by There is a cleaning show that can be found just behind an unmarked door in a corner of the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
This is the home of Kingbridge’s huge new cleaning facility, which opened in January 2020. It’s where a fastidious and very labor-intensive process takes place, which Avilés believes is necessary for clothes to be properly cleaned.
He learned the trade when he was five, when his mother, Victoria, who still helps run the decades-old family business, dressed him in a suit and took him to work on Saturdays. He offered his customers hot chocolate in the winter and lemonade in the summer, and soon learned to iron shirts himself.
Today, workers pile dirty shirts—unworthy with their discolored collars, chipped buttons, and sweat stains—into a huge bin to manually sort them by color and condition. They then put them in a dry or wet cleaning machine, or clean them by hand if the situation is serious.
Each garment is then inspected to ensure it does not need a second cleaning. If all is well, the workers put the shirts into a loudly humming dryer, installed next to giant extractors that channel the steam. If the machine detects a risk of shrinkage, it will stop abruptly and open the door to let in cooler air.
Then, an employee and a machine work together to ensure that the collar of each shirt is pressed and the cuffs are pressed. The machine spins the shirts every few seconds, in a perfectly synchronized waltz. Hot air shoots through the sleeves of the shirt, giving the impression, for a few seconds, that it has come to life.
Two workers then inspect each garment and use planks suspended from ropes from the ceiling to correct any remaining folds. Another employee, known as a bagger, places plastic clips under the collar to keep it rigid, wraps the shirt around a hanger and then covers it with a garment cover, which Aviles hopes customers keep on to prevent dust from collecting.
None of that is cheap.
Professional laundry maintenance was one of the first things to go away when the pandemic hit and most New Yorkers were suddenly sequestered in their apartments. Virtually overnight, Kingbridge Cleaners & Tailors saw its business plummet, falling 93 per cent from the previous year.
Avilés did not receive a salary for about two years, when practically the entire industry closed. Kingbridge sales are still about 15 percent lower than in 2019, he said, as many office workers spend at least part of the week in sweatshirts instead of suits.
Running a cleaning business in 2023, he said, means that “even though we’re not making money, if we can break even, then we’ll stay ahead.”
You try to maintain that optimism even when a customer complains about a stubborn stain and grant them a discount or refund.
You see cleaners around you go out of business because they keep their prices the same for years and lose too much money too quickly. Still, Avilés has been careful not to raise his prices too much: A laundered shirt costs the customer about 10 percent more today than before the pandemic.
For Avilés, it’s easy to feel nostalgic for the days when New York workers visited their cleaners once a week or more. You know that money is tight and that keeping clothes perfectly clean and ironed is not always a top priority. But he wants his neighbors to know that it’s worth it to keep their closets fresh.
“It’s less expensive to maintain your wardrobe and do it properly,” she said, “than it is to go out and buy disposable fashion.”
Produced by Eden Weingart, Andrew Hinderaker and Dagny Salas. Development by Gabriel Gianordoli and Aliza Aufrichtig.
