Dry cleaner calculator: how many pieces a month do you need to break even? Free, private

How many pieces a month does your dry cleaner need to break even, and what price rise would fix a loss?

Enter your monthly dry-clean and laundered pieces, prices, supplies per piece, claims and card fees, labor, rent and loan payments. You get monthly operating profit, contribution per piece, break-even pieces, the average price change that reaches zero, debt coverage, and what price or volume moves do to profit.

It works from your own figures. It does not know your market's prices, your route density or whether customers stay after a price change.

Volume and price

Dry-clean pieces per month

Average dry-clean price per piece, $

Laundered shirts and other wet-clean pieces per month

Average price per laundered piece, $

Solvent, chemicals, poly and hangers per piece, $

Damage claims and re-cleans, % of revenue

Sales paid by card, %

Card fee, % of the sale

Labor, fixed costs and loan

Paid labor hours per month

Average hourly wage, $

Payroll burden, % (taxes, workers' comp)

Rent per month, $

Utilities (gas, power, water) per month, $

Insurance per month, $

Equipment lease or maintenance per month, $

Pickup and delivery route cost per month, $

Other fixed cost per month, $ (permits, waste disposal, software)

Loan payments per month, $ (principal and interest)

Fill in your pieces, prices, labor hours and wage, then click Work out the plant. Everything else defaults to zero.

Result

If your average price moves

Change per piece	Profit after loan, per month

If pieces move

Change in pieces	Profit after loan, per month

What it does, and what it leaves to you

Contribution: revenue (pieces × price, for dry-clean and laundered pieces) less supplies per piece, claims and re-cleans as a share of revenue, and card fees on the card share of sales.
Costs: labor hours × wage × (1 + burden), plus the fixed costs you enter, held fixed when volume moves. Loan payments come after operating profit; debt coverage is operating profit ÷ loan payments.
Break-even pieces: labor, fixed costs and loan payments divided by contribution, applied to your current mix of pieces.
Price change: an equal change on every piece, with claims and card fees following revenue. Customers' reaction is not modelled.
Not decided: what your market will pay; solvent, waste, air-permit and environmental rules; lease terms; lender terms and thresholds; whether volume holds; and tax.

Common questions

How much profit does a dry cleaner make?

It depends on volume, price per piece, labor and rent, so the page works from your own figures rather than an industry average: revenue less supplies, claims and card fees is contribution, and labor and fixed costs come out of that.

How many pieces does a dry cleaner need to break even?

Contribution scales with volume while labor, rent and loan payments mostly do not. The page divides those fixed costs by your contribution to show the volume multiple at which profit after loan payments is zero, and the equivalent pieces a month at your current mix.

How much should a dry cleaner raise prices?

The page shows the average increase per piece, across everything you clean, that would bring profit after loan payments to zero at your current volume, and a table of profit at several price changes. It does not predict whether customers stay.

What is debt service coverage when buying a dry cleaner?

Operating profit before loan payments divided by loan payments. Lenders set their own minimum, commonly above 1.25 times; the page shows your ratio and leaves the threshold to your lender.

Is my data uploaded anywhere?

No. Everything is calculated in your browser and nothing is sent; a test in the code asserts there are no network calls.