Presto Drycleaners may have begun 30 years ago, but it continues to thrive under the second generation business owner Weitian Chan today. After leaving a tech start-up he co-founded to develop the family business, he remains on the constant lookout to see how he else can innovate and transform the business into a more digitally-savvy one that better caters to its target audience and their silver workforce.
In light of Presto Drycleaners’ participation in American Express’s Shop Small movement (an initiative to ignite passion for local businesses), we take some time to sit down with Weitian to talk about his unique childhood, the nature of growing a family business in an increasingly competitive and technologically-powered environment, as well as how the business of drycleaning changed pre-, during and post-pandemic.
Hello Weitian! Before we start the interview proper, how would you describe the Presto Drycleaners of today to someone from 10 years ago in 10 words?
Presto provides quality dry-cleaning to free you from laundry chores.
Now, you must have spent a lot of time there as a child with both your parents working in the same space. How did that shape your childhood and now as an adult taking over their business?
As a child, my parents pride themselves in keeping the house sparkling clean. Our floors were mopped after every meal. It was the iron clad rule in our house to keep things neat and tidy.
After school, the factory was my “after school childcare”. It was then that I was able to see first-hand my parents working together. There was conflict. But there were also times where they rely on each other.
Through these times, it gives me the confidence that I will be able to work with my wife, Cherie, in the business together.
Presto Drycleaners at Takashimaya.
What was your favourite memory of that time?
I appreciated the times when we went overseas for our yearly holiday. Family times was precious due to my parents’ involvement in the day-to-day operations of our laundry plant.
Overseas family trips were like business study missions. Every country we went, my parents would arrange for visits to learn from local established laundry players. We would visit their laundry plant, to observe their operations. My parents have always inculcated in me the value of learning and growth since young. This prompted our company to be first in Singapore to bring in an automated laundry sorting system.
Was this what led you to coming back to Presto Drycleaners after working in your start-up?
My parents live and breathe the business. Moreover, they are also involved in much of the operations, which is laborious in nature. As they are growing older, my sense of duty of giving back and relieving them of their duty was the main driver of joining the family business.
But once I was in the business for around 1-2 years, I loved the challenges of being an entrepreneur and the positive impact that I was able to contribute became the motivating factor.
Presto Drycleaners at Paragon.
Looking at your website, it seems like tech has been used to expedite everything from the way you communicate your services to the actual dry cleaning process. How did you know where to start including your experience from working in SMEs into the family business?
To begin our digitization journey, we started by using digital tools to measure and track metrics that we cared about. It is often said that you cannot track the impact of the change if you don’t measure before the change. Measuring before the start of the change gives us a baseline to compare to.
As we are a service provider, it is important for us to track our customer feedback using automated tools. Our team review these feedback on a regular basis, and we are able to measure our service performance over time.
Seeing that many of the team have been with the business since it started 20 years ago, how did you manage to convince them to accept the all the changes you wanted to implement?
Change is tough pill to swallow. But in small doses, it is more palatable. We started with small changes, quick wins. And once the team can see the positive impact that the change brought about, it becomes easier to implement future change.
COVID also helped expedite the change. Without COVID, there would have been much more resistance to change, as changing is a scary process. It is scary because we did not know if the change will bring about improvements or make things worse. But with COVID, the mindset became: “things are already bad, why not take the leap of faith and change?”
Presto Drycleaners at Kallang Leisure Park.
Then what about with your parents? How did they react to your plans?
They have been very supportive in general. Their reaction is definitely positive, sometimes bittersweet.
What about Presto Drycleaners are you most proud of? I heard you came up with an app just for your drivers and I think that’s really impressive.
Our people. Presto’s workforce’ average age is 55. Asking them to evolve with the changing needs of the business was not easy. But I am glad that they trusted me, learned the digital skills and embraced the change. With their support, we were able to introduce many new digital initiatives, which enabled them to be more efficient and effective in their areas of responsibilities.
The onset of the pandemic must have affected you guys quite a bit too. How did you guys pick yourselves up?
During COVID, Presto experienced a huge drop in our business volume due to work-from-home arrangements and the travel ban. As Presto has always been a brick-and-mortar focused dry cleaner, our retail arm was majorly affected. So to survive, we shifted our focus to 3 areas: Home pick-up, retail refresh, and social media.
As retail sales dropped due to the closure of physical stores, we had to pivot to Home Pick Up services. We developed a driver app so that jobs can be distributed to our drivers efficiently. And our customers can now book through multiple channels: our website, WhatsApp and online chat.
For our retail side, we took the opportunity to do a brand refresh and renovate our key Orchard outlets in Paragon and Takashimaya. We were able to consolidate our retail footprint. Although we had to close some outlets, we had the opportunity to open in other areas, such as Junction 8 in Bishan.
Finally, we launched our Instagram page: @presto_sg. We collaborated with numerous local fashion brands through our Presto Cleans Local initiatives – offering exclusive discounts and garment care tips.
Finally, what was your most played song on Spotify last year?
Blinding Lights by The Weeknd.
From now till 31 August 2022, American Express Cardholders who spend $10 or more at selected Presto outlets can receive $3 off. Once you’re done with this story, click here to catch up with our August 2022 issue!
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