Atlanta-based dry-cleaning startup Presso says it has recently closed deals several major movie studios including Netflix, HBO, Apple TV, Fox, Disney, Hulu, and Shudder to handle the cleaning of costumes during productions.
According to the company, which was started by two Purdue University students, their machines can clean, disinfect, and dry up to 150 costumes a day. One machine installed on the set of a major production can save a costume department over $1,000 per day in dry cleaning costs, and reduces production delays often encountered with third party dry cleaning services.
The company said they had to turn down some customers due to limited production capacity and are using a new round of funding to boost manufacturing and operations to scale the service to all movie and TV productions in the U.S. as they reopen in 2021.
Presso is aggressively hiring and tripled its office space to make room for all the new hires.
“We are hiring in all domains of the company, software, hardware, business, and operations,” said Presso co-founder and chief technology officer Thibault Corens. “To meet customer demands and parallely build out our robotics team is going to be the main focus for 2021.”
While Presso currently has its sights set on the movie industry, the company says it hasn’t forgotten about other key markets like apparel retailers and
hotels. “We’re excited to play an important role in helping other industries recover and providing new value to brick-and-mortar retailers, hotels, and conference venues,” said co-founder and CEO Nishant Jain.