My friends call me lazy.
Maybe I am.
For the past three years I have paid Lyme Road Laundry $125 per term to have my laundry picked up, washed, dried, folded and returned. I love my laundry service. I love putting my dirty clothes out in the hall with the knowledge that they will be ready to wear after lunch. Sometimes I even put clean clothes out to be picked up just so they will come back folded and neat and not on my floor.
I learned today that I will not be getting my laundry washed this year, at least not by Lyme Road Laundry. The "lazy" part of me is devastated, but this is not about my dirty clothes. Whether or not you are willing to shell out $125 per term to have your laundry done has nothing to do with the fact that Dartmouth College decided that this year you can't. In fact, Lyme Road Laundry can no longer even come onto Dartmouth property. E&R Laundry, Dartwash, has been given a monopoly.
Shocked, angered and increasingly anxious about the pile of clothes already on my floor, I called the Office of Residential Life to "ask" about what Lyme Road Laundry had just told me. I was transferred three times until I ended up speaking with the Emily Farnham, the fiscal officer of ORL. She confirmed Lyme Road's statement.
E&R has been given a monopoly, but it is not because this mega-laundry service based out of Manchester, New Hampshire is giving the College kickbacks. It has nothing to do with the curious fact that E&R bags are collected by ORL. It is because the College is concerned for our safety and has the "responsibility to prohibit solicitors" from walking the residence halls.
"Solicitors?" I asked. Is someone with whom I have a written contract to pick up my laundry soliciting me when they pick it up? "Maybe vendor is a better term," Farnham said.
Hmm ... So the College wants to protect us by issuing monopolistic contracts to certain "vendors" while threatening all competitors with lawsuit. It's the vendors who are endangering our well being as students. EBAs employs an eclectic group of deliverers. I enjoy regular conversations with many of them, but am I being threatened? Why is the College allowing this? Maybe Ramunto's should be the only pizza place allowed on campus. They could raise prices and offer limited service, but at least we would feel safer. Right?
Wrong.
What the College has done has very little to do with protection and a lot to do with politics and money. Farnham told me Lyme Road was "unable to handle the volume of business that all the students on campus require." This is true. Lyme Road Laundry, a local business, delivered to approximately 200 students last spring. They are not prepared to deliver to more than this while still providing the detailed service they do.
Contrarily, E&R would be happy to wash everyone's clothes. They are a Manchester-based company serving many institutions in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. E&R washes clothes on a three-day cycle: pick up Monday, drop off Thursday. I ordered E&R at registration as a freshman, and a bag of my laundry was ruined; a "problem dryer," I was told. But these are only reasons I would personally discourage you from ordering E&R's service.
The real issue is that the Dartmouth College has both decided that you do not have the right to choose the laundry service best suited to you and carelessly taken more than 50 percent of a local company's business and sent it to Manchester.
This is an insult to our intelligence as students and to the Hanover community. Do not accept it. Call the Office of Residential Life and tell them how you feel. Or call your dean. Call President Wright. Stand up! Fight to keep Dartmouth more an institution of higher learning and less a power-hungry, money-making scheme.
