
What is the Technician role in Wash Dry Fold POS?
The Technician role is a permission level for mechanical staff. Technicians log in with email and password from any mobile device and have access to exactly two pages: equipment setup and repairs. They can update ticket status, look up model and serial numbers, and review repair history while standing in front of the machine. They cannot see wash-dry-fold orders, reporting, or POS transactions. Attendants, by contrast, use four-digit PINs and cannot log in remotely — that distinction keeps clock-ins honest while still giving your facilities team the mobile access they actually need.
Who first launched a laundromat repair ticket system, and have other POS companies copied it?
Wash Dry Fold POS launched the first laundromat-specific repair ticket system on September 24, 2021. It was built by Sean Henderson, who was the operations and facilities manager across all three Liberty Laundry stores in Tulsa before joining Wash Dry Fold POS as a developer. Since then, other laundry POS companies have released their own versions of the feature. In Ian’s words on the podcast, those are vastly inferior versions — not because the concept is hard to copy, but because none of them have had four-plus years of feedback from thousands of real operators driving improvements. The triage column, the technician role, the minimum description requirement, the unlisted equipment category — none of those exist in a first-year clone. They come from operators like Hope Dewlin and Trevor at Liberty Laundry asking for exactly what they needed.
Ian Gollahon
CEO & Co-Founder, Wash-Dry-Fold POS®
Ian Gollahon is co-founder of Wash-Dry-Fold POS, a laundromat point-of-sale system built from the operating experience of laundromat owners, and co-owner of Liberty Laundry in Tulsa, Oklahoma. His commentary here draws on more than a decade of operator and customer conversations about laundromat maintenance and repair ticketing, attendant workflows, machine downtime and equipment replacement decisions.
Full episode transcript
Ian Gollahon 00:10
Hello and welcome to Laundromat Ownership. I'm your host Ian Gollahon Me and my business partner, Brian Henderson, own three laundromats in the Tulsa, Oklahoma area. In 2025, laundromats did about 2.5 million in revenue, top line. But we're also the founders of Wash Dry Full POS, which is the laundromats. And today we have on a very special guest,
Brian Henderson's brother, Sean Henderson. Hey Sean, thanks for joining us. So the reason I wanted to have Sean on today is because there is a lot of buzz around a software that as far as I am aware, Sean was the original creator of certainly this latest generation of this software. And it is essentially this repair ticket.
Sean Henderson 00:39
Buddy. Thanks.
Ian Gollahon 01:05
Tracking software. And what I mean by that is you have a washer or dryer that has an issue. So then a laundromat attendant could put in a repair ticket describing the issue. And then if you have a facilities guy, he'll get an email about it. If you're the facilities guy, which is probably most of our listeners, then you get an email about it. But it really does kind of solve the problem of
this has been out for weeks and I didn't even know about it or where are the parts? Did we order the parts? It really just tracks and centralizes all that information. And we've had that now for quite some time, but other people are, you know, kind of catching on and making their own versions. And so I wanted to talk to Sean a little bit about the, the inception of this and Sean, can you tell me kind of in your own words, what was the problem you were trying to solve? Cause you were managing Liberty laundry at the time, right?
Sean Henderson 01:58
Yeah, yeah, so I was spread across three stores as a operations manager and part of my duties there was also for facilities and equipment maintenance and all that. I was Mr. Fix-It in the company, three stores. It was a very frustrating experience walking into the laundromat, one of the laundromats in the morning.
And there's a machine flagged out of service and if I'm lucky I get a post-it note on the desk. If I'm even luckier I get something more than it no work good or something like that you know and then you know and then if I'm even luckier beyond that I recognize their handwriting because they didn't write their name on it so I don't even know who to talk to about it.
Ian Gollahon 02:33
That sounds right.
Sean Henderson 02:45
And it just it ticked me off because it kept happening and it was just week after week after week months and then also when I'd know what I needed to get for a part or for equipment all that I needed to hunt for all the info for the machine itself, you know, sometimes
you know, for newer machines, I'd be able to check on the inside of the door and there's the model and serial, or I'd have to climb to the back of the machine in like a tiny little crawl space to look at a sticker for a model and serial number. And I was getting sick of that too. And it's just like, need all that right now. So I just, I needed some sort of communication tool. That was one of the big things, first and foremost. I need something better than a post-it note.
Ian Gollahon 03:23
You
Sean Henderson 03:40
When I came on board for Wash-Dry-Fold POS. I was champion at the bit, like I've got a first big project. Like I know how we can really expand Wash-Dry-Fold POS into more of a laundromat management tool than just a point of sale over the counter.
Ian Gollahon 03:59
Yeah. Now that makes a
ton of sense and that is pretty consistent probably with what most laundromat.
Owners have experienced with communication with their attendance. It's like, yeah, that one's broke. How long has it been broke? I don't know. Maybe two weeks. What's wrong with it? I don't know. It doesn't get hot or something. And it's just like.
Sean Henderson 04:09
Or lack thereof, yeah.
Uh-huh.
At Liberty Laundry, we had a paper-filled binder that we kept notes and dates of when we fixed stuff and what we fixed it with. And that worked okay. But it was these giant paper binders and they were at, and we had three stores and each one of them's at the store itself.
And then I'm over at HQ and I have this faint inkling that that washer did the same thing a month ago and then again a few months ago and then again a few months but I don't know for sure. So now I have to drive half an hour back over around town to look at that log to then confirm so that way I know the part and then I gotta go find the model in Syria. Anyway, you get where I'm going with this. It's just such a headache. Anyway.
Ian Gollahon 05:04
No, that's, yeah. No,
I think what you're bringing up is actually something I've been dealing with a lot recently, which is the whoever you bought your washers and dryers from, they come over and they charge you the trip charge, which is like,
Sean Henderson 05:21
Right.
Ian Gollahon 05:22
You know, 200, 300 bucks or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. And they take a look at it and they say it's broken and, then, you know, we're going to order a part. Okay. Well, did you order that same part last year for that machine? For me, it's become a tool to, yeah, for me, it's become a tool to make sure they're not overcharging us for like, you know, are they going to do a trip charge and then another trip charge when they
Sean Henderson 05:24
Nowadays, yeah.
Yeah, warranty stuff, yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 05:45
You know, cause like if, you're doing a trip charge, just to diagnose the problem, I don't need that. Right. I already know that I already know it doesn't work. I'm telling you to fix it. Right. And so, with Liberty Laundry is just making sure we don't get overcharged for everything,
Sean Henderson 05:54
Yeah.
Ian Gollahon 05:59
Nowadays it's any of the laundromat attendants can submit the ticket, which is great because then that gives all that info to Trevor, who's our facilities manager. And then he's able to actually keep track of what parts have been ordered through the distributor. And if it's same machine and all that, and he'll make those notes in the repair, a ticket tracker. When I'm actually looking.
Sean Henderson 06:10
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 06:24
At that machine I can see actually this should be covered under warranty and we've had the same issue before and do we need to fix something else so it doesn't keep on having the same problem. So I think yeah, it solves the attendant communication problem.
Sean Henderson 06:29
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, because they're already at the point of sale using the point of sale, you know? And they're logged in and they've got their username there. So if they just submit a ticket, then that automatically slaps their name on it so that we know who to talk to if we need more info. That, yeah, that makes it way easier there.
Ian Gollahon 06:56
That's such a good point, yeah.
Because you don't really want to have to teach every employee you have like six different softwares. And so if this were right, if it were its own standalone software, I'm not sure that that would work because then you've got a login that they have to do. They've got to remember how to use it. And I mean, as silly as it sounds with laundromat attendance,
Sean Henderson 07:08
Centralized.
You're putting
a higher expectation of like, I guess, not just computer literacy, but specifically like, yeah. Your average Joe is wanting something that's just there. I click a button and you use it, you know? They're not going to be wanting to go to 20 different programs. They're not a programmer or developer
Ian Gollahon 07:48
I think part of that too that people don't even think about, but you and I think about because we meet every week together on product meetings and all that. Even just having consistency in the software, there's the green save button, there's the red cancel button, and it's in the same place. And this part works like the rest of the software and all that.
Sean Henderson 08:10
We try
to keep thematically the same,
Ian Gollahon 08:12
That's right. So if they know how to use the rest of it, they know how to do a support ticket. And so you're not having to teach them a separate software with a separate login. And to your point, they already have to enter their pin when they're doing, yeah, when they're doing anything on the software. They're already essentially logged in. They already have that.
Sean Henderson 08:16
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, it's integrated.
Yeah, literally the first thing you have to do when you go to the repairs section of WashRy 4.0 POS is enter your PIN. And there it is. 100%.
Another thing that's nice about having this communication tool beyond just what I had before, which was nothing, is requiring them to put in a little bit more letters. I forget the number of characters that you have to put in to be able to hit the submit, but it's just enough more to have to write more than it doesn't work. Like, yeah.
Ian Gollahon 09:00
That's right.
That's right.
I remember that. I remember that because I think I was going to fool around and put in a sample ticket. I was like, it doesn't work. And it's like, I need more info. Can you please be specific about what is not working? You explain how did the problem come about? Just give us a sentence, please, about what is not working so that we're not having to go do all this work on it. Yeah.
Sean Henderson 09:15
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I
had a of explainer text on there that says, please describe any sights, sounds, and or smells. Just like we need all the info.
Ian Gollahon 09:47
It's so late.
I'm not trying to pick on, you know, someone who's trying to build this software from scratch. The, motivation for this episode in the first place was, okay, why wouldn't you build it from scratch? Well, one of the things is not only do you have, you know, Liberty laundry being one of the top performing chain of laundromats and in the world, not only was it built there,
for an operation at scale. But then it was built back in what, 2020, 2021? I mean, it was built a long time ago and we have hundreds and hundreds of laundromats that use it every day. And so we've improved it every month or two or whatever, however often we update it. We improve it regularly. And so there's just little things like, well,
Sean Henderson 10:18
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 10:37
Why would you, you know, require more than a hundred characters or maybe it's maybe 25 characters or something like that? Well, because if you don't require that, people will just say it's broken and you need more information. And so even just having something as simple as asking them what you want from them and then requiring that they actually give you a decent amount of info. I mean, that's something that isn't really a software limitation. That's really just a design thing that you won't know unless you've tried to use it.
At scale with hundreds of stores over several years. So I actually think that is pretty on point for what we're discussing. I did have a question that kind of goes along with this about why is it important to have it as the same software as the point of sale software? And one of the things I remember Brian talking about when we were interviewing with Alliance on the Laundry Nerd podcast, he was talking about
Sean Henderson 11:10
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 11:36
Well, what's so cool is we already have all the washers and the dryers listed with their serial numbers and the names and all that in the software. And so when we integrated with Alliance, it was easy because you didn't have to recreate that map. But I guess my question is then what about the reverse of that? What if you already have a new store with quantum machines and then instead of kind of building that list with serial numbers like you typically would for like
Sean Henderson 11:58
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 12:03
Let's say it's an old Dexter store and you've got old Dexter machines. Well, there's no way for us to just pull that list. But with the new Speed Queen API, are we able to just create a list of washers and dryers from just pulling it from the Alliance Insights program? And then that becomes kind of your starter list for the machine repair tracker? It a little different from that? Yes, exactly. Yeah.
Sean Henderson 12:26
For the, like on the equipment setup side of it.
I don't see why, I mean, yeah, I mean, the way that we have the setup for the machine start integration, it starts by us pulling a list of washers and dryers from Alliance. And then we're matching that up with the ones that we've already created in Wash, Dry, Fold, POS.
Ian Gollahon 12:46
Right.
Sean Henderson 12:51
So essentially it would be like, like an Alliance equipment setup wizard is essentially what it would be.
Ian Gollahon 12:56
I think that makes a lot of sense. And if there were other manufacturers that wanted to do that as well, I mean, we would be happy. We work with everyone. So,
Sean Henderson 13:04
Goodness yeah, I would
love that. I want Wash-Dry-Fold POS to talk to everyone. That would be awesome.
Ian Gollahon 13:08
Exactly, exactly.
And then just pull in all that stuff for the machine repair. I mean, that just saves time. It's not like it's hard to do now, but it would be just even faster when it is actually importing the serial numbers because part of what this repair ticket system is, is the ability to go and look at all the details on which washer is it? What size is it? All the when did you buy it? What's the history of the problem with the history of that piece of equipment? Has it had any problems?
Sean Henderson 13:13
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Right. On the equipment itself. Yeah.
Ian Gollahon 13:37
Another thing that people don't think about, but they tend to get really excited about when I tell them about this was, well, yeah, it also works for your vending machines because I know those are always breaking too. And the sliding doors, I know those break all the time too. What about the bill breakers? And so was that something you thought of right from the beginning of like, I'm just going to put everything that breaks in the laundromat on the repair ticket tracker, not just the washers and dryers, or did that get added later? Okay.
Sean Henderson 13:49
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
No, it was from the beginning. Was based. The thought was any installed equipment that you're wanting to track that sort of stuff like vending machines was the big one for me. Like we had, operated our own vending machines in the laundromat and then just coming in and then having to diagnose, was I'm, I'm more of a washer and dryer guy than I am a vending machine guy. Let's put it that way.
Ian Gollahon 14:07
Okay.
Yeah.
Right.
Sean Henderson 14:34
So having that, so even on the equipment setup page, having those just like a washer or dryer just as another piece of equipment, it won't show up on like machine starts or anything like that. The only place that those kind of other equipment pieces show up is the repairs page to be able to select it for a history, to keep a history of it in the system.
Ian Gollahon 15:00
That makes sense.
Sean Henderson 15:02
Also beyond that, I know that there's just there's always weird stuff you can't account for anything and it seems kind of silly to Enter in a piece of equipment and wash dry full POS for like say the toilet So that way you can put in a repair ticket when the toilet is clogged or some weird like that So I also have like a miscellaneous catch-all at the very end of it. It's like okay if the if the
If the issue is too weird, you know, falls outside of any of the equipment we have listed, select that and tell us more.
Ian Gollahon 15:37
That's cool. So it's like a one-time
use. Like if you only want to have the toilet and the repair trucker once, you can use it once. I didn't even know we had that. OK.
Sean Henderson 15:41
Yes. Right. Think, yeah,
unlisted slash miscellaneous, I think is what the option is.
Ian Gollahon 15:50
Makes a lot of sense for it to live in the place where the equipment already lives, especially for other reasons. And as we get deeper into the integrations, you already need those, that list of washers and dryers anyway, like even if you have like a fast card or laundry card system and you're gonna start them from the point of sale system.
It's like, that's already where that list lives. And so why not just then extend that functionality into the order tracker system. And it sounds like something, you know, I've even had, and this is a credit to you, just to give you your, your flowers here. But I have had people buy our system and then I'll talk to them a month or two later and just be like, how are things going with the system? How are you liking it? And they're like, you didn't even tell me about this machine repairs functionalities. Like I would have bought that.
Sean Henderson 16:11
Yeah.
Ian Gollahon 16:39
I would have paid, you know, the subscription costs just for that feature. I wouldn't even, you know, you could just hold me just that, like all the point of sale and all, which is funny because we're definitely like a point of sale. It's Wash-Dry-Fold POS, right? And so it's, you know, we're not, the machine, repair tracker software, but I mean, we kind of are because that we were the first to kind of come out with it. And then, I think we've, we've improved it the most. And in fact,
Sean Henderson 16:46
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Yeah, yeah.
Ian Gollahon 17:07
The second motivation I had for this podcast episode, was Trevor sent Brian and I a video that was him just talking about how excited he was about the new. There's like a column that is essentially in service or out of service. And so it might have a problem, but it's still in service.
Sean Henderson 17:25
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 17:29
But if it has a problem and it's out of service, then you can kind of sort it by the top of the list. And I think that was did hope recommend that who thought of that?
Sean Henderson 17:32
Mm-hmm.
It was Hope and a few other people as well. I'm off the top of my head. Yeah, Hope Doolin down in Florida. She's awesome.
Ian Gollahon 17:51
Well, she really is.
And it makes the most sense because she's got 30 laundromats. So if you've got 30 laundromats worth of machinery, like there's going to be a lot of broken machines, but you want to be able to focus on the ones that are actually out of order and not able to.
Sean Henderson 17:55
Yeah
Mm-hmm. So it's another…
Yeah,
so that's another thing that we discovered from actually having it implemented and then getting that feedback is that having that just little bit of extra detail is super valuable for technicians to be able to triage for like the urgency of an issue. It's like, well, if it's still in service, I'll get to it next time I'm there. But if it's like a big problem and then the attendant is able to communicate, like I had to flag it out of service and it's one of our two big 80 pound washers on a Sunday, our busiest day.
Ian Gollahon 18:25
That's right.
Sean Henderson 18:37
I gotta go in now. So it's super helpful.
Ian Gollahon 18:38
Yeah. No, that's, I mean, that's so
different from like, there's a small machine that squeaks when you run it. That's a support, you know, that's a machine repair ticket and you do need to fix that squeaking, but it's not your 80 pounder being out of service, which actually impacts your revenue. And so the ability to, yeah, to triage that, think, I mean, it makes sense now that we've already built it and people have requested it at, but at the time it was like, why would you, why would you even need that? So I think.
Sean Henderson 18:46
Yeah.
Right. Right.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 19:07
I think that kind of goes back to, yeah, go ahead.
Sean Henderson 19:07
Yeah,
at the time it didn't make sense to do that because the idea was, well I can…
I can see that it's out of service. Like there's a take on it. I need to know what's wrong with it. So it just wasn't a priority for me in the first version that was built for it. But then after that, what we noticed and what some of these folks were telling us is that the problem was that their attendance were just writing for the description. I put it out of service. And it's like, okay, so we need to have some way to be able to communicate that that isn't communicating the problem. Or yeah, you know what I mean?
Ian Gollahon 19:26
Right?
Right,
yeah, because if that's already a toggle, then like, okay, it's out of service, but then describe what is actually wrong with the machine, please.
Sean Henderson 19:47
Yeah, yeah, you get what I'm saying. Yeah. What's happening?
Depending on what role you are in the software. So like for technicians and admins and managers, like you don't need to go to the submit a new repair ticket form every single time. You're the one actually fixing it. So it just automatically takes you to the list. Whereas if you're an attendant or a lower, then it's gonna take you to the submission first. You can go to either, but it's just more convenient.
Ian Gollahon 20:11
Right.
Well, I think that is probably one of the last things to cover is the permission levels of it where, yeah, you the technician role. That's what I was gonna say, Right.
Sean Henderson 20:24
Oh, the technician role, yeah. That was another thing that we added on because,
I mean, for the guy that's actually fixing it, it's not convenient to have to traipse over to the point of sale computer and shove the attendant out of the way to be able to log in what you did to fix it, right? So we made a technician role for the employees to be able to go for just the tech, right? So you…
Ian Gollahon 20:40
Yes.
Sean Henderson 20:52
Enter in the tech info, you set them up with some login credentials, like an email and password, okay? And also, you probably want to toggle on the receive repair ticket emails option. And then…
Ian Gollahon 21:04
Yep.
Sean Henderson 21:07
That allows them to be able to log into the software from their mobile device. And a technician role is able to really only, when they're logged in with their own credentials, really only able to go to a couple of places, which is the equipment setup page to be able to get all that machine info and the repairs page. I mean, that's it. And that's what they need. And they're able to go in and keep their history, get their info that they need.
Ian Gollahon 21:23
Yeah.
Sean Henderson 21:33
You know, update the ticket status, all that stuff. And anytime a repair ticket status is updated, that gives another email. If you're an admin that's set up for a return of ticket emails, that's a communication tool for the tech to tell you that they fixed it.
Ian Gollahon 21:46
Right.
And that's what we do with Trevor is he's just fixing stuff, ordering parts, talking to the distributor and all that. And he just takes all that off our plate and we just get the emails of, Hey, this is what's being done. Yeah.
Sean Henderson 21:51
Mm-hmm.
And as the owner, don't
need to be called constantly to be told that you fixed it. It's like, I'll see at the end of the day, there it is in my emails that, hey, you fixed that, hey, you fixed that. Awesome. Way to go, Trevor.
Ian Gollahon 22:09
Exactly,
Trevor gets the most shout outs of anyone on the,
Sean Henderson 22:14
He's great, I love him. He's my guy. It's
so funny that he recorded a little video just basically just showering me and Cole with praise. He's so sweet. Because he loves it. He's a facilities manager, you know, and maintenance. That kind message echoed what I actually get a lot at like…
At previous clean shows and stuff like that where I'll have the people that actually fix the machines, like once they hear that I made the repairs page, they're like, you get it. And that feels so good. They're like, yeah, the technicians are the real ones, you know? They get it.
Ian Gollahon 22:43
You
I knew a drink. Yeah.
Was so funny how people were like, well, it's simple software, right? You just like, you accept, you need to be able to sell some soap over the counter and wash, dry, fold. And it's like, that is like 1 % of what the software is. And like when we were talking about like
Sean Henderson 23:02
Yes. Well, yeah.
Ian Gollahon 23:10
Well, why would you need a technician role? Well, if every employee were able to log in from their phone, they would also be able to clock in from their phone. And so you wouldn't be able to, yeah. So you wouldn't be able to necessarily tell if they were there in the building or not. And so just the regular staff member doesn't have their own log into the software because you don't necessarily want them on their phones with your software. They just have the four digit pin. But then for the technician,
Sean Henderson 23:21
Potentially.
No.
Ian Gollahon 23:40
He actually does need to log into the software, but then what he doesn't need is the ability to do, you know, wash, dry, fold orders or see reporting and stuff like that.
Sean Henderson 23:48
I just thought of a very
a very strange analog. Okay, if I can put it into a metaphor, there we go So the admin and manager login credentials are like the keys to the store itself It unlocks the front door to allows the attendance inside the store The attendant pin is like their signature, right? They're signing their work. That's how we know who's doing what? So if we were to follow that metaphor simile
Ian Gollahon 23:53
Sure.
Right, right, right. That's Mm-hmm.
Sean Henderson 24:18
Then the technician login credentials is like a key, but only to the mechanical room. Yeah.
Ian Gollahon 24:27
That's right. It's like they've got their own little rent entrance into the.
Yep. No, I mean, you know, how would you do that if you were making your own standalone software a but then also be it's not as simple as people think it is. And then it sounds really simple until you actually start using it and you realize that the needs for every role and the needs for every feature within the, you know, the laundromat management software that we have kind of become, you know, beyond just
Sean Henderson 24:54
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 24:57
Point of sale piece of it. Actually, it all does get pretty sophisticated as far as not just functionality, but permission levels, then UI, and user interface for those who don't talk about UI all the time.
Sean Henderson 25:12
It's
been an interesting maturation process for the software.
Ian Gollahon 25:21
Let's get into how we're gonna
vibe code a version of it in three days and how it's gonna work just perfectly.
Sean Henderson 25:25
You right. Uh huh.
Ian Gollahon 25:29
Well, awesome. And I really appreciate you coming and getting on the show and telling us all about this feature that you built, but not only has been so good that it's added a lot of value to our company, but there have been multiple copycats now. And there's other companies that now have some version, some vastly inferior version of this software.
I'm kidding, but maybe not. Mean, if they haven't had it as long as we have and they haven't made as many improvements as we have, obviously it's not gonna be quite as good. And that is the problem when you try and do something that someone else has been doing for quite some time. It's hard to catch up to them sometimes. But anything else that you think we should cover or talk about the repair ticket system? Mean…
Sean Henderson 26:10
Mm-hmm.
A pair tickets paid? I don't know. It's just… I think that it is important for Wash Dry Full POS that we are people that actually have industry experience, you know? I've been…
In the trenches, so to speak. The washer and dryer, the washer trenches, know, the drainage trenches, that's what I mean. Yeah, I've been in the trenches. Right, and so I get it. And so a lot of the stuff that we've built initially and continue to build.
Ian Gollahon 26:43
Right, right, right, right. Yeah, you've been in the actual trenches, Yeah, yeah, under the bulkheads, yeah.
Sean Henderson 26:55
Is because of Liberty Laundry, stuff that we actually need. It's practical, you know? And being able to expand that based on what other people are using it for and their suggestions, adding to it as well, it's just, it's so cool. It's so much fun to be a developer in that way.
Ian Gollahon 26:58
Yep.
Well, and that really is, I mean, I listened to a lot of business podcasts where they're always talking about your moat, you know, how's your business defensible? And, and it's like, yeah, with vibe coding, maybe the software becomes easier to clone or easier to mimic. But what is the real moat? Well, the moat is we've got many years and thousands of, users that then give us feedback and help us improve, you know,
Sean Henderson 27:21
Mm.
Hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 27:41
Week over week. And of course we have multiple developers on staff now that are, that are doing that and that are improving. And it's based on the living breathing organism that is the Wash-Dry-Fold POS customer user base, all the stores that use our equipment and our software.
It's all now kind of working together as a, as a larger picture and just kind of gets better over time based on real feedback from for real launch mat owners. And that's, that's a hard thing to clone because how do you just go and get, you know, 20 % of the total addressable market for, you know, for laundromat point of sale, it's, it's a hard thing to do. And so.
Sean Henderson 28:07
Mm-hmm.
Ian Gollahon 28:23
That kind of becomes the moat of the software to defend it. Anyway, Sean, thank you for joining us and for joining me and for sharing your wisdom with the listeners today.
Sean Henderson 28:30
Mm-hmm. My pleasure.
You're welcome. It's been my pleasure.
- Wash Dry Fold POS Machine Repair Tracking feature
- Wash Dry Fold POS Speed Queen integration
- Laundromat Employee Theft Prevention feature
- Laundromat Attendant Checklists feature
- Easy to Use, Easy to Train feature
- Wash Dry Fold POS Reporting feature
- Wash Dry Fold POS
- Liberty Laundry
- Laundromat Ownership Podcast