Chinese hand laundries once dominated the personal laundry business. The work was physical and monotonous: washing, boiling, pressing, packaging and delivering clothes. The rooms were cramped, hot and steamy. Laundrymen often worked 18-hour days, seven days a week. They earned little money and many owners were forced to live in the back of their laundries. Business was made more challenging when onerous laws were introduced that specifically targeted these small operations. Eventually, white-owned laundries catered to the lucrative, high-volume washing for hotels and restaurants, while Chinese laundromats focused on personal laundry services.
華人經營的手洗洗衣店曾一度稱霸本地的家居洗衣行業。洗衣工作十分消耗體力而且工序單調：洗滌、蒸烘、熨壓、包裝，以及運送。洗衣店內的環境狹小逼窄、充滿蒸氣，又濕又熱。工人每週需工作七天，每天十八小時。由於經營洗衣店的利潤不大，很多店主只好居住在店鋪的後方。隨著政府引入煩瑣的法規針對這些小本經營，洗衣業的生意變得雪上加霜。最後白人經營的洗衣店改為主攻洗衣量大和利潤可觀的酒店及餐飲業客戶，而由華人經營的洗衣店則集中服務家居客戶。
