The Side Hustle Show

725: How One Mom’s Laundry Side Hustle Turned into an $12M Business

34 snips
Feb 26, 2026
Susan Toft, founder of LaundryLady.com, turned a new-mom pain point into a global mobile laundry business. She talks about starting solo with van pickups, hiring contractors and building booking tech, landing a $1M Shark Tank investment, and expanding into new countries. Short, practical stories about scaling service operations and creating a recurring local business.
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INSIGHT

Cheap Ads Seeded Rapid Early Demand

  • Early digital advertising made customer acquisition trivial; Susan notes Google AdWords cost cents per click when she started.
  • That low-cost channel let a one-person operation find many customers fast, but operational capacity (a home washer) capped growth.
ADVICE

Put Booking Tech In Place Before Hiring Contractors

  • Do build an online booking system before scaling to contractors so you can automate bookings, payments, and multiple locations.
  • Susan used a grant to buy an off-the-shelf system, adapted it, and launched the contractor model once it handled core flows.
ADVICE

Recruit Contractors From Your Own Community

  • Recruit contractors from networks of people who share your target lifestyle — busy parents seeking flexible income.
  • Susan found initial laundry ladies via friends, Gumtree ads, and by appealing to mums wanting flexible work.
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