Hang It Up

Everyone does laundry, some more than others.  I probably average a load a day for my family of five between my girls going through princess outfit after skirt after dress (rest assured most of those slightly worn clothes go right back in the dresser), the baby’s explosive bowel movements, and our workout regimens.  365 loads of laundry a year is a lot for my very inefficient washer/dryer set.

Water, electricity, detergent…oh, my!  Laundry costs do add up.  Let’s take a closer look at the dryer portion of the equation.  Figure out roughly how much you are spending on drying your clothes every year. Dryertips.com has an awesome article that helps determine how much of your cold, hard cash turns to fluffy, lint with each drying cycle.  You need three numbers:  amount of power consumed by dryer when running, kilowatt/hr price, and hours machine ran.  My household numbers respectively if I dried every load of laundry I washed:  5.4 KW, $0.074/KWH, and 365 hrs (at one hour of dry time per load).  Therefore, I would spend about $146 per year in dryer costs alone.

Cut your annual dryer bill in half by hanging up clothing such as pants, shorts, shirts, sweatshirts, etc.  I have a closet rod in the laundry room, or I hang them on the trim over doorways.  I also make use of my trusty drying rack.  In my house, I simply hang up the entire ‘dark’ load and sometimes partial ‘light’ loads if they have undershirts, tank tops, the kids’ sweatshirts, etc.  Benefits of hanging clothes include:  immediately cuts dryer bill in half, nominal amount of bending exercise (can be turned into your daily squat exercise) and in the winter, the damp clothes help humidify the air.  It is also better for the environment and will keep your clothes looking spiffy longer. 

After hanging up full and partial loads, I estimate I spend about $65 per year to dry my clothing…a savings of $81.  Don’t forget the other benefits, too!