Richard Thum liked to quip that his biggest worry as owner of Five Star Cleaners was if customers suddenly joined a nudist colony.
“As long as people are going to work and getting their clothes cleaned, man, we were kind of insulated” from trouble, Thum said.
“We never had any problems until …,” Thum added, without mentioning COVID-19 by name. “Who ever thought you would never have to go to work? That you could do it remotely and do it on Zoom?”
This year was shaping up to be the best ever for Five Star Cleaners based on January and February results, but business has dropped off significantly since then. The dry-cleaning business has 14 stores, primarily on San Antonio’s North Side.
The decline has been so precipitous that Richard, 64 and “60-something” wife Sharlene, president and vice president of SA Five Star Cleaners, say they may have to close some of their stores if business doesn’t eventually pick up.
Richard Thum landed in the public eye four years ago after going to the FBI to report a fraud at a San Antonio oil field services company that bought and sold frac sand. The Thums had invested $1.4 million with FourWinds Logsitics. The case led to several criminal convictions and the imprisonment of some, including former state Sen. Carlos Uresti.
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The Thums recently discussed how they got into the dry-cleaning business, how the pandemic has changed it and their role in taking down a longtime local politician. Here’s an edited transcript of the interview.
Q: Was it happenstance that you got into the dry-cleaning business?
R.T.: Yeah, kind of. I graduated from the University of Southern California, and I was working for a real estate brokerage firm in Beverly Hills. That’s when the prime interest rate was, like, 22 percent. You couldn’t make the numbers work (in real estate). So then we tried to look for some type of business. My brother had a (dry-cleaning) store up in the Plano area. (Richard went to help his brother. While there, an uncle died and Richard attended the funeral in San Antonio. During the trip, he got the idea to start a dry-cleaning business in San Antonio.)
S.T.: Two punk kids, just had gotten married, 21 and 24. And so we moved down here and started our first store on Northwest Military Highway (in 1981). That was it.
Q: Your stores are clustered on the North Side between Loops 410 and 1604. Is there a reason for that?
S.T.: Got to go where the people who do the dry-cleaning are.
Q: How many employees do you have?
S.T.: 96 employees.
Q: Who’s the boss?
S.T.: The dog (the couple have a Shih Tzu named Brutus who accompanies them to their flagship store on Huebner Road). Both of us. We work really well together.
Q: What do you each do in the business?
S.T.: I do all the work, and he goes and plays — let’s get down to brass tacks here. Right now, we’ve got no maintenance person because he’s ill, so Richard does all the maintenance.
R.T.: I negotiate the leases (for the stores). We work together on employee problems or concerns, staffing, all that kind of stuff.
S.T.: It just comes so natural. It’s hard to say exactly what we do. It’s just the day-to-day business. Going around checking on the stores, checking on the quality. These days we do Zoom calls with our managers.
Q: I suspect there may be more than a few people who would say they wouldn’t be married if they had to work with a spouse. What’s it like working with your spouse?
S.T.: We’ve heard that a lot.
Q: So what’s it like?
S.T.: We’ve done it for so long.
R.T.: It’s second nature for us.
Q: Do you bring your work home with you?
S.T.: Sometimes, yeah. We eat, drink and sleep dry-cleaning.
R.T.: It’s a lot of responsibility.
S.T.: It’s not a business where you can just turn it off.
R.T.: You can’t put this on autopilot. No way. You’re dealing with very expensive garments. People don’t bring their rags to get dry-cleaned. They bring their best clothes, so you want to make sure that it’s done right. For that one reason, you’ve never seen a national franchise of dry cleaners, because it can’t be done. Why? It’s such a personalized business.
Q: What do you like best about working in the dry-cleaning business?
S.T.: I don’t have to keep inventory.
R.T.: There’s a satisfaction in knowing that you’re providing a service to the customer that makes them feel successful.
Q: What do you like least about the business?
S.T.: The hours and the heat.
Q: What’s the biggest change in your business since you started?
R.T.: Environmental laws.
S.T.: Big time. It used to be so easy.
Q: We’re about five months into the pandemic. How has your business changed?
R.T.: When people don’t go to work, they don’t have to get their clothes cleaned.
S.T.: They’re not going to work, they’re not going to any activities whatsoever.
R.T.: Weddings, Spurs, fundraisers.
S.T.: Dinner parties. Anything and everything. That’s where we get the dry-cleaning clothes. We’re still getting some work in but nothing (like before the pandemic).
Q: On a percentage basis, how much is business off?
R.T.: 30 to 40 percent.
S.T.: And it’s better now than when it first dropped (at the beginning of the pandemic).
Q: Why is it better now?
R.T.: People are starting to go to work.
S.T.: When they first said, “Stay at home, don’t come out,” gosh, man, it dropped. Shoot, we were doing 20 percent of our work that first month. … We went ahead and really started pushing our route deliveries. Of course, a lot of our stores have drive-thrus, so many people use those.
R.T.: We’re in a national cost group. It’s dry cleaners all over the country. … I would say the average dry cleaner is down 50 percent.
Q: Other than deliveries, is any part of your business up? Are you dry-cleaning more bedspreads, for instance?
S.T.: Yes. It’s more of the sanitizing of things. It’s the bedspreads. It’s the blankets.
Q: Will you have to close store stores if people don’t return to work and business doesn’t pick up?
S.T.: That’s on the table.
R.T.: If you don’t have the volume, you can’t keep on paying on the rent, and the utilities and labor, and so forth and so on. Our business is not going to improve until people go back to work.
Q: You were defrauded in the FourWinds Logistics scheme. Carlos Uresti, the former state senator, and others went to federal prison largely because Richard alerted the FBI to the fraud. What’s your takeaway from that episode in your life?
R.T.: Investors beware. After doing all of your due diligence and crossing the “t’s” and dotting the “i’s,” and you think it’s a legitimate investment, you could still be swindled. I don’t know what more we could have done to vet that investment.
Q: You lost most of the $1.4 million you invested with FourWinds. What were your plans for that money?
R.T.: Expansion and for the opportunity to be able to improve the business. To be able to buy, i.e., new equipment. There was a lot of opportunity that we missed because of that.
Q: The defendants in the case were ordered to pay about $6.3 million in restitution to investors. Have you gotten any of your money back?
R.T.: I think, altogether — don’t hold me to it — but probably around $650,000, $700,000.
Patrick Danner Patrick Danner covers banking, insurance, business litigation and bankruptcies. To read more from Patrick, become a subscriber. pdanner@express-news.net | Twitter: @AlamoPD
The Link LonkAugust 13, 2020 at 06:00PM
https://www.expressnews.com/sa-inc/article/COVID-19-shakes-up-San-Antonio-couple-s-15479717.php
COVID-19 shakes up San Antonio couple’s dry-cleaning business - San Antonio Express-News
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