Roosevelt Island Women Charged More For Shirt Cleaning Than Men At Valet & Riverwalk Cleaners - But Not The Main Street Dry Cleaner

Image of Man's & Woman's Shirt From NY Times

A Manhattan Park resident was upset to find out that Valet Cleaners charges more for having a woman's shirt washed and ironed than a similar man's shirt. The issue was raised on the Manhattan Park Google Group:

I just tried to set up an account at Valet Cleaners in 30 River Rd, and found out they discriminate against women! They charge $1.50 to wash and iron a man's short sleeve white shirt, but charge $4.50 to wash and iron a woman's short sleeve white shirt!!!!

Isn't this illegal?!?! Even though it's farther away, I'll just stick with Roosevelt Island Cleaners on Main St. They charge the same price for men's and women's shirts. Maybe a boycott is in order. Has this happened to anyone else, or just me?

I spoke with the Riverwalk Cleaners and they told me the same thing that they charge more for cleaning a woman's shirts than for the equivalent man's shirt. The NY Times had an article about this.

For women across New York City and beyond, it basically amounts to being taken to the cleaners. Women’s shirts often cost much more to launder than men’s, even if they are smaller and made of the same cloth....

and explained the difference in pricing from the Cleaners perspective:

... Asked to explain the price discrepancy, several launderers cited the size and shape of their industrial pressing machines. They were built for men’s shirts, they said, explaining that the smaller, tapered women’s garments were often ill-fitted for the big, manly presses or were otherwise too delicate. That meant hand-pressing, which is more labor-intensive.

“They won’t fit the machine; they would rip,” said a woman at Alpian’s Garment Care in Midtown East, where it costs $9 to launder a woman’s shirt, $2.75 a man’s...

A second Manhattan Park resident reported:

I never noticed that problem, as I live alone, however I had another problem with Valet Cleaners.

I had a business meeting and had a suit cleaned for that meeting. I [told] the man there I needed it by 4:00PM in 2 days. He promised to have it delivered to me by 2:00.PM.

I could not find the man in Valet Cleaners, nor my suit, unitl 5:00 PM the day it was promised, after my business meeting. The man had nothing to say and he had collected the money from me before hand. I am sorry, but in America business is just not acceptable that way.

Another resident wrote:

We also had terrible, terrible experiences with them. My wife left her jacket to be cleaned and they shrunk it! What kind of laundry professional is that? Also, did you know they use the machines in the building? You have to compete with them during the day to get your laundry done. And they use a lot of machines! Just absurd. Don't use them. The one at Riverwalk is way superior.

and a suggestion for an off Island cleaner:

If you have the opportunity to get off the island, I use a cleaners in Queens on 21st St and Broadway. They are great I have no complaints. Broadway Cleaners. I have been using them for a few years now. I started off using Valet Cleaners and I thought they were ripping us off.

The Dryclean's Blog explains the Cleaner's perspective:

Why are women's blouses more expensive to clean than men's business shirts?

The reason cleaners charge more for women’s blouses than men’s business shirts is because they are passing along their increased cost of production to their customers. Depending on the cleaner’s equipment, it costs them between three and four times the labor expense to properly “finish” a women’s blouse compared to a men’s shirt. Here’s why…

The biggest production cost for a cleaner is their labor expense, the money they pay their employees. Most of their labor goes into the “finishing” of a garment. Finishing is a combination of machine pressing and hand ironing. Most garments require a combination of machine pressing and hand ironing to achieve the desired finish. Many cleaners have special “assembly line style” machines that can finish the typical men’s business shirts without any hand ironing. These machines greatly reduce the time and labor needed to finish a shirt compared to a women’s blouse which sometimes requires as much as 100% hand ironing to achieve the proper finish. Depending on their equipment and the skill of the presser, most cleaners can finish three to four men’s business shirts in the same time it takes to finish one women’s blouse...

You Tube Video On How To Press A Shirt

Does that explanation resolve the issue?