Like in a classic movie, the story is that of Mr. Angelo, born in 1940, who emigrated to America when he was still a boy. Here, in 1961, he opened his first shop in Illinois when he was still very young, and in five years he gathered all the necessary knowledge to relocate the business to his native Calabria, where the Mister Bruno Laundry Shop currently serves customers from all over the region. “Because we are doing more than washing the garments, we also restore them, by mastering all the available technology, and we return them as good as new”.
From Calabria to Illinois and back, but returning with suitcases full of winning ideas, very American, regarding the laundry. And in plus, an exquisitely Italian vocation for a work that we call “artisan”, made to perfection, and promotional ideas to overpass half a century of marketing.
That being said, would you like it as a movie title, “Mister Bruno”?
Doesn’t it sound catchy and relaxing like an old Italian comedy?
The right impressions, because having a conversation with Mr. Angelo Bruno, from Marano Marchesato, Calabria, where he was born on the 2nd of January 1940, is same pleasant as like unrolling with your own eyes one of those films that are never getting old and that, indeed, the more time it passes, the more they “live” thanks to the humanity and the passion expressed by their frames.
The actual setting of the story is developing inside “Mister Bruno’s Laundry Shop”, in Marano Principato, in the province of Cosenza, where about twenty employees are treating the garments with all the solutions available in the 21st century in the textile care technology: guaranteed washing upon the needs, from perchlorine ethylene, hydrocarbons, wet cleaning, and ironing with high performance machines. This is where Mister Bruno’s story begins to unravel, from a laundry shop where its loyal customers from all over Calabria are always returning.
“It was the 1950’s when I was still a boy, and I have emigrated to the United States, because here you couldn’t find so much work “, begins to narrate Mr. Bruno. The destination turned out to be Chicago, a metropolis in Illinois among the most populated by Italian immigrants. “I started working as an apprentice tailor – continues the craftsman – and this type of activity allowed me to understand how much development were having in the United States the laundry services. So, in 1961 in Cicero, just outside of Chicago, after putting few dollars aside, I opened a pick-up and delivery shop, where I have brought my contribution with some of my own valuable tailoring work. And I called that shop Mr. Bruno.”
The first few years of business helped Mr. Angelo to understand one thing. “And that is – he explains – if in Illinois I did that job to buy a car and eat a good pizza on Saturday night, I could get the same things by moving the business to Italy. So, in 1966, at the age of 25, I opened a laundry shop in Cosenza, in Viale della Repubblica 121, fifty square meters of shop where I have started the business with only one employee”. “In reality – continues Mr. Bruno – they were difficult beginnings, because on one hand the shop was too small, and on the other hand it was necessary to convince the customers on the efficiency of certain ideas, which at that time were absolutely new: not only in Cosenza, but in the whole country”.
One of the solutions that I have learned in America, was the delivery of the washed and ironed garments. “I think I was the first one in Italy – says the entrepreneur – that replaced the classic dry-cleaning package, difficult to be carried and creasing the garments, with the hanger and cellophane which, as they teach you in the States, are preserving the perfect fold of the garment. I have been searching for a long time the right hanger manufacturer for me, and I finally found one, not right behind the house, but in Frosinone.
“The most important aspect – explains the owner of Laundries Mister Bruno – was the possibility of offering this type of service, and then to convince the customers that it was more appropriate to leave the laundry shop with hangers and no longer with packages, but this has never been a problem for me”.
Because if America is the home of the marketing, and Angelo Bruno is the prove of treasuring it during his apprenticeship in Chicago. “I have always invented advertising forms with the resources that I had at my disposal – he explains – for example by mounting a loudspeaker on the car I was driving around in Cosenza for making advertisement to my laundry shop. Then, I created the Mister Bruno company logo, a man wearing a tailcoat, that already appeared on the side wall of our first Garelli motorcycle”. Speaking about this van, Mr. Angelo is not missing to tell a nice anecdote: “As I was still young when I was driving it, I was often confused with a simple laundry driver, so I have gathered a hundred or two hundred liras of tip into my pockets”. The quality of service plus a good marketing can be translated as development, and this is exactly the trajectory followed by Mister Bruno’s Laundry Shop, which in 1970 multiplied its own spaces by moving to the nearby town of Rende, where there is a university campus, densely populated by students. The formula works good also here, “and it’s not difficult to understand why,” tells Angelo Bruno, “considering that we were a bit American regarding the communication and promotion, but at the same time, we provided our service with an all-Italian precision and care.
“We could say that we have always done restoration here, and not just a simple washing – reveals the craftsman – in the sense that, even if used for years, the garments treated by the Mister Bruno Laundry shop return as good as new to the customer. To realize this, it’s enough to see how we take care of a shirt, from the first soaping on the collar and up to the final ironing.” It is a work method that the owner has been able to pass on to his four children, each one having its own task in the family-run business shop.
This is the philosophy that explains the continuous growth of the company, that moved from its headquarters in Rende to the larger one in Mariano Marchesato, and up to the current one in Mariano Principato, even larger, and equipped with spaces dedicated to the important side activities, such as the rental of the roll towels and the soap dispensers. It’s true that our work is seasonal, more productive from May to December – emphasizes Angelo Bruno – but it’s also true that people come here looking for the quality guaranteed by Mister Bruno. Those who demand it, drive even a hundred kilometers to bring us their garments that we wash to perfection, and they are ready to pay that extra couple of euros that makes the difference. In the end we are all satisfied, us and the customer”.
It’s a really good movie, “Mister Bruno”. With a happy ending.
“Italian talent” – Published in the February 2022 issue of Detergo magazine.