Emkay Dry Cleaners & Coin-Op Laundry

It takes three weeks or more to get a rug cleaned b/​c they send it up to the Canadian border. Bizarre. I’m sure you can get a rug cleaned in Albany, a few miles away. This is the only dry cleaner in the area (Chatham, Ghent, Kinderhook, Valatie) unless you want to schlep ½ hour to Hudson.

I’ve use the dry cleaner part a few times to have some suiting washed, but the hours are inconvenient for anyone who doesn’t work in the area, which is a large percentage of people by me (especially those of us who need things regularly dry cleaned). They’re closed when I leave for work (815) and closed when I drive past on my way home (about 530). I’d use them more often if they had better hours.

Today I visited this location for the second time in two weeks. I do laundry once a week and it’s not an unusually large amount as I am one person. The first time I visited I counted over 16 washing machines that were out of order. That was a major inconvenience and I had to wait for others clothes to finish washing to get a washer that wasn’t in use. After leaving that day I said I’d never return but since this location is near my home, I foolishly returned today. Upon arriving today my husband and I had to fight to find empty washers because there are still a large amount out of order. Once we put or clothes in the washers we attempted to get quarters but both machines were out of order and not dispensing quarters. We found a staff member who told us she didn’t have a key to the cash register to give us quarters. We removed our laundry and drove to Hudson and are currently washing our clothes in a very clean/​friendly and accommodating place. The staff at Emkay is never helpful and the customer service is awful. You have a small amount of machines that actually work, you can’t provide quarters and the place always smells musty and you call yourself a business? I will not return and hope that they improve on these things as it’s the only place in Valatie.

When I lived in Northern California, I had to wear dress clothes all the time… since returning to the Northeast, I have less need for dry cleaning, but I was shocked to find the nearest dry cleaner charging $ 2.25 for laundering a shirt (not to draw comparisons because there is higher volume in the Bay Area, but one place I went had .99 and the other had 1.29)…I called a friend and he referred to the dry cleaners as «rapacious harpies». I looked up the word rapacious and the word harpies and I had to agree. So I called around and Emkay does laundered shirts for $ 1.75. Not the cheapest, but I had 24 shirts to launder, which put my savings at 12 bucks.
I was very pleased at the customer service. They found something in my pocket and put it in a little sleeve for me. The shirts (and other dry cleaning) looks great and I am very happy. Emkay is a little out of my way, but I can plan my dry cleaning around trips farther afield.