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Laundromat outreach is becoming more and more popular. Small churches like yours are heading to their local laundromats to offer laundry products, coins, and conversation to patrons making their once-a-week laundry run.
Laundromats are often a place where community members gather. People do their laundry, have conversations, share snacks, and develop friendships on various levels. People talk about the day’s news, what’s happening in their community, and their families. These businesses are places where strangers can become friends as they talk about the weather, their lives, and what’s happening in their world. Planning your next outreach at a laundromat is a step beyond a collection drive and allows your congregation to meet people face-to-face.
Great Outreach Idea For All-Church Ministry
Laundromat outreaches are a time for your congregation to make connections and hear the stories of those you are helping. Small church volunteers can hear first-hand about the blessing you give as you pay for the laundry expenses for the single parent, the young family, or the older adult.
This post contains several ideas your small church can take and develop to fit your town or community outreach. Consider your volunteers and choose ideas that best fit your church culture.
How To Plan A Laundry Outreach
Before you start planning, identify your purpose. A Laundry outreach can have several different purposes. What is yours?
- Meet financial needs
- Increase church presence as a community partner
- Show the love of Jesus
- To get to know those in your local community
- Develop relationships with a few local neighbors
- Gift as many as you can by paying for their laundry
Decide On The Purpose Of Your Event
Decide on your purpose. Everything you do for this outreach should revolve around your purpose. Understanding the purpose of an outreach or event can help your team evaluate the level of success of your outreach.
Choose Your Location & Time
If this is your first laundromat outreach, the best start is to set it up as a one-time event. Then, after you evaluate your outreach, your group can decide if they’d like to do it repeat it quarterly, monthly, or once a year.
When thinking about times, do some reconnaissance. Drive past the laundromat at different times and days so you can better understand when to plan your outreach. See who goes to the laundromat on Monday evenings. How is that crowd different from the Saturday morning group?
Your purpose and frequency can help you determine the date and time for your outreach event.
For example, if you intend to develop relationships with a few local neighbors and have one or two volunteers from your church to go to the laundromat, choose a less busy time during a weekday.
However, if the goal is to bless as many families as possible on a once-a-year event, set your outreach at a reasonably busy time. This can relieve the awkwardness of your team in the laundromat with just one or two customers who may or may not want to engage with you. Setting your outreach at a busy time gives you more people and a better chance to make connections.
Consider choosing a two or three-hour window. This can give you time to reach more people than in a one-hour timeframe. Also, it allows you to start building relationships and enjoy some conversations. Often, Saturdays can be busy days. Think about 11 am – 2 pm, or 6 pm – 8 pm.
Choose Your Small Church Laundromat Outreach Date
Set your date far enough out in advance to give your church time to collect the funds you need for your outreach. Consider the entire event when you plan for fundraising.
Check the cost per load of laundry at the laundromat. Include any extras in your fundraising plan, such as filling washers with detergent, giving dryer sheets, or offering water bottles and snacks.
What Does Your Laundry Outreach Look Like?
The following ideas can all work well in planning a laundromat outreach. Again, think about the personality of your community when making plans. If your target outreach is at a time where you mostly reach senior adults, they probably would appreciate help carrying in and taking out laundry baskets. If you do your outreach and the clientele is mostly men, they may not respond as well to someone else bringing in their laundry from their car or truck.
Start Conversations With Those You See
Greet people when you are at the laundromat and let them know you and your friends came to the laundromat to give people a smile for their day by paying for their laundry machines.
People love to share their stories, just like in the Coins & Conversation idea. When you start conversations, begin with general, small-talk questions and comments. This gives people time to get to know you before they share personal information with you.
Easy Outreach Discussion Starter Ideas
- Are any of these machines better than others?
- I love your nails.
- Your kids are really well-behaved. How many children do you have?
- I can’t believe it’s going to be 80 degrees again today.
- We brought butter cookies. Would you like some?
- That’s an interesting tattoo. What does it mean to you?
- I love your shirt. They’re one of my favorite bands.
- How’s your week going?
- Do you have any weekend plans?
- Even though laundry is a chore, I like not having to think about the dishes when I’m here.
- Have you been here before?
When having conversations, being all-in with the person you are talking to can show they are important to you. You want the patrons to feel valued. Relationships can often start with a smile and conversation. You may be the best thing that happens to a stranger at the laundromat. You don’t always know the true impact and encouragement you give to someone.
Put Quarters in Washers & Dryers
Go to the laundromat with LOTS of quarters. Although some laundromats do have change machines, be considerate not to empty the machine for your outreach event. If you run out of quarters, it’s okay to use the change machines but don’t let their machine be your only source of quarters.
Putting quarters in washers and dryers is the main portion of your outreach. Giving quarters and starting conversations with the patrons are often the only components in many small church laundry outreach events.
Practice ahead of time the phrase, “Hi. Can I put the quarters in and pay for your laundry? No catch, we just want to show some kindness today.”
Be Helpful To Carry Laundry Baskets
If you have strong people on your team who can carry in laundry baskets, wait outside and offer to help people pulling into the parking area. “Can I help you carry that?”
Of course, some will take you up on it and gladly receive help. Others may be slower to warm up to your kindness and let you know they can handle it on their own.
You may find more will accept your help carrying clean laundry to their cars. They had a chance to get to know and even trust you over the past hour they’ve talked with or watched you in the laundromat.
Offer Free Detergent & Dryer Sheets
Some small churches bring jugs or pods of laundry detergent with them on their outreaches. Offer to pour in the detergent or give them a pod or two (or three for an extra large load) to toss into their washing machines.
Offer dryer sheets when people flip their laundry. Consider making dryer sheet baggies. Put two dryer sheets into each baggie. Give these to patrons you’ve been talking with if you need to leave the laundromat before they switch their laundry.
If someone doesn’t want to use your free detergent or dryer sheets, take it in stride. They may be allergic to different scents. Or they may have a preference for detergent for other reasons.
Pass Out Snacks & Water To Customers
Almost everyone loves snacks. Bring little baggies of chocolate chip cookies, popcorn, or cut veggies. Offer snack-sized bags of chips, pre-packaged snacks, or cheese sticks. Offer water bottles.
Bringing food to share adds another element of caring. Most people stay at the laundromat while their clothes are washed and dried. This means most people hang out in a small building for at least two hours with little to do unless they bring a book or something to work on.
Snacks and conversation are a great win for laundromat outreaches.
Hand Out Laundry Supply Bags
For a totally different take on a laundry outreach event, pass out laundry gift bags. Each gift bag could contain one baggie with two laundry detergent pods, one baggie with two dryer sheets, and one baggie with $4 in quarters.
Put sets of one of each into grocery bags or mini gift bags. Pass out bags to patrons once they get in the building and have a chance to put down the laundry they are carrying
Bring Coloring Books & Crayons For Children
It can be hard for children to spend hours at the laundromat without their backyard or indoor toys. Bring small toys or fidget toys to give away. If the laundromat has a table or area where children can color, bring coloring books and small packs of crayons to give.
Reminder: Always first talk with parents and ask permission to give their children toys, books, crayons, or snacks. If you feel more comfortable, you can give the children’s things to the parents, saying, “We brought these in case any children were here.”
How To Fund A Laundry Outreach
- Place a clean laundry jug on a table in the foyer or welcome area and ask people to toss in extra change.
- Collect used coffee or tea cups. Ask congregation members or take a cup and fill it with loose change. Bring the cup in next month or sooner if you fill it up.
- Ask local businesses for donations of $10, $20, or $50.
- Take up a special offering.
- Build laundry outreach into the church budget.
Show Support For Your Local Laundromat
It’s always great when we support local businesses in the community. Your support can mean a lot to local businesses, both small and big.
Laundromats are privately owned businesses that open their doors to the public. Think about your outreach as if you were going to a local bakery, bookstore, or gas station.
- Be respectful.
- Don’t leave literature lying around.
- Only pass out church or religious literature if someone asks for it.
- If someone doesn’t want to engage in conversation, respect their choice.
- Don’t leave a mess. Leave the laundromat looking better than when you arrived.
- Feel free to bring your own laundry to do while you’re there. This can help people feel you are more approachable.
Start Planning Your Local Laundromat Outreach
A laundromat outreach is easy to plan and can be done with any size group, from 1 to several. Effective outreach isn’t about how many people do the outreach. It’s about building relationships. Always recognize the value of impacting just one life. There were many times Jesus ministered to the one.
Enlist a friend to help you plan. Identify your purpose. Choose the event details and start planning your laundromat outreach.
When you are at the laundromat, watch to see what doors God opens in conversation and in starting friendships with others in your community.
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