Because there was a water shortage, my sister-in-law opted to bring the clothes for laundry at the newly opened laundry shop owned by our friend. It was an exciting day for us because she newly opened that business and finally, she is not a bored housewife at home. 1 kilo of the clothes costs 170 pesos or 3.5$. The color of her shop is blue namely HoneySweet Laundry Shop. When we arrived, there were tons of laundry to be washed that were displayed on the floor, meaning, she has a lot of customers. At first, I was skeptical that she entered that kind of business because the shop has only a few neighbors. I thought she would have a few customers, but I was wrong. The shop has already old clients. Mostly of them are foreigners. I realized that if a business has a good service, the old customers keep coming back and they recommend it to their friends. Sometimes, it doesn’t matter if the area has only a few residents, because it is the customers who look for the shop. But when you enter in this kind of business, where there are only a few people that lived in the area, it is risky. There is no certainty how much is the daily profit. What you need to do is to provide a better service than the other shops.

Our friend’s name is Bevs and we call her ate Bevs. According to her, she assumed this laundry shop for only 300,000 pesos (6,000$). Fortunately, she earns 7,000 (120$) pesos a day, sometimes 8,000 (137$). But it is not the same. These days that we have a water shortage in the entire Butuan City, she earns 15,000 pesos (240$) because people cannot wash the clothes as there is no water. To many of us who don’t have a laundry shop, it’s really struggling, but for her, it is their advantage. Even if she only has two machines, she still has many customers.

Aside from a laundry shop, she also has a store where anyone can buy beverages and water, foods, medicines, soaps and conditioner, shampoo, candies, wipes, milk, coffee, diapers, ointments, pills, can goods, school supplies, wine and liquors, alcohol, tissues and toys. However, she wants to stop selling all these so she can focus on laundry.

Ate Bevs was busy to name tag of each laundry basket. She uses a paper tape and pen so she can identify who owns it. The 2 loads below are owned by my sister-in-law. Later, she separates the white color from the colorful clothes if there is any. She also separates the blankets and underwear (if there is any). Well, my sister-in-law looked at her laundry basket repeatedly while we were at home to find out if there were underwears because she chose to just wash those at home. Well, it’s really embarrassing to add an underwear in the basket and let other people wash it. It reminds me of our neighbors who has a laundry shop just beside our house. There was an underwear included in the basket. Her workers were backbiting the customer that brought that laundry and laughed at her underwear. Maybe it was only an accident that the customer added the underwear, or maybe she didn’t know it was added because she was rushing to her work, but the workers are very Marites (people who loves to chitchat all day instead of working, those who spread fake news and meddle about other people’s lives).

In the picture is Ate Bev’s niece whom her worker. Her task is to fold the clothes all day long. For her, it’s an easy job because while sitting down, her arms are moving. If it was me in her job, maybe I can just work half of the day because I have a backache. Anyhow, she gets her monthly wage from her aunt about 10,000 pesos (200$). That’s just small for ate Bebvs compare to what she earns daily. Example, if she earns 150$ each day, her monthly earning is 3,606.61$.

In the picture is my sister-in-law who carried my baby. The woman in pink shirt is ate Bevs. They were laughing when ate Bevs joked how hard it was for her to speak English while talking to her foreigner customers. She said she was nosebleeding (a Filipino slang language that means at difficulty of speaking and understanding English) because Bisaya and Tagalog are her vernacular. Now that she’s a businesswoman, she is practicing to speak it most of the times. She graduated a 4- years degree of Cooking, but it is common in the Philippines that even graduated in college, some of them cannot speak English fluently. So, we just laughed while she continued sharing her moment with her customers.

When the laundry is done, they should fold them properly and put in a white plastic with their names. There are the clothes that were done, so they put in in the shelves. According to her, some customers with own vehicles prefer to get it after 7-24 hours. Some customers chose to be delivered it to their homes. It is also her advantage because she has a car she can use to deliver it door-to-door.

Ate Bevs put a doubled powder in a laundry because she wants the clothes to be more fragrant. After the powder, she puts a conditioner on clothes because the scent of the powder would just fade after wearing the clothes for many hours of sweating. However , conditioner and powder aren’t enough. When they fold the clothes finely, they also apply a fragrant spray. No wonder why their customers keep coming back because they make sure that the clothes are washed and perfumed perfectly.

As I am sharing her business story, I am dreaming to have my own laundry shop soon. I’m not hoping for a grandiose life with an abundant money as long as I have a financial freedom, have an enough savings for my little one, can provide her personal needs and can give her a good future. How about you, do you wish to enter a business world soon?

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Thank you amazing friends @olivia08, @diosarich and @antonette.Thank you @justinparke for your kindness and delegation. Thank you @asean.hive for your unfading support. Love love all the way!